Teaching communication in medicine, what psychologists are doing and how we can be better

Abstract

Background: Psychologists often teach communication skills to medical students and residents, however, little is known about the process by which skills are taught. This study explored how communication skills are taught in Family Medicine residency programs. Methods: Faculty members in U.S. Family Medicine residencies were contacted via email and professional organization list serves to complete an online survey addressing their communication curriculum. 32% of Family Medicine residency training sites responded. Findings: The most commonly utilized teaching technique in communication education was lectures (90% of respondents used lecture) followed by direct observation of resident-patient communication (78%), small group work (72%), and video review of resident-patient encounters (71%). Most respondents indicated that they used a combination of 6 teaching methods (24.4%), and 3% of respondents indicated that they used one teaching method for communication education. The majority of U.S. Family Medicine programs utilized the Patient Centered Communication model to teach communication skills (34%). Nearly a quarter of respondents indicated that they did not use any model to guide their communication education curriculum (24%). Other communication models used included Common Ground (7%), Kalamazoo (5%), and Motivational Interviewing (5%). Discussion: Results suggest that education providers are incorporating active learning techniques such as direct observation of resident-patient encounters into their communication education curriculum. However, well-researched communication models (e.g., Kalamazoo) are not commonly utilized in residency communication education, and many programs do not use any model at all. Results are compared to best practices and recommendations for health psychologists in medical education are provided.