Social science & medicine
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Social science & medicine · Jul 2015
Playing doctor: Simulation in medical school as affective practice.
Simulated patient encounters, in which a trained layperson role-plays a patient, have become increasingly important in medical education. One such type is the gynecological teaching associate (GTA), who teaches medical students how to perform the pelvic examination using her own body. ⋯ This paper uses the theoretical framework of the medical habitus to understand the role of emotion in medical student socialization. It argues that simulation is an example of affective practice: any rehearsal of techniques or styles of expressing, experiencing, or managing emotion that reshape the body's capacity to feel.
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Social science & medicine · Jul 2015
"It's safer to …" parent consulting and clinician antibiotic prescribing decisions for children with respiratory tract infections: An analysis across four qualitative studies.
This paper reports a cross-study analysis of four studies, aiming to understand the drivers of parental consulting and clinician prescribing behaviour when children under 12 years consult primary care with acute respiratory tract infections (RTI). Qualitative data were obtained from three primary studies and one systematic review. Purposeful samples were obtained for (i) a focus group study of parents' information needs and help seeking; (ii) an interview study of parents' experiences of primary health care (60 parents in total); and (iii) an interview study of clinicians' experiences of RTI consultations for children (28 clinicians). ⋯ Therefore perception of a threat or uncertainty about that threat tended to lead to parental consulting and clinician antibiotic prescribing. Clinician and parent experience could influence the perception of safety in either direction, depending on whether previous action had resulted in perceived increases or decreases in safety. Future interventions aimed at reducing unnecessary consulting or antibiotic prescribing need to consider how to make the desired action fit with social norms and feel safer for parents and clinicians.