Mastering Communication With Seriously Ill Patients

Physicians who care for patients with life-threatening illnesses face daunting communication challenges. Patients and family members can react to difficult news with sadness, distress, anger, or denial. This book defines the specific communication tasks involved in talking with patients with life-threatening illnesses and their families. Topics include delivering bad news, transition to palliative care, discussing goals of advance-care planning and do-not-resuscitate orders, existential and spiritual issues, family conferences, medical futility, and other conflicts at the end of life. Drs Anthony Back, Robert Arnold, and James Tulsky bring together empirical research as well as their own experience to provide a roadmap through difficult conversations about life-threatening issues. The book offers both a theoretical framework and practical conversational tools that the practising physician and clinician can use to improve communication skills, increase satisfaction, and protect themselves from burnout.

A practical guide to help clinicians communicate more effectively with seriously ill patients and their families about what matters most.

'The Textbook of Palliative Care Communication' is the authoritative text on communication in palliative care. Uniquely developed by an interdisciplinary editorial team to address an array of providers including physicians, nurses, social workers, and chaplains, it unites clinicians and academic researchers interested in the study of communication.

A handy guide to tackling difficult patient and professional interactions with confidence and compassion In this age of increasing reliance on technology, it is essential that the fundamentals of compassion and good communication—the art of patient care—remain at the heart of health care. This clear, concise guide to professional communication strategies helps nurses and other health care clinicians to build effective patient relationships and navigate a wide variety of difficult patient and professional interactions. Written by a practicing psychotherapist who has devoted nearly 30 years of study to clinician—patient relationships, the book tackles such complex issues as dealing with demanding patients, maintaining professional boundaries, overcoming biases and stereotypes, managing clinician emotions, communicating bad news, challenging a colleague’s clinical opinion, and other common scenarios. The book guides the reader through a conceptual framework for building effective relationships that is based on the principles of mindfulness. These principles are embedded in discussions of the fundamental elements of interpersonal effectiveness, such as hope, empathy, and listening. Chapters apply mindfulness principles to specific challenging situations with concrete examples that describe effective clinical behaviors as well as situations depicting pitfalls that may impede compassionate care. From a focus on everyday manners in difficult situations to beneficial approaches with challenging populations, the guide helps health care professionals confidently resolve common problems. Brief, to-the-point chapters help clinicians channel their clinical knowledge and good intentions into caring behaviors that allow the patient to more fully experience empathy and compassion. With the guiding theme of “using words as precision instruments,” this is a resource that will be referred to again and again. Key Features: • Helps health care professionals and nurses communicate effectively in challenging clinical and professional situations • Uses the principles of mindfulness to build satisfying relationships and resolve problems • Addresses such difficult issues as demanding patients, maintaining boundaries, overcoming biases, managing clinician emotions, and much more • Provides special tips for communicating with family members and caregivers • Authored by a practicing psychotherapist specializing in clinician—patient relationships for nearly 30 years

For readers of Being Mortal and Modern Death, an ICU and Palliative Care specialist offers a framework for a better way to exit life that will change our medical culture at the deepest level In medical school, no one teaches you how to let a patient die. Jessica Zitter became a doctor because she wanted to be a hero. She elected to specialize in critical care—to become an ICU physician—and imagined herself swooping in to rescue patients from the brink of death. But then during her first code she found herself cracking the ribs of a patient so old and frail it was unimaginable he would ever come back to life. She began to question her choice. Extreme Measures charts Zitter’s journey from wanting to be one kind of hero to becoming another—a doctor who prioritizes the patient’s values and preferences in an environment where the default choice is the extreme use of technology. In our current medical culture, the old and the ill are put on what she terms the End-of-Life Conveyor belt. They are intubated, catheterized, and even shelved away in care facilities to suffer their final days alone, confused, and often in pain. In her work Zitter has learned what patients fear more than death itself: the prospect of dying badly. She builds bridges between patients and caregivers, formulates plans to allay patients’ pain and anxiety, and enlists the support of loved ones so that life can end well, even beautifully. Filled with rich patient stories that make a compelling medical narrative, Extreme Measures enlarges the national conversation as it thoughtfully and compassionately examines an experience that defines being human.

Diagnosed with dementia in 1997, my husband, Jim, lived at home during his illness and died there in January 2006. I wish this story were fiction, but it is not. Dignifying Dementia is both a love story and an attempt to reach out to others who are living through or who will live through a similar tragedy. It is written in the hope that others might benefit from what I learned as the caregiver of a dementia victim. Only then will Jim's cruel affliction serve some purpose, because it might help others feel less lonely, bewildered, angry or frustrated than I did, shorten the dreadful learning c.

