Developing Effective
Communication in
Health and Social
Care
Unit 1 - Task 2
By Madalena Adao
Student number 1316168
Mehjabeen Skaukat
,(P3)
There are many reasons why interpersonal communications may fail. In communication,
the message may not be received exactly the way the sender intended. This happens
because of barriers such as noise, lighting, time, seating, space and settings. All these are
factors that may influence communication and interpersonal interactions in health and
social care settings. The World Health Organization (WHO) describes barriers as being
more than just physical obstacles. The WHO definition of barriers: “Factors in a person’s
environment that, through their absence or presence, limit functioning and create
disability.
Noise
Background noise can have a weighty impact on communication in several different ways
between professionals and service users. In health care settings, a care worker is on the
phone with a patient telling her that she will be late, but in the patient's house, the
grandchildren play, yelling resulting in the patient stop from hearing what’s being said by
the care worker. She may mishear and misunderstand the conversation. The noise prevents
the individual from hearing each other. Background noise is a barrier because can take the
receiver's attention away from the content of the communication, making it more difficult
to understand them.
Lighting
The lighting needs to be in the right intensity, not too strong and not too poor because we
can’t see in the dark, we need light to see especially, to see the non-verbal as facial
expression and written communication as papers. If the patient is in the hospital and the
lights bulbs aren’t working properly and there aren’t windows, the patient will be in a room
dimly lit. The nurse is giving some documents to the patient to read and fill out but because
of the poor lighting the room the patient won’t be able to read verbal communication such
as facial expression and written communication.
Time
Timing is critical in communication; poor timing prevents effective communication. For
example, in the hospital, if a patient is in pain or eating, the patient will not be a
concentration on what is being said by the sender. So, the doctor as the sender needs to be
aware of the receiver's mood to assess if it is the right time to talk right. Timing it is a barrier
because your time to talk maybe it's not the right time to talk for the service user, they
maybe are busy, distracted or not in the mood to talk.
Seating
The care worker is on the bus with many service users he is seating in the front of the bus.
The male worker wants to talk with a certain patient that is seating in the back of the bus.
Seating is a barrier because both are seating too far from each other making them need to
shout so they can hear each other. It could be more effective if they are seating close to
each other to be able to communicate better. They need to seat too close neither too far so.
, Space
Lack of space could be a barrier because can make service users uncomfortable and don’t
want to use the health care services. The centre must have the right size that everyone can
walk without people do not get pushed. The lack of space in having cluttered corridors or
very tiny corridors in an elderly centre could have a negative effect in wheelchair service
user, could make services user does not want to walk in these corridors. By not having
enough space in the corridors prevent service users from taking information by not want to
walk in tiny corridors.
Settings
The environment such as location or place can affect negatively the service user
communication with others. The patient meets the psychiatrist in their office as a health
care setting. The couch and the room are the environmental contexts. If the session was
taking place in the outdoors on the raining day the communication between could be as
effective if the session took plain the inside. This happens because the patient won't be as
comfortable and confident to talk if the patient was in a silent and calm setting.
(P4)
Barrier: Depression
Depression is having feelings of unhappiness and hopelessness, to losing interest in the
things you used to enjoy and feeling very tearful also as feeling constantly tired, sleeping
badly, having no appetite or sex drive, and various aches and pains. Feelings that lead to
suicidal thoughts.
Depression can be a barrier because an individual with depression doesn’t have the
confidence to openly talk about things and also, they are struggling to ask things a direct
and straightforward way. Usually, people with depression are often so overwhelmed with
depressive symptoms to the point the symptoms impair their ability to communicate
effectively.
Don’t be able to have enough confidence to ask for help have a huge impact on the patient,
because as health professionals we can’t help if we don’t know the problem. When an
elderly patient has losing interest in life, she is ashamed to tell people her feelings. By don't
say her worries, she is making things worse. It’s impossible the care worker helps the
patient if the patient doesn’t tell the problem to the care worker.
Strategies: Building relationships & Confident
To overcome it barrier health professionals may build good relationships with service users.
When health professionals build a relationship by listening, making activities together, be
patient and not be judged with the patient is more likely the patient to open up and disclose
the information if they trust their health professional. This happens because the patient
starts to increase the trust in the professional. Building relationships as strategy improves
communication in health and care settings because when a care worker, a nurse takes
