Communicating bad news, e.g. the message of the death of a close relative, is not a straight forward task for physicians. Typical common inter-speaking attitudes often fail in this difficult situation. Even simple rules and cooking recipes are seldom helpful. Medical training unfortunately does not cover this topic sufficiently. Hence physicians have to learn from trial and error. However, this trial-and-error-method may provoke an unfavourable course of conversation. Training and knowledge of evidence-based rules can improve communicative faculties and facilitate delivering bad news.
Georg Thieme Verlag Stuttgart * New York.