I have recently began to watch the Grey’s Anatomy series and I think this is a perfect show to talk about patient/ provider communication. This show is so captivating but a lot of the scenes are unrealistic (or at least they should be). There are many examples of communication issues in this show, but the first one that comes to mind is Christina.
Christina is very blunt and does not show any empathy towards her patients. She typically is the one to tell the patients “either have the surgery or die” and doesn’t understand why people would care about anything else. She is not personable and often interrupts her patients while they are talking if she doesn’t agree with them. I think it is important not to sugar coat things, but Christina does not really care about her patients feelings at all. This creates a bad relationship with her patients and in the show they often call her out for being rude and judgmental.
A good example of patient/ provider communication in this show is George. Even though he usually gets stuck with the cases that nobody wants, he always makes the situation better. He is very kind hearted and really cares a lot about the patients feelings and emotions. He talks to them about how their feeling, their families, and what they may be scared about. George is very good at making patients feel better about their situations helps them to accept the reality they are in.
There are other examples of communication in this show but I think Christina and George are the best to talk about. They are both great surgeons but have very different ways of communicating with their patients.