The relationship between the doctor and the patient is the basis of medicine, the platform on which the treatment process is based. An indicator of professional presence is the ability to establish the necessary psychosocial contact with the patient. It depends on his ability to understand human beings, physical body and spiritual body, whether the patient will follow the proposed recommendations, and regularly take medications.
Only a doctor can set up rules with the patient for a positive outcome, make him believe in his strength and capabilities and create a healing environment. The professional qualities of the doctor are manifested in the ability to build the most acceptable relationship and environment with the patient based on the ethical, moral, clinical aspects of the doctor’s activities.
The Key Rules
With a smart, tactful word, it is possible to cheer up a person’s mood, instill in him courage and hope. At the same time, with a careless word one can deeply hurt the spiritual body, cause a sharp deterioration in human health. Based on this, the need arises for the obligatory possession of a professional presence, psychosocial support and the influence of a medical worker.
An important factor in healing is not only what to say, but how, why, where. It is necessary to consider how the respondent to whom the medical worker addresses will respond: the patient, his family, colleagues, and so on.
The same thought can be expressed in different ways. Moreover, patients can understand the same word in different ways, depending on their intellect, personal qualities, human beings, the spiritual body, and temperament. Not only words, but also intonation, facial expression, gestures are of great importance in a psychosocial environment of the patient, his relatives, and colleagues.
Medical specialists need to have a special “sensitivity to the person,” possess empathy and the ability to sympathize, put himself in the patient’s place. He should be able to understand the physical body of the patient and his family, be able to listen to the “soul” of the patient, calm and convince. We can say that this is a kind of art, and not easy. After all, it is not only the ability to social support but the need in self-discipline.
The Connection Between Communication and Healing
Every word of the medical staff can have tremendous psychotherapeutic meaning. An important role in the process of interaction between the medical worker and personality is played by the perception and understanding of human beings. It is worth paying attention to the fact that incompetence in communication, at least, on the one hand, can disrupt the entire therapeutic rules of healing, social support and not lead to the desired results.
The Samueli Institute is conducting numerous health studies on how medical personnel can influence the healing. Moreover, Samueli researchers are convinced that with proper treatment and understanding of psychology, it is possible to improve the environment and quality of life of a society. Samueli Institute offers training for medical staff in this direction, which is still quite popular today.
The nature of the reactions that arise in the system of the higher nervous activity of the patient directly depends on the doctor himself. The entire appearance of the doctor, his manner of staying with the sick, the tone of his conversation, his emotional state is a complex of stimuli with tremendous strength and significance, which are capable of causing a very strong psychosocial and emotional reaction on the part of the patient.
Mutual understanding between the doctor and the patient directly affects the effectiveness of treatment and healing as well as the correct diagnosis, and the full medical care provided. When communicating with the personality, especially during the first contact, the doctor should remember rules, be benevolent, with understanding refers to the experiences of the patient and physical body state. A personality who experiences physical and psycho discomfort from his condition does not have enough medical knowledge; it is difficult to find the strength to build a relationship with a doctor, cooperation, focus on the main thing, and the ability to separate the main and secondary. In this regard, it is the physician who should be the initiator of establishing trusting relationships, provide psychosocial support being able to listen to the patient, and express an understanding of what has been said.
Patient and Medical Worker Behavior
The behavior of a medical specialist with a patient depends on the characteristics of his psyche, which largely determines the so-called internal health.
It can be said that this is the awareness by the patient of his disease, the reflection in his consciousness of the disease, the holistic view of the patient about his disease, its psycho assessment of the subjective manifestations of the disease. These factors are directly influenced by the characteristics of the patient’s personality (temperament, type of higher nervous activity, character, intelligence, and so on).
The internal state of the patient is distinguished:
- sensual level, which implies painful feelings;
- emotional – the patient’s response to their pain;
- intellectual – knowledge of the disease and its assessment, the degree of awareness of the severity and consequences of the disease; attitude towards the disease, motivation for the return of health.
The sensual level is very important because it allows diagnosing the disease more accurately. The emotional level reflects the patient’s experiences diseases. Unfortunately, these emotions are always negative. Proceeding from this, the medical , as a rule, have to show sympathy, to be able to elevate the mood, and instill hope for a favorable end to the disease and in no case should be indifferent to the experiences.
The intellectual level depends on personality, intelligence and general cultural development of patients. It should be borne in mind that patients can know a lot about their disease (special literature, Internet). This case allows you to build your relationship with patients on the principles of partnership, without rejecting requests and information available to the patient.
People with fairly acute diseases have a lower intellectual level of mind awareness of the sheath. As a rule, they know very little, and this knowledge is very superficial. In such a case, the task of the worker is to the extent necessary and in view of the condition to fill the lack of knowledge about the disease, to make healing environment, to explain the essence of the disease, to tell about the upcoming treatment. In other words, to attract the personality to the joint fight against the disease, aim it at healing, and not at the opposite effect.
Knowledge of the intellectual level of the internal state of health allows defining the correct choice of treatment tactics, healing, and psychotherapy.
The rules of every medical professional are to manifest humanism, provide a healing environment, to assist the sick, provide social support and never participate in activities that are against physical and mental health. Responsibility for their actions, work and the quality of its performance in the activities of medical workers acquire special meaning in order to heal human. This is due to the fact that no profession has such close, concrete contact with the most important and secret for any person, namely, life and death. Specialists in this area confide in the life and health of people. It is worth remembering that they are responsible not only to the individual person, but also his family, environment, and society as a whole.
