As a patient, do you feel uncomfortable if a doctor reveals too much personal information?
In her weekly column, Pauline Chen found that in a third of office visits, doctors made such “self-disclosure statements” with “40 percent . . . unrelated to the patient’s symptoms, family or feelings. In addition, in the vast majority of cases, doctors never returned to the topic that inspired the personal reference in the first place.”
An additional interesting finding was that patients reacted positively to surgeons who revealed something personal, and more negatively to primary care doctors who did the same. Make of that what you will.
Spending more time with patients is a good thing, but the conversation should be focused to the issues at hand, as spontaneous disclosures have the potential to leave a patient less satisfied with the visit.
topics: patients, pauline chen
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{ 1 comment }
It is an understandable problem. You are tired, no one is listening at home, and you have a captive audience.
The key is exercising the discipline to make sure that you only disclose after asking yourself if this is going to help the patient, then make the specific disclosure that you think will do so and in the same breath tie it right back to the patient’s concern. It isn’t that there should never be any disclosure, but that it shouldn’t be made because for the doctors.
It helps to keep a personal support system where you make sure your emotional needs get met elsewhere–perhaps a personal psychotherapist or a medical colleague that you have a weekly lunch or golf date with. Even is “good enough” marriages, spouses usually don’t cut it.
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