Why Women With Breast Cancer Don’t Understand Their Situation

I read an article that talked about a study that was done regarding women with breast cancer and the understanding that they had about their condition. The results may seem rather startling when taken at face value and attributed to what seems to be a failure on the women’s part for not having this knowledge. One comment that I saw was particularly touching in that the patient was taking responsibility for her own lack of knowledge indicating that chemo brain may be a cause so be sure to keep a diary. However, I have a very different take on this matter.

“Hopefully, more doctors will take the time and make the effort to educate the patients that they have immediately in their spheres.”Barbara Jacoby

The conclusions from the study led the researchers to identify that “a critical need for improved patient education and provider awareness of this issue is needed. I am completely in agreement with this suggestion but I don’t believe that a study was needed to reach this conclusion. Based upon my own experiences and those of others with whom I have spoken, the patient does not have this information available to her because no one ever took the time to give it to her.

It seems that many doctors are of the belief that the patient doesn’t need to be informed because they won’t understand the information anyway and there is no need for her to have it because the doctors will direct her with regard to her course of treatment because they know what is best. For them, the old way of people blindly following doctor’s orders is still very much in play.

Another reason that doctors quite often don’t discuss this type of information with the patient is because they don’t have the time. Medicine has now become a business on a new level because most practices are now at a group level and each doctor is expected to see a certain number of patients each day in order to assure that enough money is being brought in to the practice. Added to that is the requirements for medical records to be electronically kept so in many cases the time that may have been allotted to discussions with the patient in the past is now being used to record the data on some sort of electronic device to assure that it is understood for purposes of proper coding so that insurance payments can be received as quickly as possible.

The sad part is that both the patient and doctors lose in this situation. If a patient is not given enough information to understand their condition and what might be given to them as recommended treatment, the patient may choose not to follow the prescribed steps because they don’t have any sense of real need for it. Recommended tests and treatments may be understood by the patient as just something that the doctors are doing so that they can make more money. After all, how many stories have we all seen in the press about over diagnosis and unnecessary surgeries being performed?

For the doctor, respect, trust and satisfaction may also be lost in such situations. If a patient does not understand the reason for a course of treatment or a recommended surgery, she may very well lose faith in her provider and either seek assistance elsewhere or just ignore the problem altogether. The doctor may also be perceived as not caring enough about his/her patients and not only lose the patient that is currently being treated but also lose other patients when word is spread among a patient’s personal community about the doctor with a recommendation that others should seek medical help elsewhere.

Hopefully, more doctors will take the time and make the effort to educate the patients that they have immediately in their spheres. Every effort should be made to provide as much information to the patient as the patient is willing to accept. Little things like writing down the information for a patient who seems to be overwhelmed can make a huge difference. Not every patient chooses to know the basis of how her care and treatment have been decided but that doesn’t mean that the information doesn’t need to be shared in some form so that the patient has it for reference at a future time.