Strategies for Communication in Health and Social Care Organizations

This report delves into the critical role of communication within health and social care organizations, emphasizing its importance in fostering relationships between staff members and patients. It explores various communication theories, such as Maslow's Hierarchy of Needs, Freud's Psychodynamic Theory, and Cognitive Theory, highlighting their application in enhancing patient care and staff performance. The report identifies essential communication skills, including friendliness, respect, empathy, and patience, and reviews methods for addressing inappropriate interpersonal communication, stressing the importance of active listening and avoiding defensive behavior. Furthermore, it proposes strategies for meeting specific communication needs, such as non-verbal communication training, showing respect, implementing sign boards and help desks, and providing language interpreters. The conclusion underscores the need for respecting cultural values in healthcare settings to ensure effective service delivery. Desklib provides this document and many other solved assignments for students.

Communicating in Health and Social Care Organizations
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TABLE OF CONTENTS
 INTRODUCTION
 1.1 Theories of communication in health and social care
 1.2 Communication skills required in health and social care
 1.3 Reviewing methods of dealing with inappropriate interpersonal communication between individuals
 1.4 Use of strategies with specific communication needs
 CONCLUSION
 REFERENCES

INTRODUCTION
 Communication plays an important role in any organisation or sector, communicate
may be defined as exchanging of the ideas or information by speaking, writing or using
other medium, it is the act of conveying meaning from on one person or group to
another by using mutually understood signs, symbols etc
 For health and social care sector it is important to have an effective communication
within an organisation as it has to deal with needy and sick people who need extra care
and support.

1.1 Theories of communication in health and social care
 Communication theory attempts to explain the source of information, how can a
information can be transmitted, various methods used to convey information and how
meaning of a information is created and shared in an organisation.

Cont…
Various communication theories that can be applied in Cromwell are as follows:
 Humanistic Maslow's Theory
 Freud's Psychodynamic Theory
 Cognitive Burner

Cont…
Humanistic Maslow's Theory
According to this theory Cromwell can apply this theory which consists of five tier model
of human needs, and with the help of this model Cromwell can meet the needs of patients
in the hospital. As per this theory Cromwell can achieve the following needs in hospital:
 Physiological needs- These are the basic needs which has to be met for the patients
like food, water, shelter etc. So it is important for Cromwell to fulfil the psychological
needs of patients which is a basic criteria of satisfying the patients.
 Safety needs- Safety is an important factor after fulfilling psychological needs, it is the
duty of staff to provide safety to patients and should make them feel secure in the
hospital.

Cont..
 Love and belongingness needs- Staff has to develop a interpersonal relationship with
the patients and should treat them with love and socially.
 Esteem needs- Cromwell should give respect to the patients and should treat them with
dignity and reputation.
 Self-actualization needs- Cromwell has make use of all the staff members in the
hospital by exploiting their talents, capabilities and potentials of staff in order to offer
better services to patients.

Cont…
Freud's Psychodynamic Theory
 According to this unconscious can influence the behaviour and experiences even
though an individual is unaware of underlying influences, it can include thoughts,
habits, memories desires and reaction.
 So the staff members should be provided with an effective training to have control on
their habits emotions, how to have control on situations in order to prevent staff
members from getting affected by their psychological factors.

Cont..
Cognitive Burner
 By applying this theory in the hospital, Cromwell can improve the performance of the
staff buy constructing new ideas or concepts based upon their current or past
knowledge and experiences in order to improve their level of service in the hospital.

Cont..
 Another way is convergence which is used by individuals of social focus in order to
match the communication styles of patients.
 Both ways can be used by the staff members in hospital in order to make
communication more effective.

1.2 Communication skills required in health and social care
 There are various communications skills which can be used by Cromwell in order to
improve the level of communication in the hospital.
 With the help of effective communication skills Cromwell can improve the level of
satisfaction of their patients as the staff members lack the effective communication
skills how to interact with patients.

Cont..
Communication skills which are required are as follows:
 Friendliness
 Respect
 Empathy
 Patience
 Open-mindedness
 Facial expressions
 Privacy
 Gestures

Cont..
 Friendliness: It is the most important communication skill which need to be developed
by the staff members of Cromwell hospital. Doctors and nurses need to be friendly with
the patients in order to ease their stress and help them out with the problems. Nurses
and doctors should talk to patients in polite manner and need not to shout on patients.
 Respect: Each and every patient should be treated with respect despite of their culture,
status, background, physical conditions etc. It will give an opportunity to serve the
patients in effective way.

Cont..
 Empathy: Doctors and nurses of Cromwell hospital should be able to
understand and share the feeling of the patients in a hospital and then only they
can provide treatment to patients effectively.
 Patience: Patience is a test for staff members of Cromwell hospital, they should
have patience to hear and understand the needs of patients, developing patience
will improve their communication skills in order to communicate with patients.

