Communication

I am also currently doing my Neuro placement in an outpatient setting. My case load consists of a few patients who are both expressive and receptive aphasic, to differing degrees (some can only respond with yes and no, while others have more words to their vocab and can adopt and repeat your cues), as a result of their strokes. It has been very interesting to consider your own communication you have with your patients and a great way to develop your communication to ensure you can ask the same thing in a number of ways so that your patient understands what you are asking them and that you are getting an accurate response from the patient. I have found that it does however limit the personal relationship you can have with some of your patients as it is quite difficult to answer family etc questions with yes/no. Yet, these people all have families including children and even grandchildren and to see their eyes light up when you mention them but not being able to chat with you about them must be so frustrating for them. To me, this aspect has been a big reminder that a lot of patient’s are often still cognitively alert yet must get so frustrated at not being able to express themselves all the time.