First-year Australian and international medical students self-evaluated their medical communication skills during two interviews with a standardized patient. Self-evaluations were compared with clinical tutors' evaluations. Students' evaluations showed moderate, significant correlations with the tutor's. Students improved their medical…

Study aims to assess the need for a thyrotoxicosis patient education programs and evaluates a group education session. Patients with thyrotoxicosis were surveyed to assess their needs. Determined that people with thyrotoxicosis had limited knowledge about their condition. The offer of a group education program has little effect on that knowledge…

Discusses obstacles involved in the routine clinical practice for type 2 Diabetes Mellitus, a disease associated with serious complications and co-morbidity. States that educating patients to take an active role in their care by changing their diet and habits is a challenge to health care educators. Lists tools patients will need to learn to help…

Examines how physicians and patients interactionally accomplish the transition from the activity of history taking to that of physical examination. Finds implications for: the theoretic relationship between verbal and nonverbal behavior in social meaning; what it means to explain transitions and reduce patients' uncertainty; the organization of…

Explored how primary care clinician-teachers actually attempt to convey empathy to medical students and residents. Found that they stress the centrality of role modeling in teaching, and most used debriefing strategies as well as both learner- and patient-centered approaches in instructing learners about empathy. (EV)

The Child Protection Service's philosophy is to be child oriented, treating the child as a person and not an object from which evidence is extracted. The role of the medical examination, significant in overall assessment of allegations of child abuse and neglect, should be one of integration with those providing the psychosocial assessment. Clear…

Purpose: The purpose of this study is to expand knowledge regarding end-of-life care received in nursing homes through the use of narrative interviews with family members close to the decedents. Design and Methods: We conducted follow-up qualitative interviews with 54 respondents who had participated in an earlier national survey of 1,578…

Purpose: This study examined attitudes of caregivers and physicians toward assessing and diagnosing dementia, with an emphasis on how a diagnosis is disclosed. Design and Methods: Seventeen focus group interviews were conducted with caregivers or physicians from three sites; 52 caregivers participated in nine interviews (three each at the three…

Objective: To describe the documented adherence to quality indicators for the outpatient care of attention-deficit/hyperactivity disorder, conduct disorder, and major depression for children in public mental health clinics and to explore how adherence varies by child and clinic characteristics. Method: A statewide, longitudinal cohort study of 813…

A positive coping style can be critical to successful rehabilitation of psychiatric consumers. Using structural equation modeling, this study examined the relationships among consumers' psychological characteristics, self-esteem, and behaviors, and the role of self-esteem in mediating the relationships between psychological characteristics and…

We describe the age-specific outcomes for patients hospitalized with newly diagnosed congestive heart failure using administrative hospital abstracts from Alberta, Canada, from April 1, 1994, to March 31, 2000. Seniors (aged 65 years and older) constituted about 85 per cent of the 16,162 patients. Both co-morbidity and severity of illness tended…

A professor discussed options for interviewing new patients using a bloodhound metaphor. After picking up a scent at the door, would the hound methodically search from room to room to room? Or would the hound efficiently follow the thread of the scent directly to the meter reader? In the past, psychiatrists learned to interview by tracking…

This study examined the relationship of catastrophizing to fatigue in 80 women receiving chemotherapy (CT) or radiotherapy (RT) for treatment of early stage breast cancer. Findings revealed expected relationships between catastrophizing and fatigue among women receiving RT but not CT. Among RT patients, those high in catastrophizing reported…

Anger and related emotions have been identified as triggers in substance use. Forgiveness therapy (FT) targets anger, anxiety, and depression as foci of treatment. Fourteen patients with substance dependence from a local residential treatment facility were randomly assigned to and completed either 12 approximately twice-weekly sessions of…

Psychological assessments of competency-to-stand-trial (CST) referrals must consider whether the defendants' impairment is genuine or feigned. This study addressed feigning on the Evaluation of Competency to Stand Trial--Revised (ECST-R), a standardized interview designed for assessing dimensions of CST and screening for feigned CST. In…