Communication Strategies And The Stages Of The Helping Process In Health Care

The Five Stages of the Helping Process in Health Care

Question:

Discuss about the Communication Skills in Social Work for Health Care.

Health care field is a demanding and intensive service where health care staffs as well as patients or client may need help to address their health issues or professional issues in life. As health care organizations are the touch points and focus for recovery of patients, newly placed staffs may require help in solving complex issues in their professional practice or a health care professional may require help in effectively communicating with clients to understand their health issues and build therapeutic relationship with patients. Hence, helping process is crucial for client engagement in health care delivery and optimizing their health outcomes. Similarly, the helping process is critical for health care professionals to learn the strategies needed to overcome complex issues in practice. The essays give a detail insight into the stages of helping process and the role of communication strategies in each stage of helping process. Discussion is also provided for the barrier to communication process that influences engagement and the ways to address them.

In the health care field, health care simulation and debriefing methods is an excellent example of the helping process. The timing, facilitation, conversation and process elements determine the process of helping and learning for target health care staffs (Sawyer et al., 2016). Whatever might be the context or purpose of helping any client, the stages of helping process is similar for all context. All facilitator goes through the five stages of relationship building, assessment, goal setting, interventions and termination and follow-up during the helping process. The first stage of relationship building focuses on establishing genuine relationship with client based on trust and non-judgmental attitude. Any client feel safe and wish to participate in helping process or training only when facilitators respect the best interest of clients and communicate with empathy to help them verbalize their feelings and problem (Fox, 2013).  It is also evident that trust between facilitator-client is built by displaying acceptance, empathy, respect and non-judgmental attitude towards client. Grinberg et al., (2016) showed that in case of care management programs for patients with multiple chronic conditions, the element of security, genuineness and continuity facilitates building authentic healing relationship. Such relationship lead to active healthy management and motivation of patient to address persistent health issues too.

The second stage in the helping process is the assessment or clarification stage where formal and informal communication methods and technique is applied to get data regarding range of problems experience by clients. The questions used in this stage may be close ended and open ended questions. Maintaining sensitivity is crucial at this stage because certain question may have negative effects on clients and they may feel anxious or vulnerable (Joyce & Sills, 2014). Hence, having knowledge regarding the appropriate ways to communicate is important at this stage. The next stages that follows in the helping process is the goal setting phase which is made easier by going through the first two stages. By this stage, the facilitator is clear about the issues facing client and the appropriate technique needed to address the issue. Based on the knowledge regarding client’s issues, goal setting process for the future makes it clear to the facilitator as well as the client as to where they are heading. To establish a new goal for client, facilitators also communicate to patient about the desired outcome and benefits of the goals in the near future. The fourth stage in the helping process is the intervention stage where appropriate intervention is implemented according to the learning ability, experience and comfort level of clients (Hackney  & Bernard, 2016). In context of client suffering from major depression and altered moods, cognitive behavioral intervention is often provided by counselors to replace maladaptive behaviors with desirable behavior (Kendall & Hollon, 2013). The final stage in the process is the termination and follow process where relationship ends after the goal of helping is achieved (Fox, 2013).  

The Role of Communication Strategies in the Helping Process

After reviewing the process involved in all the five stages of helping process, it is evident that communication skill plays a crucial role in interacting and building a trusting relationship with clients. Whether the helping process is for any patients or any newly placed nurse in health care setting, integrating communication strategies at each stage is important for the success of mentoring process. Firstly, patience is needed as building relationship requires time and right communication styles. Interacting with clients in a friendly and supportive manner to ensure that client becomes comfortable and develops the trust that that the mentor is there to address their concerns only (Ivey, Ivey, & Zalaquett, 2013). In addition, having a non-judgmental attitude and expressing care or concern helps to strike the balance between facilitative and authoritative role of mentors.

In the assessment stage too, the style of communication used by the mentor has significant impact on the clients. The supportive skill is demonstrated by the mentors by expressing good intention and purpose of counseling or mentoring. In addition, giving good attentions to clients reduced the feeling of vulnerability in the client and they become comfortable to honestly disclose importance issues or challenges affecting them. The eliciting skill is demonstrated by mentors by asking clarifying questions and prompting the client to say more about any issues. Such process in interaction promotes reflective listening and provokes clients to self-discover their worries and solutions through reflecting (Okun & Kantrowitz, 2014). . Moreover, verbal and non-verbal gestures play an important in increasing the success of the helping process. For example, posture, tone of voice, eye contact, touch, proximity and facial expressions determines the level of genuineness and concern for clients. A mentor leaning forward to ask questions and holding their hand gently during communication is a sign of interest in client’s issues and being supportive to address their worries respectively (Zhou  & Fischer, 2017). Hence, it can be said that use of verbal as well as non-verbal communication skills helps to build rapport and extract useful information from clients. Similar communication style is often adapted by counselor when interviewing clients regarding the problem in their lives. 

