Exploring the relationships among attachment, emotional intelligence and communication

Objectives  Attachment style has been shown to influence both emotional intelligence (EI) and the clinical communication of medical students and doctors. No research has assessed the relationships among attachment, EI and clinical communication in medical students. This study was conducted to evaluate the effect of EI on the relationship between medical students’ attachment style and clinical communication. Methods  Medical students were invited to complete measures of attachment (using the Experiences in Close Relationships–Short Form [ECR-SF], a 12-item measure that provides attachment avoidance and attachment anxiety dimensional scores) and EI (using the Mayer–Salovey–Caruso Emotional Intelligence Test [MSCEIT], a 141-item measure of the perception, use, understanding and management of emotions) at the end of Year 1, prior to a summative objective structured clinical examination (OSCE). Clinical communication was assessed using OSCE scores. Structural equation modelling (SEM) was used to analyse a hypothetical model of the relationships among attachment style, EI and clinical communication. Results  A total of 200 of 358 (55.9%) students participated. Attachment avoidance was significantly negatively correlated with total EI scores (r = − 0.28, p < 0.01); total EI was significantly positively correlated with OSCE scores (r = 0.23, p < 0.01). A parsimonious SEM revealed that attachment avoidance accounted for 13% of the variance in students’ total EI scores but did not directly predict OSCE scores, whereas total EI significantly predicted 7% of the variance in OSCE scores. Conclusions  Attachment is perceived to be stable from early adulthood, whereas the literature suggests that EI can be developed through the use of targeted interventions. This has potential implications for the training of medical students in clinical communication

Conscientious objection and person-centered care

From PubMed via Jisc Publications Router.Stephen Buetow - ORCID 0000-0002-9771-248X https://orcid.org/0000-0002-9771-248XItem not available in this repository.Person-centered care offers a promising way to manage clinicians' conscientious objection to providing services they consider morally wrong. Health care centered on persons, rather than patients, recognizes clinicians and patients on the same stratum. The moral interests of clinicians, as persons, thus warrant as much consideration as those of other persons, including patients. Interconnected moral interests of clinicians, patients, and society construct the clinician as a socially embedded and integrated self, transcending the simplistic duality of private conscience versus public role expectations. In this milieu of blurred boundaries, person-centered care offers a constructive way to accommodate conscientious objection by clinicians. The constitutionally social nature of clinicians commits and enables them, through care mechanisms such as self-care, to optimize the quality of health care and protect the welfare of patients. To advance these conditions, it is recommended that the medical profession develop a person-centered culture of care, along with clinician virtues and skills for person-centered communication.39pubpu