Therapeutic Communication Skills

Active listening is the main key for understanding any kind of communication. Active listening means more than just hearing words. It means understanding what someone else is saying by making eye contact, body language and verbal responses.

Communication is usually taken for granted in our every day to day living as we use it without thought. Good communication skills are needed in the workplace and especially with nursing staff to and from patients when giving first hand care. Good or bad communication can make there experience within the health care setting a positive or negative one and can leave a lasting impression. A good health care provider can use there communication skills to put a patient at ease with a few comforting words or gestures, a lack of positive communication in the health care setting could leave the patient feeling neglected, ignored and not valued as a patient.

The five following questions are a great way to discuss today’s communication in the health care field; this paper will give a better explanation on what therapeutic communications are, cultural blindness as well as cultural competence, and identifying cultural backgrounds. Working in the health care field we use these very few things every day without even realizing it. It is important that health care professionals have a clear understanding about these concepts to provide the proper care to patients.

In nursing practice, communication is essential, and good communication skills are paramount in the development of a therapeutic nurse/patient relationship. This aim of this essay is to discuss the importance of communication in nursing, demonstrating how effective communication facilitates a therapeutic

Listening and attending, empathy, information giving and support in the context of a nurse-patient relationship are identified as essential communication skills in nursing (Timmins, 2007).

As a nurse, communication is an essential and important factor to building a therapeutic relationship between a nurse and patient as it is the difference between average and excellent nursing care, as it helps maintain a good quality of life and allows nurses’ and patients to interact and provide comfort when needed. The importance of good communication can become apparent with patients especially when they are in the hospital, as it helps the nurses build a positive relationship with patients and helps overcome barriers including physical, psychological and social. A therapeutic relationship is built on many factors which include both verbal and non-verbal communication which helps maintains the relationship and strengthens it due to the positive impact it has not only on the patient’s experience but also the nurse’s.

Therapeutic communication is considered the heart of family nursing practice (Deane, & Fain, 2016). Knowing the different types of communication is vital for nurses, as it delivers an effective relationship between nurse-client affiliation. Effective therapeutic communication is the main key to success.

In this essay, I intend to reflect on a situation I encountered during my first community placement I had the opportunity to develop my communication skills not just theoretically but also practically, facing a real life environment. My placement made me aware of the importance of interpersonal and communication skills which are very important in the delivery of care. Throughout my nursing career, I will be encouraged to develop reflective practice skills and become a reflective practitioner. Reflection refers to a series of steps that you may take to question and explore an experience with the aim of learning from it. I will discuss the importance of communication in order to maintain a therapeutic relationship.

I find active listening to be a strength and skill that comes to me from enjoying listening to all kinds of people and engaging with them. I strike up conversation with all genders, races, ages, and cultures as communicating with people helps we learn about them, myself and

Achieving the goal as a successful nurse is not easy as it requires not only a broad knowledge but also clinical skills (Raya 2006). One of the crucial factors leading to that is learning to create therapeutic relationships between health care professionals and patients through professional communication. This is long-term training since nurses must know how to apply different communication methods to help their patients with kindness and sincerity (Varcarolis 2005). The purpose of this study is to assess knowledge of how diversified communication types are used and their efficiency in building a therapeutic relationship.

As first year nursing students, we have been introduced to concepts that are fundamental to our professional development as future nurses, such as interpersonal understanding, and interpersonal communication. In fact, understanding the importance of interpersonal communication during different stages of the therapeutic relationship between a nurse and a client is one of our main learning objectives. As a result, we have been assigned to perform a standardized patient scenario interview with an actor in order to demonstrate our communication skills through three different stages of the therapeutic relationship: the interaction phase, the working phase, and the resolution phase. The purpose of this paper is to critically analyze my own performance during the interview process, and identify my areas for growth and my areas of strength in the communication techniques.

Arnold E (1999). Interpersonal Relationships: Professional Communication Skills for Nursing. 3rd Edition. Philadelphia: WB Saunders Company.

In this assignment, I am going to review four cases, which will require a number of different communication skills focusing primarily on; developing a therapeutic relationship, communicating assertively, communicating effectively with an individual with a disability/impairment and communicating with individuals from another culture. I will discuss building a therapeutic relationship and effective communication with each patient.

Therapeutic Communication has a huge impact on patients, whether, we, as nurses, see it or not. It is very important for a nurse to gain a patient’s trust. Many patients are already filled with sadness, nervousness and unsure thoughts of their current situation. Such thoughts may make a person scared to trust or open up to a nurse or doctor. Developing a close rapport with a patient can help to create a safe, warming environment, resulting in a positive experience throughout their time in the hospital or even nursing home. In “Therapeutic Communication”, Anna Lauria opens saying, “What we say or do not say can influence whether a client is able to quiet his mind, relax his body and initiate a healing response” (Lauria). Being a nurse, we automatically have the opportunity to create a strong influence on patients’ lives during, and even after, their hospital experience.

Listening is more than just hearing. The process of listening involves receiving and constructing meaning, and responding to verbal and/or nonverbal messages. In other words, listening is not always easy and being a good listener is all about developing listening skills. To receive messages appropriately we have to listen actively. Active listening can be broken down into three important skills; first of all you have to reflect the feelings that the person is communicating, secondly reflect the content that they are communicating and finally ask good, meaningful questions.