Integration of communication strategies is also necessary during goal planning stage. By this stage, the problem or concern of client is known and facilitator communicate with client in a way to determine the problem in current situations and the appropriate intervention needed to achieve the goal of counseling (Eller, Lev & Feurer, 2014).. In this stage also, facilitative style helps to collaborate with mentee and make them accept the need to adapt new behavior to achieve desired goals. In this stage, question is often used to analyse the thinking process of mentee and their readiness or acceptance to adapt a new idea. Considering about confidentiality issues and informing clients about all possible risk and benefits of specific intervention is crucial at this stage to motivate clients to accept the change (Smith & Lewis, 2015). In the intervention stage, the authoritative style become dominant as mentors need to contribute their experience and knowledge correctly to client to maximize the benefits for them. Hence, authoritative style helps to correct the action and offer advice to client. Finally, during the termination stage of helping process, communication is necessary to make it clear to the mentee that a particular goal has been achieve and no more support is required by mentee. They may end the relationship by encouraging the client to continue with new behavior or change (Moore, 2014).

Barriers to Effective Communication and the Helping Process

The above discussion gives a clear idea regarding the link between communication strategies and helping process. However, many factors act as barriers in the helping and mentoring process which may limit the achievement of desired outcomes. These barriers may include organizational barriers such as lack of value to coaching, lack of time and resources for mentoring, resistance from senior staffs and low priority to mentoring process over other issues in organization (Janssen et al., 2014). In addition, poor communications skills in mentors or conflicting relationship between learner and mentor may hamper the purpose of helping and increase the likelihood of challenges and conflict in the process (Gopee, 2015). In many situations, lack of commitment of learners to adapt to new behavior also creates challenges for mentors during the helping process (Lee, Bell, & Shaulskiy, 2017). In case of organization barriers, the issue can be addressed by having a clear process of mentoring and making all key stakeholders aware about the helping process, support, supervision and its benefit for the organization. Having clear idea about the timing and place of mentoring and integrating them in existing practice is also crucial to address the barriers in the helping process. Poor communication skills also limit the purpose of helping purpose. For such mentors, there is a need to learn about socialized perceptions, appropriate behavior and ways to use verbal and non-verbal language with mentees (Liang et al., 2013).

The essay summarized the key stages which is essential in the helping process with examples from the health care field. In all the stages, appropriate methods of communication determine the success of the helping process. However, certain organizational and professional barriers to the mentoring process has also been identified that may defeat the whole purpose of helping a staff. In such situation, both the organization and supervisor must identify the key weakness and effectively integrate the helping process in existing practice. 

Reference 

Eller, L. S., Lev, E. L., & Feurer, A. (2014). Key components of an effective mentoring relationship: A qualitative study. Nurse education today, 34(5), 815-820.

Fox, R. (2013). Elements of the helping process: A guide for clinicians. Routledge.

Gopee, N. (2015). Mentoring and supervision in healthcare. Sage.

Grinberg, C., Hawthorne, M., LaNoue, M., Brenner, J., & Mautner, D. (2016). The core of care management: the role of authentic relationships in caring for patients with frequent hospitalizations. Population health management, 19(4), 248-256.

Hackney, H. L., & Bernard, J. M. (2016). Professional Counseling: A Process Guide to Helping. Pearson.

Ivey, A. E., Ivey, M. B., & Zalaquett, C. P. (2013). Intentional interviewing and counseling: Facilitating client development in a multicultural society. Nelson Education.

Janssen, S., Van Vuuren, M., & De Jong, M. D. (2014). Motives to mentor: Self-focused, protégé-focused, relationship-focused, organization-focused, and unfocused motives. Journal of Vocational Behavior, 85(3), 266-275.

Joyce, P., & Sills, C. (2014). Skills in Gestalt counselling & psychotherapy. Sage.

Kendall, P. C., & Hollon, S. D. (Eds.). (2013). Assessment Strategies for Cognitive–Behavioral Interventions. Academic Press.

Lee, J. J., Bell, L. F., & Shaulskiy, S. L. (2017). Exploring mentors’ perceptions of mentees and the mentoring relationship in a multicultural service-learning context. Active Learning in Higher Education, 1469787417715203.

Liang, B., Spencer, R., West, J., & Rappaport, N. (2013). Expanding the reach of youth mentoring: Partnering with youth for personal growth and social change. Journal of Adolescence, 36(2), 257-267.

Moore, C. W. (2014). The mediation process: Practical strategies for resolving conflict. John Wiley & Sons.

Okun, B., & Kantrowitz, R. (2014). Effective helping: Interviewing and counseling techniques. Nelson Education.

Sawyer, T., Eppich, W., Brett-Fleegler, M., Grant, V., & Cheng, A. (2016). More than one way to debrief: a critical review of healthcare simulation debriefing methods. Simulation in Healthcare, 11(3), 209-217.

Smith, M. K., & Lewis, M. (2015). Toward facilitative mentoring and catalytic interventions. Elt Journal, 69(2), 140-150.

Zhou, Y., & Fischer, M. H. (2017). Mimicking non-verbal emotional expressions and empathy development in simulated consultations: An experimental feasibility study. Patient Education and Counseling.