Medical Information, Forums and Communities (2024)

FAQs

What strategy will you use to ensure your message is free from medical jargon? ›

Using clear language and avoiding vague or overly technical jargon will help your patients digest complex medical information. A study published in Health Literacy Research and Practice found that sometimes patients neither understand medical terminology nor recognize the gaps in their comprehension.

The National Institutes of Health website is a good place to start for reliable health information. The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention website is another one. As a rule, health websites sponsored by federal government agencies are accurate sources of information.

The High Cost of Health Care

The problem: Perhaps the most pressing issue in health care currently is the high cost of care. More than 45% of American adults say it's difficult to afford health care, according to a survey by the Kaiser Family Foundation, and more than 40% have medical debt.

Be honest. Avoid medical jargon as it may confuse or mislead patients. Speak clearly and use unambiguous language. Actively listen to the patient, ask for and respect their views.

health brochures in your local hospital, doctor's office or community health centre. telephone helplines such as NURSE-ON-CALL or Directline. your doctor or pharmacist. reliable health information websites, such as government sites, condition-specific sites, support organisation sites, and medical journals.

The main sources of health statistics are surveys, administrative and medical records, claims data, vital records, surveillance, disease registries, and peer-reviewed literature.

Enhancing patient trust and community connections, advocating for greater affordability, and providing options for telehealth and after-hours appointments are all potential components of improving access to needed care for these patients.

What are key barriers to health care access? ›

Heart Disease – 655,381 deaths per year

Heart disease encompasses many heart conditions, including heart valve disease, heart infection, disease of the heart muscle, congenital heart defects, heart rhythm issues, coronary artery disease, and more.

Perspective: Consistency, Continuity, and Coordination—The 3Cs of Seamless Patient Care. Amid our efforts to improve health care quality, we can easily lose sight of the most basic questions. Consider evidence-based clinical guidelines, protocols, and pathways.

According to the seven Cs, communication needs to be: clear, concise, concrete, correct, coherent, complete and courteous.

You can collect patient data in several different ways — by conducting an interview in a clinical setting, by having the patient complete a paper form, or by having the patient fill out an online form. There are pros and cons to each method.

The results showed that the family doctor and pharmacist were generally regarded as the most reliable sources, whereas TV advertisem*nts, newspaper and magazine articles were among the least reliable.

What are 5 unreliable sources? ›

Some examples of reliable sources would be scholarly or peer-reviewed articles and books, trade or professional articles and books, reputable magazine articles, books, and newspaper articles from well-established papers.

Health information can be extremely useful, empowering us to make important health decisions. However, health information also can be confusing and overwhelming. Given the wealth of information available through the Internet, journals and other sources, it's important to be able to assess its quality.

Generally, a credible or reliable source is one that experts in your subject domain would agree is valid for your purposes. This can vary, so it is best to use one of the source evaluation methods that best fits your needs. Do remember that credibility is contextual!

Awards and Recognition. WebMD offers credible and in-depth medical news, features, reference material, and online community programs.

Not enough primary care physicians. Not enough medical schools. Urban blight and rural poverty limiting desirability of those neighborhoods for medical practices. No convenient and affordable transportation for poor patients to get to remote medical offices or hospitals.

Researchers and health care providers have found that lack of access to healthy food, adequate housing, transportation, and education account for 40% of what contributes to poor health within vulnerable populations .

Why is healthcare not accessible to everyone? ›

Race, or racial discrimination, has resulted in patient access to care problems. Decades-old racist policies like redlining have led to unequal healthcare access and thus unequal healthcare outcomes, numerous studies have found.

Health and health care disparities are often viewed through the lens of race and ethnicity, but they occur across a broad range of dimensions. For example, disparities occur across socioeconomic status, age, geography, language, gender, disability status, citizenship status, and sexual identity and orientation.

Potential health effects of low health care access include poor management of chronic disease, increased burden due to preventable diseases and disability, and premature death.

Social determinants of health such as poverty, unequal access to health care, lack of education, stigma, and racism are underlying, contributing factors of health inequities. The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) is committed to achieving improvements in people's lives by reducing health inequities.

Social determinants of health (SDOH) have a major impact on people's health, well-being, and quality of life. Examples of SDOH include: Safe housing, transportation, and neighborhoods. Racism, discrimination, and violence.

Existing research has focused on five dimensions of access: affordability, accessibility, availability, accommodation and acceptability.

Social barriers are related to the conditions in which people are born, grow, live, learn, work and age – or social determinants of health – that can contribute to decreased functioning among people with disabilities.

Guns are the leading cause of death for US children and teens, since surpassing car accidents in 2020. Firearms accounted for nearly 19% of childhood deaths (ages 1-18) in 2021, according to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention Wonder database. Nearly 3,600 children died in gun-related incidents that year.

The 10 most common health conditions in the United States are heart disease, cancer, chronic lower respiratory diseases, obesity, Alzheimer's, diabetes, substance abuse disorders, the flu, kidney disease, and mental health conditions.

What are the top issues facing healthcare in 2023? ›

The US healthcare industry faces demanding conditions in 2023, including recessionary pressure, continuing high inflation rates, labor shortages, and endemic COVID-19.

Many unsafe care practices, risks, and errors contribute to patient harm and overall economic burden. These include medical, diagnostic, and radiation errors, healthcare associated infections, unsafe surgical procedures and transfusion practices, sepsis, venous thromboembolism, and falls.

Clinical topics commonly considered controversial include abortion and other aspects of reproductive health; end-of-life and palliative care matters, including physician-assisted dying; LGBTQIA (lesbian, gay, bisexual, transgender, queer [or questioning], intersex, asexual) care; elements of addiction medicine and ...

Common conditions in older age include hearing loss, cataracts and refractive errors, back and neck pain and osteoarthritis, chronic obstructive pulmonary disease, diabetes, depression and dementia. As people age, they are more likely to experience several conditions at the same time.

Mental health

“Mental disorders are a leading cause of disability worldwide, with no evidence of a decrease in this burden since 1990.

Business jargon is often used by both leaders and staff members because of familiarity and the need of the speaker or sender to impress. Instead of looking to impress, strive for simplicity and clarity instead. Utilize simple language that is literal and straightforward.

To avoid jargon in your writing, here are a few tips: When in doubt, ask a friend who doesn't know anything about your field to read your article. Get honest feedback and act on it. Read your writing out loud.

Use Simple Language

By omitting all jargon terms and bookish words, you eliminate opportunities for miscommunication and increase the chance that the person you're communicating with will immediately understand you.

What are jargons examples? ›

Jargon is occupation-specific language used by people in a given profession, the “shorthand” that people in the same profession use to communicate with each other. For example, plumbers might use terms such as elbow, ABS, sweating the pipes, reducer, flapper, snake, and rough-in.

Overview. Medical jargon has been described as a second language used by healthcare professionals to shorten and ease communication. In patient care, this "medical shorthand" can cause confusion and diminish understanding between healthcare professional and patient.

Verbal communication makes conveying thoughts faster and easier and is the most successful method of communication.

Drafting involves writing consistently in a formal, casual, or informal style characterized by the “Six Cs”: clarity, conciseness, coherence, correctness, courtesy, and conviction.

The seven C's are: clear, correct, complete, concrete, concise, considered and courteous.

Excessive use of the passive voice, excessive nominalization, unnecessary repetition, and unnecessary words and phrases are some common causes of wordy writing.