Patients Anxiety
Should doctors be open and honest with patients or not?
I’m talking about the situation where a patient is referred to a specialist consultant because of their symptoms. The doctor knows which diseases may be associated with the symptoms and sends the patient for further investigations to obtain a definitive diagnosis.
Should the patient be told what the doctor suspects, or kept in the dark?
Is anxiety exacerbated by the knowing, or the not knowing?
Like a few others have said, it is probably best dealt with on a case by case basis, in other words, the Dr. has to make this judgement on how the patient presents.
Some patients will say up front that they want to know everything, good or bad and others will say how they don’t want to know if the news is bad. Some patients hand everything over to family and get them to know everything and expect them to make decisions with the doctors.
It is surprising how many patients are happy for the latter scenario, it is not an ideal one, as it places a great burden onto relatives often pushing them into allowing relatives to have extensive treatments which ultimately prolong suffering.
A good Dr. will hope to avoid this and instead try and encourage patients to involve family at the start but as part of the team with decisions ultimately based on medical benefit in conjunction with patient wishes, rather than just family driving everything.
In the end even if family say the patient can’t take bad news, should that patient directly demand answers including whether or not they are dying, you have to consider what the consequences of lying are. A lie may protect the very vulnerable but it also denies the chance for saying goodbye, for ensuring all legal matters are settled, there may be children who need caring for etc.
Finally, do you remember how it feels as a child or even an adult being in a strange environment, in the dark knowing something is out there but not knowing what? I think not knowing what you’re facing leaves you defenceless at a time when you perhaps most need defending.
Patients Use Hypnotherapy For Anxiety, Insomnia
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