Communication during patient-provider encounters regarding diabetes self-management (original) (raw)

Managing Patient-centered Communication across the Type 2 Diabetes Illness Trajectory: A Grounded Practical Theory of Interactional Sensitivity

This article uses the theoretical and methodological framework of Grounded Practical Theory (GPT) to provide a lens for analyzing and interpreting discourse as a situated form of social action in routine Type 2 diabetes visits. Drawing on a total data-set of 400 audio-recorded routine visits, we randomly selected 55 visits for qualitative analysis. In this article, we use Conversation Analysis to document communication techniques, which we in turn use as evidence to ground our claims within the GPT framework. We use two single cases of interaction to analyze communication techniques physicians use when recommending a change from oral medication to insulin. We argue treatment intensification is a key moment in health communication to reflect about patient centeredness because physicians can find themselves in an interactional dilemma: while insulin may effectively help control unstable disease, an insulin recommendation may simultaneously counter patient values and treatment preferences. Our analysis suggests that physicians use what we call interactional sensitivity to balance medical need and patient preferences when making medical decisions by tailoring their communication according to the local situation and the patient’s larger illness trajectory. We propose that interactional sensitivity is a type of communication work and a quality of patient- centered communication characterized by the theoretical relationship between tailoring communication to the contingencies of the local interaction and the global illness trajectory. Overall, this article contributes to health communication scholarship by proposing a normative model for reflecting on how physicians negotiate challenging interactions with patients during routine chronic illness visits.

Barriers and facilitators to self-care communication during medical appointments in the United States for adults with type 2 diabetes

Chronic Illness, 2014

Objective: Diabetes self-care is challenging and requires effective patient-provider communication to achieve optimal treatment outcomes. This study explored perceptions of barriers and facilitators to diabetes self-care communication during medical appointments. Design: Qualitative study using in-depth interviews with a semistructured interview guide. Participants: Thirty-four patients with type 2 diabetes and 19 physicians who treat type 2 diabetes. Results: Physicians described some patients as reluctant to discuss their self-care behaviors primarily because of fear of being judged, guilt, and shame. Similarly, patients described reluctant communication resulting from fear of being judged and shame, particularly shame surrounding food intake and weight. Physicians and patients recommended trust, nonjudgmental acceptance, open/ honest communication, and providing patients hope for living with diabetes as important factors for improving self-care communication. Further, patients stressed the clinical benefits of physicians directly addressing poor self-care behaviors while physicians described having few strategies to address these difficulties. Conclusions: Physician-patient self-care communication barriers included patients' reluctance to discuss self-care behaviors and physicians' perceptions of few options to address this reluctance. Treatment recommendations stressed the importance of establishing trusting, nonjudgmental and open patient-provider communication for optimal diabetes treatment. Medical education is Chronic Illness 0(0) 1-11 Downloaded from stage] needed to improve physicians' strategies for addressing self-care communication during medical appointments.

Diabetes and the Motivated Patient: Understanding Perlocutionary Effect in Health Communication

Health Communication, 2016

Healthcare providers (HCP) understand the importance of keeping patients motivated but may be unaware how their words may have unintended negative effects upon their patient's lives. People with diabetes report being told by their HCP that they are "cured" or that they are praised for strides made in weight-loss and/or lowered blood glucose, and interpret these messages in unexpected ways. For this paper, we focus upon one case to illustrate the depth and nuance of the patient-provider communication as it emerged within a larger interview-based ethnographic study. Audio-recorded interviews and transcriptions were analyzed discursively. Discourse analysis reveals the ways ideology affects how the patient responds to HCP's utterances and how this affects diabetes self-care. Findings indicate significant perlocutionary effects upon health outcomes, varying both positively and/or negatively. This study points to the importance of carefully considering the power of words and whenever possible knowing the patient's ideological orientation to their world. HCPs should be explicit and deliberate with their communication. Sensitization to the various ways patients hear and react to messages in a clinical setting may lead to improved health outcomes, especially for those with chronic health conditions such as diabetes mellitus.

