Communication about side effects: Reducing the occurrence of cognitive side effects in breast cancer patients by means of empathic communication.

Keywords
Loading...
Thumbnail Image
Issue Date
2015-06-01
Language
en
Journal Title
Journal ISSN
Volume Title
Publisher
Abstract
In this experiment, 60 healthy women were asked to act as analogue breast cancer patients, to either watch an empathic or non-empathic videotaped consultation, to report whether they had any cognitive or general complaints, and to evaluate several characteristics of the video, physician, videopatient and themselves. The findings showed that both videos increased cognitive problem reporting, and memory and concentration problems. It was found that reported cognitive problems were not lessened in any way by a physician’s empathic communication style. The findings of this study could be of use to physicians in a sense that they should keep in mind that their patients might feel more comfortable and less anxious when being treated in an empathic way. By using real breast cancer patients and a laboratory, future studies might find more interesting results on the relationship between a physician’s communication style ! and the o ccurrence of cognitive side effects.
Description
Citation
Faculty
Faculteit der Letteren