Quality healthcare delivery for the elderly: Consent-taking in a cataract surgery clinic in Singapore

Quality healthcare delivery for the elderly must be supported not only by advance biomedical research but also in-depth investigations of language and communication in clinical settings. Obstacles to communication between clinicians and patients have been found to limit the outcome of consultations in terms of diagnosis, treatment and patient satisfaction. While biomedical research has been progressing in leaps and bounds, little is known about how clinicians and elderly patients actually interact and communicate in medical consultations in Singapore. 

This study proposes to use conversation analytic (CA) methodology to investigate clinician-elderly patient interaction in Singapore. Given the paucity of such research, this project offers the potential to deepen our understanding of the interaction between clinicians and older patients in an environment where language and communication barriers are inherent, as well as the potential to enhance the transmission of timely medical information and advice and the potential to promote the interpersonal dimensions of the partnership.  

Advancing communication in healthcare delivery also signals a return of focus to the humanistic dimension of medicine. The ultimate goal in improving the clinician-patient interaction is to promote healthcare encounters that are conducive to comprehensive healing, in both the biomedical and the psychosocial senses. By identifying the communicative practices and interactional structures between doctors and elderly patients, healthcare practitioners can be made more aware of how they can interact more effectively with their patients, to facilitate patient involvement in discussions and decisions about their own conditions, and ultimately contribute to patient trust and satisfaction.