• Scand J Caring Sci · Jun 2009

    Immigrant patients' experiences and reflections pertaining to the consultation: a study on patients from Chile, Iran and Turkey in primary health care in Stockholm, Sweden.

    • Eivor Wiking, Nuha Saleh-Stattin, Sven-Erik Johansson, and Jan Sundquist.
    • Center for Family and Community Medicine, Department of Neurobiology, Caring Sciences and Society, Karolinska Institutet, Stockholm, Sweden. eivorwiking@swipnet.se
    • Scand J Caring Sci. 2009 Jun 1; 23 (2): 290-7.

    AbstractOur knowledge of the immigrant patient's experiences and reflections regarding consultations in primary health care where interpreters are used is limited. Thus, the primary aim was to explore these experiences and reflections. The second aim was to study whether demographic and migration-related factors are associated with the patient's satisfaction with the consultation and feeling of consolation given by the general practitioner (GP). The third aim was to analyse whether these feelings are related to the time from the booking to the consultation, to self-reported health, symptoms and the patient's experiences. A questionnaire was distributed to 78 consecutive immigrant patients from Chile, Iran and Turkey at 12 primary healthcare centres around Stockholm. The respondents were asked about their background and health status, while open-ended questions focused on their experiences and comments regarding the consultation and cross-cultural communication in general. Ethical approval was obtained. The respondents consisted of 52 patients, 16 from Chile, nine from Iran and 27 from Turkey. Most of the answers concerned communication problems because of language and cultural differences between the GP and the patient and the GP's ability to listen. Therefore, the importance of having a competent interpreter for a satisfactory consultation was stressed. Many of the respondents also felt that the GP's ability to listen to them and understand them is crucial in the consultation. Background facts, including demographic and migration-related factors, health status and factors related to the consultation, did not seem to be associated with the patient's satisfaction and the feeling of consolation. One limitation is that the sample is small and not equally distributed. The use of authorized interpreters during the consultation is essential. The consultation must be based on a patient-centred strategy and adjusted to the patient's educational level. Cultural competence is needed when meeting immigrant patients.

      Pubmed     Full text   Copy Citation     Plaintext  

      Add institutional full text...

    Notes

     
    Knowledge, pearl, summary or comment to share?
    300 characters remaining
    help        
    You can also include formatting, links, images and footnotes in your notes
    • Simple formatting can be added to notes, such as *italics*, _underline_ or **bold**.
    • Superscript can be denoted by <sup>text</sup> and subscript <sub>text</sub>.
    • Numbered or bulleted lists can be created using either numbered lines 1. 2. 3., hyphens - or asterisks *.
    • Links can be included with: [my link to pubmed](http://pubmed.com)
    • Images can be included with: ![alt text](https://bestmedicaljournal.com/study_graph.jpg "Image Title Text")
    • For footnotes use [^1](This is a footnote.) inline.
    • Or use an inline reference [^1] to refer to a longer footnote elseweher in the document [^1]: This is a long footnote..

    hide…