Application of the READY framework supports effective communication between health care providers and family members in intensive care

Abstract

Effective communication between intensive care health care providers and family is crucial to support surrogate or shared decision-making and to individualise care. Despite its importance in health care standards and policy, the quality of communication with families in intensive care is regarded as suboptimal. Furthermore, an intensive care admission is an extremely stressful event for families, which may impact their understanding and subsequent decision-making. Communicating with family members is a routine practice in intensive care; however, health care providers often receive no formal communication training. To date, family-focused communication interventions in intensive care have targeted end-of-life care and are not generalisable across all types of family-health care provider communication interactions. Mugweni et al. recently reported the results of a multiprofessional training intervention involving 26 health care professionals to improve the delivery of different news to families during pregnancy and at birth. A critique of this article has been undertaken to inform routine communication with critically ill family members and optimise the delivery of care in intensive care units.

Keywords: Communication; Education; Family-centred care; Intensive care; Training.