Reflect on your own experiences consulting with health professionals in the past and consider communication styles you have experienced. What types of communication encouraged you or helped you the most? What types of communication discouraged you or made it difficult for you? What are some ideas for improving communication between health providers and patients?
The Learning Journal entry should be a minimum of 300 words and not more than 500 words. If you use an informational source, be sure to identify the source and share the link to the source you used.
When I was 6-7 years of age I had short tendons in my legs specifically my ankles which caused me to walk on my toes all the time and of course children were mean but what ya going to do. My parents took me to a specialist and after months of tests they offered me surgery, they said it would be painful, and I may have to be in a wheelchair for an indeterminate amount of time and use calipers, crutches and have physio. They must have been very descriptive and straight up to the point and by this point in my short life I had already spent a significant amount of time in hospital due to asthma. I elected to just suffer with the toe walking and I cannot remember another doctor being as honest as they were, but it was a hospital that specialized in care for children, perhaps I'm biased but I know they gave me a child of single digits what we call now, "Informed consent". Though I elected not to have the surgery I did feel safe in saying that and felt right not to have the surgery perhaps for selfish reasons. I cannot imagine now speaking to a doctor who would be fully disclosed as they were. I was also glad for once my parents let me decide my medical care as up until then it was the doctor is going to cause me pain and there is nothing I could do about it (Ogden, J, 2019) it was years later that I noticed I wasn't walking on my toes any more. Turns out it was very hilly where I lived and although I always felt the burn when walking up them but a little bit of pain daily as opposed to being debilitated and in constant pain for at least year was the better choice. Turns out my dad agreed with me simply because he didn't want me under anesthetic at such a young age.
The only really difficult time that I can remember is being gravely ill with asthma soon after, at that age most E.R. doctors do not really acknowledge you and just do their work whether its painful or not and it usually was painful. When your a child a discussion isn't usually had with the child or at least it felt like that and I had to have an I.V. stuck in my arm, 7 times because they were training a doctor and he just couldn't get it into my vein until an old nurse took over and did it in one. Could there have been a better way of doing it, well, it would have been painful either way, how much is the question (this leads into my discussion topic). When your dealing with kids and your a doctor I think I would have preferred they say its going to hurt and you may suffer but we need to do it to save your life, I don't know if that would have made a difference. This both comes under Emotional Response to Health Threat and Stage 2 (Ogden, J, 2019), it was worse for my parents, we live in a world where we can knock most people out with a pill or a small shot and that thought never occurred to them.
Brutal honesty is best way for dealing with children who you are about to inflict pain on, it was made worse by being surrounded by doctors and nurses causing me the pain and holding me down and constantly failing, in hindsight, "NURSE 1ST", every time.
Ogden, Jane, 2019 The Psychology of Health and Illness: An Open Access Course, Stage 3, Appraisal, Was my coping Strategy Effective, Emotional Response to Health Threat, Stage 2
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