The question is: do these additional determinants matter?
Can they really influence the clinical outcomes of a person’s diagnosis? And do healthcare professionals consider the holistic attributes of the patient sitting in front of them when making clinical decisions? Do they view them only as a “patient” not as a “person”?
There is a need to trigger an important shift within healthcare communication. Although more research in the past few years has emphasized the positive benefits of shared decision-making and discussions regarding patient preferences, there is so much more left to implement.
The objective of this discussion is to encourage healthcare professionals to dive deeper and understand their patients pre‑existing schema, which is likely to predict how the patient will behave once they are outside the consultation room; but why is this important?