One of the most important requirements of leadership is effective communication. The idea that some people are natural leaders and that others will never learn to show good leadership is now outdated. It has been replaced by the conviction that leadership and communication skills can be learnt. Providing a thorough introduction to skilled interpersonal communication, Communication in Organizations consists of three parts. Part I introduces basic communication skills, and makes a distinction between regulating skills, listening skills and sender skills. Part II considers a number of different dialogues: the interview used to gather information, the selection interview, the employment interview, the performance evaluation interview, the personal problems interview, handling complaints, breaking bad news, and the sales interview. Part III is dedicated to conversations in more complex group situations, discussing decision making, conflict management, negotiations and giving presentations. Practical examples and concrete conversations are used to give students and professionals straight-forward advice on key leadership skills, including motivating people, delegating tasks, leading meetings and overseeing projects. This book will appeal to undergraduate and postgraduate students of psychology as well as those studying business, economics, and the hospitality industry.

The first resource of its kind, Palliative and Serious Illness Patient Management for Physician Assistants provides a fundamental framework for physician assistants and physician associates to incorporate palliative care medicine, including end-of-life care, into their practice. The book focuses on pharmacologic and integrative medical therapeutic modalities, as well as the evaluation and treatment of special populations, which reflects the reality of a physician assistant's day-to-day job. It uses a patient-centered approach to address the comprehensive management of serious illness patients, as well as their designated families, significant others, caregivers, and health care providers. Chapters are organized into six sections that cover the essential aspects of care, symptom management, and transitioning care at the end-of-life. This book is ideal for physician assistant trainers (didactic or clinical), students, and practicing clinicians who seek to enhance their communication and medical skills in the treatment of all seriously illness patient populations in any specialty, and in the management of their symptoms at any stage of their disease or condition.

Millions of peopleâ€"infants, children, adults, and their familiesâ€"are currently coping with serious illness in the United States. Efforts are intensifying to improve overall care quality through the delivery of person-centered and family-oriented services, for patients of all ages and across disease stages, care settings, and specialties. While aging Baby Boomers are increasing the proportion of patients in the Medicare population over time, the sickest and most vulnerable patients needing health system support and other services to meet their complex needs can be found across the age spectrum and in a broad range of care settings, from perinatal care to geriatric care. Recognizing the need to thoughtfully consider and address the challenges and opportunities in efforts to improve care quality and value, the Roundtable on Quality Care for People with Serious Illness of the National Academies of Sciences, Engineering, and Medicine held the public workshop Integrating the Patient and Caregiver Voice into Serious Illness Care, on December 15, 2016, in Washington, DC. This workshop was the first in a series planned by the roundtable, and was designed specifically to bring together diverse personal perspectives and experiences about priorities and values that are important to patients and families coping with serious illness, and to consider solutions that support integration of these priorities and values in practice. This publication summarizes the presentations and discussions from the workshop.

"This timely book addresses the excessive and misguided use of email and helps all of us come to a more sensible view of when, where, and why to use it. It also goes beyond email to provide a roadmap for effective workplace communication in general. You and your organization will be able to go further, faster - that is, be more productive." Dr. Mark Frohman, President of Frohman Consulting Corporation and author of The Purpose Driven Organization, Mastering Priorities, and Involving Others in Problem Solving "I have key staff members chained to their desks daily clearing email and complaining that many emails are not required, or at least they did not need to be copied. I know as an organization we need to communicate more effectively. I look forward to passing this book onto my staff and watching the improvements." Terry P. Roche, President of Thomas Engineering Corporation "I spent many years trying to better manage email but seemed to be losing ground on productivity. This book showed me the real solution - use email for what it's good for, but don't overuse it. It's easy and fun to read and is packed with much more information than typical self-help and business productivity books. I've become a more effective communicator, improved my work/life balance, and have helped my staff become more productive as well." Don Silvestri, V.P. of Marketing & Public Relations for Open Sports Network & former Director of Marketing for CBS SportsLine Email Less - Talk More is the first book to provide solutions to problems created by workplace email overuse. Instead of treating the "symptoms" of reduced productivity and information overload with email management techniques and email etiquette, this book addresses the actual root cause. Email is a great communication method for many cases - but not for all cases. The book teaches people to choose the most effective communication means - email, voicemail, meetings, or direct conversation - based on the situation. It challenges readers to consider alternate communication methods before hitting COMPOSE or REPLY. It also provides solutions to many other productivity and work/life balance problems triggered by email and PDAs becoming the new preferred communication tools. Using an easy-to-read story format set in office, home, and family vacation settings, it shows how improper workplace communication - especially email - can adversely impact productivity, relationships, and personal lives. It provides many examples where email appears to be the most efficient communication tool but is actually much less productive for both the sender and recipients. The lessons from the book are summarized in easy-to-use rules that provide the Do's & Don'ts of effective communication.