Diagnosis and treatment. What do patients know?
Roizblatt, A.; Cueto, G.; Alvarez, P.
Boletin de la Oficina Sanitaria Panamericana. Pan American Sanitary Bureau 97(6): 491-496
1984
ISSN/ISBN: 0030-0632 PMID: 6241474 Document Number: 241233
In 1983, a study was conducted with 120 patients of both sexes in the psychiatric service of the El Salvador Hospital in Valparaiso, Chile, to evaluate the degree of information that psychiatric patients have of their diagnosis and treatment. As a control group, 100 patients of both sexes were selected in the internal medicine multiclinic of the Carlos Van Buren Hospital in the same city. The members of both groups presented diseases that required medical treatment during .gtoreq. 3 mo. A questionnaire was filled out for all patients, which, in addition to recording the name, age, sex, educational level and length of drug therapy, also included questions on the diagnosis, the medication prescribed and the effects and adverse reactions caused by such medication. The responses were evaluated according to the date recorded in the clinical history of each patient. Only 5 people (4.16%) in the psychiatric group and 4 people (4%) in the internal medicine group answered all the questions correctly, which demonstrated the low level of information in both groups. The patients in the control group showed greater knowledge of their diagnosis (62%) than those in the psychiatric group (48.30%); 75.83% of the patients in the psychiatric group named the prescribed medication correctly, in comparison to 54% of the control group. The lowest percentagees (5.83 in the psychiatric group and 6.00 in the internal medicine group) of correct answers in both groups were related to knowledge of the adverse reactions caused by the drugs. The results of this study point up a failure in the doctor-patient relationship; to correct this failure, it is recommended that the health staff make greater efforts to inform patients of their diagnosis and treatment in simple and direct terms.