Stop wasting your time!

In German, we have a saying: “Wer schreibt, der bleibt!”

This translates to: He, who writes things down, will prevail.

Patients only recall about 20% of, what we tell them. And half of that recollection is wrong.

When you are emotionally engaged, you struggle to form memories.

And this is precisely the experience of any parent. Who would not be emotionally engaged, when the health of your child is discussed?

What is the problem?

We need to give loads of information during a consultation. Especially, if we want to enable the parent to share in the decision-making. And the latter has become the norm.

But how can we empower the parent, let alone the child, to process this additional data during the short amount of time in our office?

In a previous Blog (How I conduct the consultation) I have introduced my “Explanations sheet”.

You should hear the sigh of relief of any father, after I have handed him the personalized explanation-sheet.

Often they say: With this it is so much easier to explain to my wife, what you just told me.

So, I would like to encourage you to stop wasting your time!

Read here more feedback from the parents.

Why do I use a handwritten summary?

This is how my explanation sheet looks like.

It is designed to facilitate the explanation of the stories I tell most frequently. The explanation sheet provides a simplified version of the anatomy, and it allows me, to note the main idea of the parent, their concerns and my explanations of about the patient.

Why write down, what the parent tells you?

Any GP will tell you, that it is important to clarify, where the patient and parent comes from. What their own ideas are about the current situation. I dig into this aspect in this previous blog-post. 

The written summary of their point of view allows the parent and me to be sure, that we are on the same page. 

Why is a copy of the letter not the same thing?

Doctors need to document a lot.

We need to share this information with our colleagues. Our letters are tools to transfer the relevant knowledge.  Here we use specific language and mental concepts.

Occasionally, we must share concerns, that are unsuitable for the patient and parent. This is for example the case in relation to child neglect or even suspected abuse.

As doctors, we need safe communication paths, that do allow the sharing of these sensitive aspects.

For this reason, I am not a fan to share the letter by default with the parents. The writing does not cater to their needs of illustration of the mental concepts, management of their expectations, and the clear phasing of the agreed treatment plan.

But this takes time!

Stop wasting your time!

The most frequent argument against a personalized handwritten summary is: this takes too much time.

I wonder if this is really true. When I share knowledge with the child and their parent, knowing, that they will have forgotten almost everything I just toll them, by the time that they reach their car, did I really use my time “efficiently”?

I passionately doubt that. This way I cement the knowledge hierarchy and keep them depending on my ongoing supervision of their health development.

Working in the NHS, I can’t afford the luxury of monitoring a patient regularly, the waiting times for outpatient appointments are far too long. Therefore, I need to empower the parent to partner with me for the health of their child. And they can play their part only with sufficient instructions.  By the way, my clinic slots are 20 minutes.

Are there alternatives?

Yes, there are alternatives for handwritten summaries.

One would be, to allow the parent to record the consultation.

Personally, I encourage them in the case that I need to explain a complicated situation without illustration.

In a nutshell: 

Please — stop wasting your time.

Provide the information in a way, that the parent can take with them home and refer to later.

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