So David Cameron has called for greater hands on contact between health professionals and their clients. I hate to use the word patient now because it's all so politically incorrect. And after all when it comes to healthcare it's now all about political correctness isn't it. And that means everything is bound to be your fault.
You eat badly, you smoke too much, you drink too much, you don't exercise, you veg out in front of the telly, those shoes will knacker your spine. Yes we've heard it ll before and guess what you'll hear it all again too. Why? Because there is nothing that is ever really that new when it comes to healthcare. Remember an apple a day keeps the doctor away! Of course you do your mum or dad told it to you to scare you into thinking that you were going to get all sorts of lurgy if you didn't have an apple. What they should really have been shouting is prevention is better than cure. And if you want prevention then you have to get things away from doctors. Why? Well because doctors treat symptoms not cure people.
I have worked extensively in and around the NHS for pretty much all my adult life, well since university anyway and I am extremely proud of what is one of Great Britain's two great legacies to the world. (The Royal Navy being the other) However if you leave it to the NHS to prevent disease you are asking for too much. If you want to prevent things you need to EDUCATE. Give a man a fish and you stop the hunger for a while, teach a man to fish ..... well you all know the motto.
Doctors are not generally educators, in fact they are the worse educators going. Nurses are better listeners generally and therefor generally better educators but even this wonderful group of people struggle when it comes to clear communication these days. And there lies the point, when you go to the doctors you do so because you have a medical problem you don't go because you want to be told you've been a bad person and be blamed for bringing on that problem.
Should the medical profession be better with their bedside manner? Absolutely. Most junior doctors are straight out of university and completely wet behind the ears having not been taught any communication skills and many GP's still act as if they should be revered like Gods. My GP is great I have to say because he is of the old fashioned mode. He listens and then talks, and he is a very good listener, which coming from a psychologist is high praise indeed. Unfortunately he is not the norm and many people still feel uncomfortable because of the inability of their carers to effectively bond with them. And also there is the pressure on the system to get you in then out the door on a conveyor.
So getting medical professionals to start asking these blame game questions is ultimately going to lead to problems not least of all because people lie.
When you tell a doctor that you smoke so many or drink so much they double the figure at least so we then get into the truth game. This I'll comment on in my other blog http://alcoholdebate.blogspot.com/ so in reality we don't ever get the right information for any given situation.
Thus in a nutshell we need to have better public education and information. Lip service is paid to this in PSHE lessons in schools but as teachers are also not really trained in this area are these lessons as effective as they could be and do young people just treat them as a lazy period?
So once again I come back to my regular argument stating clearly that you need to have the right people, doing the right education, giving the right information in the right way.
Educate, educate big time and educate now! But do not preach for a sermon is not required!
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