↓ Skip to main content

How do national cultures influence lay people’s preferences toward doctors’ style of communication? A comparison of 35 focus groups from an European cross national research

Overview of attention for article published in BMC Public Health, December 2015
Altmetric Badge

Readers on

mendeley
43 Mendeley
You are seeing a free-to-access but limited selection of the activity Altmetric has collected about this research output. Click here to find out more.
Title
How do national cultures influence lay people’s preferences toward doctors’ style of communication? A comparison of 35 focus groups from an European cross national research
Published in
BMC Public Health, December 2015
DOI 10.1186/s12889-015-2559-7
Pubmed ID
Authors

Michela Rimondini, Maria Angela Mazzi, Myriam Deveugele, Jozien M. Bensing

Abstract

The evidence that inspires and fosters communication skills, teaching programmes and clinical recommendations are often based on national studies which assume, implicitly, that patients' preferences towards doctors' communication style are not significantly affected by their cultural background. The cross-cultural validity of national results has been recognized as a potential limitation on how generally applicable they are in a wider context. Using 35 country-specific focus group discussions from four European countries, the aim of the present study is to test whether or not national cultures influence lay people's preferences towards doctors' style of communication. Lay people preferences on doctor's communication style have been collected in Belgium, the Netherlands, the United Kingdom and Italy. Each centre organized between eight and nine focus groups, where participants (n = 259) were asked to comment on a video of a simulated medical interview. The discussions were audiotaped, transcribed and coded using a common framework (Guliver Coding System) that allowed for the identification of different themes. The frequency distribution of the topics discussed highlights lay people's generally positive views towards most part of doctors interventions. The regression model applied to the Guliver categories highlighted slight national differences and the existence of a cross-cultural appreciation, in particular, of five types of intervention: Doctors attitudes (both Task-Oriented and Affective/Emotional), Summarizing, Structuring and Providing solution. Lay panels valued doctors' communication style in a similar manner in the countries selected. This highlights the existence of a common background, which in the process of internationalization of heath care, might foster the implementation of cross-national teaching programmes and clinical guidelines.

Timeline

Login to access the full chart related to this output.

If you don’t have an account, click here to discover Explorer

Mendeley readers

Mendeley readers

The data shown below were compiled from readership statistics for 43 Mendeley readers of this research output. Click here to see the associated Mendeley record.

Geographical breakdown

Country Count As %
United States 1 2%
Unknown 42 98%

Demographic breakdown

Readers by professional status Count As %
Student > Master 10 23%
Student > Ph. D. Student 7 16%
Student > Bachelor 6 14%
Researcher 4 9%
Other 2 5%
Other 3 7%
Unknown 11 26%
Readers by discipline Count As %
Medicine and Dentistry 8 19%
Nursing and Health Professions 7 16%
Social Sciences 5 12%
Psychology 3 7%
Linguistics 2 5%
Other 5 12%
Unknown 13 30%