ArticlePatient education and counseling2012
Why should I talk about emotion? Communication patterns associated with physician discussion of patient expressions of negative emotion in hospital admission encounters.
Article in Patient education and counseling, 2012. The graph could read no effect estimate from its abstract, so it casts no vote on the map. Cited by 19 papers.
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Who cites it
19 citing papers in PubMed.
- Self-Protection Motivation and Its Psychological Construction: A Process Model Distinguishing Two Unique Motivational Orientations.Personality and social psychology review : an official journal of the Society for Personality and Social Psychology, Inc · 2026Review
- Identifying emotional variations in Spanish oncology patients during treatment decision consultations: a qualitative study.BMJ open · 2026Article
- Communicating with Families after Severe Acute Brain Injury.Neurocritical care · 2025Review
- How hospital doctors respond to contextual factors revealed by older patients with heart failure in hospital interactions: an interaction-based study.BMC health services research · 2025Article
- Machine learning judged neutral facial expressions as key factors for a "good therapist" within the first five minutes: An experiment to simulate online video counselling.PEC innovation · 2024Article
- Discussion of Emotions Among Newly Diagnosed Non-Hispanic White and Chinese American Patients With Breast Cancer and Their Oncologists.Asian American journal of psychology · 2024Article
- Empathy Expression in Interpreted and Noninterpreted Care Conferences of Seriously Ill Children.Pediatrics · 2023Article
- Content and system development of a digital patient-provider communication tool to support shared decision making in chronic health care: InvolveMe.BMC medical informatics and decision making · 2020Article
- Taboo Topics in Adolescent and Young Adult Oncology: Strategies for Managing Challenging but Important Conversations Central to Adolescent and Young Adult Cancer Survivorship.American Society of Clinical Oncology educational book. American Society of Clinical Oncology. Annual Meeting · 2020Review
- Prioritizing Communication in the Provision of Palliative Care for the Trauma Patient.Current trauma reports · 2020Review
- Neuropsychiatric Symptoms of Multiple Sclerosis: State of the Art.Psychiatry investigation · 2019Article
- Oncologists' responses to patient and caregiver negative emotions and patient perception of quality of communication: results from a multi-ethnic Asian setting.Supportive care in cancer : official journal of the Multinational Association of Supportive Care in Cancer · 2018Article
- Empathy, burn-out and the use of gut feeling: a cross-sectional survey of Danish general practitioners.BMJ open · 2018Article
- The use of supportive communication when responding to older people's emotional distress in home care - An observational study.BMC nursing · 2017Article
- Enhancing adult therapeutic interpersonal relationships in the acute health care setting: an integrative review.Journal of multidisciplinary healthcare · 2016Review
- Which medical interview skills are associated with patients' verbal indications of undisclosed feelings of anxiety and depressive feelings?Asia Pacific family medicine · 2016Article
- Development of a Decision Aid for Patients With Advanced Heart Failure Considering a Destination Therapy Left Ventricular Assist Device.JACC. Heart failure · 2015Article
- Patient expression of emotions and neurologist responses in first multiple sclerosis consultations.PloS one · 2015Article
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Abstract
objectiveTo describe hospital-based physicians' responses to patients' verbal expressions of negative emotion and identify patterns of further communication associated with different responses.
methodsQualitative analysis of physician-patient admission encounters audio-recorded between August 2008 and March 2009 at two hospitals within a university system. A codebook was iteratively developed to identify patients' verbal expressions of negative emotion. We categorized physicians' responses by their immediate effect on further discussion of emotion - focused away (away), focused neither toward nor away (neutral), and focused toward (toward) - and examined further communication patterns following each response type.
resultsIn 79 patients' encounters with 27 physicians, the median expression of negative emotion was 1, range 0-14. Physician responses were 25% away, 43% neutral, and 32% toward. Neutral and toward responses elicited patient perspectives, concerns, social and spiritual issues, and goals for care. Toward responses demonstrated physicians' support, contributing to physician-patient alignment and agreement about treatment.
conclusionResponding to expressions of negative emotion neutrally or with statements that focus toward emotion elicits clinically relevant information and is associated with positive physician-patient relationship and care outcomes. PRACTICE IMPLICATIONS: Providers should respond to expressions of negative emotion with statements that allow for or explicitly encourage further discussion of emotion.
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