Our goal is to create more training scenarios for healthcare students and professionals in medicine, nursing, mental health, dentistry, pharmacy, healthcare staff and others. To continue building this resource, we kindly ask that after watching these videos. Please complete only one survey even if you access these videos on multiple occasions. The survey will take approximately 10 minutes to complete.
Communication Partner Training for Healthcare Professionals
Individuals with aphasia have worse healthcare outcomes than individuals without aphasia. This fact highlights the impact of communication difficulties within healthcare settings; patients with aphasia may lack the ability to understand plans of care, express concerns or questions, clarify instructions, or self-advocate for healthcare needs or preferences.
One way to address this inequity is to train healthcare students and professionals to communicate more effectively with individuals with aphasia.
Funded by a grant from the Association of Schools Advancing Health Professions (ASAHP), the Department of Communication Sciences and Disorders at UT San Antonio has created communication partner training videos for healthcare professionals. Our findings have shown that these modules are an effective tool for teaching healthcare students to use communication strategies with people with aphasia.
Below you will find a series of self-learning modules:
The first module features individuals with aphasia sharing their experiences with aphasia and in the healthcare environment.
The second module is a tutorial about aphasia and strategies to support communication.
The remaining modules are sets of two contrasting healthcare scenarios showing interactions with and without the use of communication strategies (4–8 minutes each). These paired videos feature clinical environments for various healthcare professionals.
- Module 1: Testimonials about Living with Aphasia and Navigating Healthcare
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Module 2: Aphasia and How to Support Conversation
explaining aphasia along with communication strategies to support individuals with aphasia in the healthcare environment
Module 2 Reflection Questions
- How would summarize the conversation partner framework for a colleague who is unfamiliar?
- What does the mnemonic SAVE stand for?
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Module 3a The Physical Therapy Environment Without Communication Support
Module 3a Reflection Question:
- How does this patient indicate that her communication is not being adequately supported?
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Module 3b The Physical Therapy Environment With Communication Support
Module 3b Reflection Question
- How does the clinician acknowledge the patient’s competence AND allow the patient to demonstrate her competence?
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Module 4a The Occupational Therapy Environment Without Communication Support
Module 4a Reflection Question
- How does this patient self-advocate for his communication needs?
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Module 4b The Occupational Therapy Environment With Communication Support
Module 4b Reflection Question:
- How does the clinician acknowledge the patient’s competence AND allow the patient to demonstrate his competence?
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Module 5a The Physician Assistant Environment Without Communication Support
Module 5a Reflection Question
- For this patient, what are two potential impacts of failing to acknowledge competence?
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Module 5b The Physician Assistant Environment With Communication Support
Module 5b Reflection Question
- How does the clinician acknowledge the patient’s competence AND allow the patient to demonstrate his competence?
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References
- Flowers, H. L., Skoretz, S.A., Silver, F. L., Rochon, E., Fang, J., Falmand-Roze, C., & Martino, R. (2016). Poststroke aphasia frequency, recovery, and outcomes: A systematic review and meta-analysis. Archives of Physical Medicine and Rehabilitation, 97, 2188-2201.
- Kagan, A. (1998). Supported conversation for adults with aphasia: Methods and resources for training conversation partners. Aphasiology, 12(9), 816–830.
- Shrubsole, K., Lin, T., Burton, C., Scott, J., & Finch, E. (2021). Delivering an iterative Communication Partner Training programme to multidisciplinary healthcare professionals. A pilot implementation study and process evaluation. International Journal of Language and Communication Disorders, 56(3), 620-636.
- Stransky, M. L., Jensen, K. M., & Morris, M. A. (2018). Adults with communication disabilities experience poorer health and healthcare outcomes compared to persons without communication disabilities. Journal of General Internal Medicine, 33(12), 2147–2155.
- Torrington Eaton, C., McAvoy, M., Morgan, S., & Kennedy, A. (in revision International Journal of Language and Communication Disorders). From knowledge to practice: Evaluating components in communication partner training for healthcare students working with individuals with aphasia.