Self-management support in primary care: Enactments, disruptions, and conversational consequences

Social Science & Medicine, 2014

A common refrain in chronic disease management is that patients and clinicians need to enact new roles: patients as their own caregivers; clinicians as professional supporters of patient self-management activities. These roles are central to self-management support (SMS), an approach that emphasizes a clinical partnership, and promotes patient identification and achievement of realistic and short-term behavioral goals. With SMS, behavior change is the desired end, not the means to a desired biomedical end. Shifting SMS concepts into clinical practice has proven to be difficult and inconsistent, creating potential, unknown risks or harms to patients. We completed a discourse analysis of 16 clinical dialogues between diabetic patients and clinicians, collected during a study of six Ontario Family Health Teams, to explore the questions of risks and harms relating to SMS implementation. We observed varying degrees of incomplete implementation of SMS, as well as interactions that actively negated the core principles. Contrary to SMS principles, clinicians tended to emphasize behavioral changes as means to achieve biomedical ends, though to varying degrees. We present two appointments in detail, highlighting how linking behavior change closely with biomedical measures often elicited face-saving defenses from patients. The subsequent dialogue shifted attention away from problem solving and behavior change into active negotiation of responsibility and identity. Interactions that oriented more to SMS concepts elicited fewer defensive maneuvers from patients. Our analysis helps explicate one additional mechanism by which self-management talk threatens the clinical relationship, and highlights a promising method to mitigate this threat.

The Influence of Patient and Provider Communication on Diabetes Care Delivery

The Journal of ambulatory care management

To elicit the perspective of patients with type 2 diabetes, specific to communication with providers and health care teams. We conducted 21 focus groups with 115 adults in Midwestern primary care, endocrinology, and bariatric surgery clinics. Facilitators analyzed the transcripts using an iterative coding method. The themes of encouragement and motivation, relationship building, compassion, and communication preferences highlighted effective strategies consistent with the core components of patient-centered care. Patients and providers benefit from systems in which patients are efficiently and compassionately supported in self-management within their abilities and in partnership with their support networks.

The relative importance of physician communication, participatory decision making, and patient understanding in diabetes self-management

Journal of General Internal Medicine, 2002

OBJECTIVE: Patients’ self-management practices have substantial consequences on morbidity and mortality in diabetes. While the quality of patient-physician relations has been associated with improved health outcomes and functional status, little is known about the impact of different patient-physician interaction styles on patients’ diabetes self-management. This study assessed the influence of patients’ evaluation of their physicians’ participatory decision-making style, rating of physician communication, and reported understanding of diabetes self-care on their self-reported diabetes management. DESIGN: We surveyed 2,000 patients receiving diabetes care across 25 Veterans’ Affairs facilities. We measured patients’ evaluation of provider participatory decision making with a 4-item scale (Provider Participatory Decision-making Style [PDMstyle]; α=0.96), rating of providers’ communication with a 5-item scale (Provider Communication [PCOM]; α=0.93), understanding of diabetes self-care with an 8-item scale (α=0.90), and patients’ completion of diabetes self-care activities (self-management) in 5 domains (α=0.68). Using multivariable linear regression, we examined self-management with the independent associations of PDMstyle, PCOM, and Understanding. RESULTS: Sixty-six percent of the sample completed the surveys (N=1,314). Higher ratings in PDMstyle and PCOM were each associated with higher self-management assessments (PPP=.004). Understanding was strongly and independently associated with self-management (standardized β: 0.25; P CONCLUSION: For these patients, ratings of providers’ communication effectiveness were more important than a participatory decision-making style in predicting diabetes self-management. Reported understanding of self-care behaviors was highly predictive of and attenuated the effect of both PDMstyle and PCOM on self-management, raising the possibility that both provider styles enhance self-management through increased patient understanding or self-confidence.

Primary care visit preparation and communication for patients with poorly controlled diabetes: A qualitative study of patients and physicians

Primary care diabetes, 2016

The purpose of this study was to examine how patients with diabetes and their primary care physicians identify and discuss visit priorities prior to and during visits. We conducted a qualitative study involving patients with diabetes (4 focus groups, n=29) and primary care physicians (6 provider practice meeting discussions, n=67). Four key themes related to prioritization were identified: 1) the value of identifying visit priorities before the visit; 2) challenges to negotiating priorities during the time-limited visit; 3) the importance of "non-medical" priorities; and 4) the need for strategies to help patients prepare for visits. Both patients and physicians felt that identifying a concise list of key priorities in advance of the visit could help establish collaborative visit agendas and treatment plans. Identifying and communicating mutually agreed upon priorities for discussion is a key challenge for time-limited primary care visits. Communication between primary car...