Correspondence
A theoretical framework to describe communication processes during medical disability assessment interviews
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* Corresponding author: Allard J van der Beek a.vanderbeek@vumc.nl
1 VU University Medical Center, Department of Public and Occupational Health, EMGO Institute for Health and Care Research, Amsterdam, The Netherlands
2 Research Center for Insurance Medicine, collaboration between AMC-UWV-VUmc, Amsterdam, The Netherlands
BMC Public Health 2009, 9:375 doi:10.1186/1471-2458-9-375
Published: 6 October 2009Abstract
Background
Research in different fields of medicine suggests that communication is important in physician-patient encounters and influences satisfaction with these encounters. It is argued that this also applies to the non-curative tasks that physicians perform, such as sickness certification and medical disability assessments. However, there is no conceptualised theoretical framework that can be used to describe intentions with regard to communication behaviour, communication behaviour itself, and satisfaction with communication behaviour in a medical disability assessment context.
Objective
The objective of this paper is to describe the conceptualisation of a model for the communication behaviour of physicians performing medical disability assessments in a social insurance context and of their claimants, in face-to-face encounters during medical disability assessment interviews and the preparation thereof.
Conceptualisation
The behavioural model, based on the Theory of Planned Behaviour (TPB), is conceptualised for the communication behaviour of social insurance physicians and claimants separately, but also combined during the assessment interview. Other important concepts in the model are the evaluation of communication behaviour (satisfaction), intentions, attitudes, skills, and barriers for communication.
Conclusion
The conceptualisation of the TPB-based behavioural model will help to provide insight into the communication behaviour of social insurance physicians and claimants during disability assessment interviews. After empirical testing of the relationships in the model, it can be used in other studies to obtain more insight into communication behaviour in non-curative medicine, and it could help social insurance physicians to adapt their communication behaviour to their task when performing disability assessments.