Good caregiver communication allows families and professionals to work together as a team. It can also help clear misunderstandings and confusion and improve care.
Caregivers need to know what a loved one is feeling. They should be willing to share their concerns with doctors and nurses.
Ask Questions
Many families have many questions about the infants and toddlers in their care. Caregivers need to be able to communicate with families in ways that are comfortable and effective.
Caregivers should always bring a list of questions to doctor appointments so they don’t forget any critical queries. They should also encourage seniors to speak for themselves, avoid using medical jargon, and ask for clarification when necessary.
Effective caregiver-patient communication is essential for positive clinical outcomes. It helps patients understand their doctors’ plans, which can improve patient adherence to treatment regimens and prevent medical errors.
Ask for Feedback
Being a caregiver, you must understand that the person in their care may be preoccupied with things other than their health. For example, they might struggle financially or deal with difficult situations before hospitalization.
Those things can make it more challenging to communicate effectively with a loved one. However, it’s essential to keep communication lines open. This is especially important during a pandemic. Fortunately, Press Ganey reports that many hospitals have stockpiles of older-generation tablets and laptops to connect patients with their family members during COVID-19 restrictions. This keeps communication lines open for everyone involved.
Ask for Clarification
Providing seniors with quality healthcare requires effective communication between caregivers and their loved ones. Unfortunately, this is not always the case. In a recent study, physicians reported that barriers to effective communication include delays in receiving information, technical issues and inadequate incident response.
Caregivers should always feel confident to ask questions or bring up any concerns. They should also be able to interpret nonverbal clues when communicating with seniors, including their facial expressions and body language.
Ineffective verbal communication can lead to confusion and misunderstandings, so seniors and their caregivers must understand each other well. This can be accomplished by asking for clarification when something is unclear and using common terms rather than medical jargon whenever possible.
Practice Empathy
Empathy is often difficult to understand, especially when your loved ones are ill. It can be easy to become overly emotional and overwhelmed by your feelings of concern for their health.
Practiced properly, empathy can be used to reduce burnout among caregivers. This is critical to maintaining high patient satisfaction ratings and improving post-acute care outcomes.
Caregivers should make a point to be aware of their emotions and avoid letting them dictate how they communicate with patients and other care team members. A simple reminder to “use active listening techniques” can help them frame conversations from a position of empathy and understanding rather than anger or frustration.
Keep It Simple
Caregivers should regularly share information about progression with the person receiving care. This should include a combination of written patient education materials and verbal discussions. The caregiver should repeatedly reiterate and explain important information if a patient has limited literacy.
Paying attention to the person’s body language and facial expressions during a conversation is also helpful. If they seem uncomfortable or confused, it is a good idea to take a break from the discussion and return after everyone has had time to calm down.
Many people needing home health care are preoccupied with concerns beyond their health and well-being. This can affect their ability to communicate with caregivers openly.
Speak at Their Level
Many people who work as caregivers feel that physicians, nurses, and other care providers do not listen to them. They often have questions, concerns, and anecdotes about their patient but do not feel they are heard or acknowledged.
Caregivers can overcome this by bringing lists of questions to appointments, scheduling additional appointments for more time-consuming questions, encouraging their patients and families to speak up for themselves, and using empathy to convey that what they say is important.
When communication is effective, everyone wins. Practicing these strategies will result in less stress and more clarity for you, the care recipient, your friends, and your family.
Eliminate Distractions
If your loved one is easily distracted, try limiting the amount of people or noise they interact with. They may not always be able to do this, but it will make them much more comfortable.
External distractions can include children, other loved ones, barking dogs, and knocking at the door. They can also come in emails, notifications and social media pings.
To eliminate this problem, implementing the mute, unfollow or do not disturb culture should be your team’s standard practice. This will help ensure they get the focus they need to work well.
Be Honest
Almost any home care professional will tell you that effective communication is the cornerstone of their practice. Yet, the reality is that patients’ quality of care depends on several variables beyond their control.
Caregivers must learn to communicate on behalf of seniors and encourage them to speak for themselves whenever possible. This often means bringing lists of questions and records to appointments, requesting more time for complicated topics, offering written instructions and demonstrations for tasks, addressing people respectfully and identifying themselves, and demonstrating a good work ethic in their interactions.
Listen More and Talk Less
People in care often feel as if their feelings and opinions are dismissed. Using active listening skills and nonverbal communication can help show people in care that their feelings are important to the professionals who work with them.
When a person in care is speaking, don’t interrupt them. Instead, nod occasionally or say “Uh huh” to show that you are listening and interested. You can also ask for clarification if you need help understanding what is being said. Repeating what they have told you can also help ensure you understand them correctly. This will help to build trust and encourage open communication.