Cont..
 Open-mindedness: In order to improve communication skills, staff members should be
flexible and open-minded to communicate with patients, staff members should be open
to listen and understand other person's point of view rather than passing a judgement.
 Facial expressions: Facial expression also plays an important role in communicating
with patients, staff members of Cromwell should make use of appropriate facial
expressions in order to communicate with patients.

Cont..
 Privacy: Doctors and nurses should touch patients kindly while treating patients or
supporting them. Privacy and dignity of patients should be maintained for both male
and female patients.
 Gestures: Staff of Cromwell should take of gesture while communicating with patients
i.e. they have to maintain proper body language while communicating with patients.

1.3 Reviewing methods of dealing with inappropriate interpersonal
communication between individuals
 Interpersonal communication may be defined as a communication between two persons
by developing a relationship with each other through interaction and simultaneously
sharing influence.

Cont..
Methods of improving interpersonal skills in Cromwell hospital are as follows:
 1. Do not show negative body language
 2. Listen Well
 3. Do not be defensive
 4. Use right communicating method

Cont..
1. Do not show negative body language
 Staff members of hospital should not negative body to their patients, so they should be
very careful with their body language while communicating with patients.
 Staff members should not try to bring any physical barriers between each other as
barriers results in distraction and patients may feel lack of interest from staff members.

Cont..
 2. Listen Well: An ability to listen well is another method of dealing with inappropriate
communication between interpersonal. Staff members of Cromwell should posses high
listening skills and should be able to understand patient's words more clearly and then
react accordingly.
 3. Do not be defensive: As the staff members of Cromwell were defensive with
Mariana, which resulted into the inappropriate communication from staff members. But
Cromwell's employees should not defensive or overexcited if they are poked by
patients but rather should stay calm and neutral.

Cont..
4. Use right communicating method
 A communication may not be always be verbal but the staff of Cromwell should be able
to understand that there are different types of situations to be faced in hospital which
demand different methods.
 So employees should be able to use right communication method which would be
suitable for the situation.

Barriers of interpersonal communication
 Breach of confidentiality
 Lack of dignity and trust
 Misinterpretation

Cont..
 Breach of confidentially: when any person breach other person confidentiality and trust
it will results as barrier in interpersonal communication.
 Lack of dignity and trust- when any person does not respect dignity and trust of other
person it can lead to barrier in communication.
 Misinterpretation- This barrier can occurs due to misinterpreting of language, message,
etc. by its own way.

1.4 Use of strategies with specific communication needs
 Cromwell can use different strategies as per their communication needs in
the hospital as hospital is facing with number of communication skills which
lack in staff members or there are presence of barriers of communication.

Cont..
So some strategies which can be implemented in hospital are as follows:
 Non-verbal communication
 Showing respect
 Sign Board and help desk
 Language interpreters for patients of diverse culture

Cont..
Non-verbal communication
 Non-verbal communication is an important component of communication, its includes tone of
voice, making eye contact, quality of voice, paying attention, body position, body movements
etc
 As Cromwell were not able to understand condition of Mariama as she was not able to
communicate with staff members, but it was not evident to them from her body language what
was she suffering from.
 So there is need of providing non-verbal communication training to the staff members of
Cromwell hospital.

Cont..
Showing respect
 Showing respect to somebody which gain respect for individual, people who do not
respect each other is totally impossible to communicate.
 So there should be a mark of respect in order to communicate with patients.
 As in case Mariama was not respected by staff members and was ignored due to which
she also lost respect for them.
 So showing respect will gain respect for the hospital.

Cont..
 Sign Board and help desk: Cromwell should have help desk within the hospital in order
to help patients and visitors and should also have sign boards which will provide
directions in the hospital.
 Language interpreters for patients of diverse culture: Not all the patients will not be
able to speak English well as same was the case with Mariama, doctors and nurses were
not able to understand her language. If staff is not able to understand other language but
they can choose simple words and pronounce them carefully or can watch patient's body
language as signs of understanding due to which Cromwell will be able to serve their
patients effectively.

CONCLUSION
 It can be concluded that communication is the most important factor in health and
social care sector which helps in maintaining and establishing relationships among staff
members and with the patients. It is vital for health and social care sector to respect
cultural values of patients while providing services to patients.

REFERENCES
 Abramson, K., Keefe, B. and Chou, W. Y. S., 2015. Communicating about cancer
through Facebook: a qualitative analysis of a breast cancer awareness
page. Journal of Health Communication. 20(2). pp.237-243.
 Batterham, R. W and et.al., 2016. Health literacy: applying current concepts to
improve health services and reduce health inequalities. Public health. 132. pp.3-12.
 Beck, A. F and et.al., 2016. Determinants of health and pediatric primary care
practices. Pediatrics, pp.peds-2015.
 Daum, K., 2018. 8 Ways to Improve Your Communication Right Now. [Online]
Available Through: <https://www.inc.com/michelle-cheng/meet-guy-in-charge-of-
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