Communications and Patient’s Care
To observe the performance of doctors in hospitals, often times patients are given surveys to rate how their treatment was. Shockingly, results shown that families with lower income generally have poorer performances. Some assumptions came up by people claiming that perhaps some doctors are biased to their patients and perform better for the richer people; however, that thought was discarded because there is no way of telling which doctors have that mindset. In addition, majority of the patients are changed into hospital gowns, which may make it harder to distinguish between rich and poor patients. Therefore, to dig deeper into finding out why does poor patients do not get the same care from doctors, the Massachusetts General Hospital in Boston raises the possibility, “do patients of higher socioeconomic status simply have an easier time communicating with doctors, and hence are more satisfied with their care than less-well-off people?”
Communication between the physicians and the patient play a huge part because with that communication, it helps the doctors make decisions and figure out how to help the patient. According to American Academy of Orthopaedic Surgeons, the benefits of effective communication is that “the patient and physician have developed a ‘partnership’ and the patient has been fully educated in the nature of his or her condition and the different methods to address the problem.” By forming this partnership, patients will have more of a say of what they want, which has shown more satisfactory. Studies by the American Academy of Orthopaedic Surgeons show that a more effective partnerships include doctors who are good listeners and the patient’s communication skills. Furthermore, with good communication between the doctors and patients, it will be made clear between the doctors and patients what to expect, the goals, and what is going on in the processes of the care.
Since communication has a huge influence on how well the doctors perform and how satisfied the patients are, it is a possible answer to why people from poorer backgrounds give lower ratings for doctors because there may be a gap between the patient and doctor. Gaps like a language barrier, lack of health literacy, and lack of communication skills are things that are common in people living in the lower social class and may cause difficulty for understanding between patients and doctors.