In all medical setups, good communication should prevail between nurse managers, doctors and most importantly patients since information is the basis for medical attention. Nurse Managers should therefore ensure that all patients get satisfied and this can only be achieved through communicating effectively with them. Nurses are some of the professionals that need to communicate with their clients to promote understanding between them because it is only through communicating that they get to know the needs of their patients enabling them to easily solve their problems. Patients need to explain to the nurses what situations they are in, prior medications that they may have used or even professional information from other medical practitioners. Since nurse managers coordinate all activities in a hospital, their communication with other staff members is necessary because they are indirectly communicating with patients. Nurse Managers are required to have good personalities and should be caring and able to pay a lot of attention to patients.
Despite efforts in training nurses to promote effective nurse-patient communication, the expected quality of communication has not been met between nurses and patients. Communication barriers are the major causes of inadequate treatment provisions by nurses as well as medical errors and unnecessary costs to patients (McNamara, 2007, p. 1). This lack of good communication skills in most cases is linked to poor training of nurses. Another major cause of miscommunication is time on the part of nurses, who may be working overtime and as a result of the pressure, end up providing poor services to patients. In rare cases, some nurses may feel free to communicate with people of certain social classes and not others. The low-class patients will therefore receive less efficient treatment than those of a higher social class (Lloyd, 2009, p. 1).
There are many different modes through which nurse managers can communicate with patients. However, some of them may not be effective enough to allow for the provision of quality treatment. Face-to-face communication is the preferred way for nurses to communicate with their patients. This gives the nurse a great opportunity to get to know the patient as they continue to interact and the patients always feel free to talk and explain themselves more efficiently. The nurse also gets the chance to enquire more about the patient’s health background something that would have been more difficult to do through other forms of communication. The nurse is as well in a position to see the condition that the patient is in and this would help her provide a better treatment than they communicate through a phone call (Stewart, 1989, p. 1).
Face-to-face communication between nurses enables them to explain medical terminologies in a better way. This would keep patients aware of their conditions and make them understand what is going on within their bodies. This would in turn enable them to take the necessary precautions about their health since they understand it much better (Maguire, 2002, p. 1). It is therefore very important for nurse managers to interact with their patients may it be directly or indirectly. They may directly visit the patients to see how they are doing, be friendly to them and maybe discuss their health issues. Indirectly, nurse managers should ensure that all staff members are well trained not only on professional matters but also on good communication skills. It is the duty of nurse managers to ensure that all nurses and other medical providers in her jurisdiction communicate directly with patients although other modes such as telephone calls and e-mails are as wells necessary in time of emergencies.
Reference List
Lloyd, M. (2009). Communication Skills for Medicine. Web.
Maguire, P. (2002). Key Communication Skills and How to Acquire Them. Web.
McNamara, C. (2007). Field Guide to Leadership and Supervision. Web.
Stewart, M. (1989), Communicating with Medical Patients. Web.