Observational Study
Copyright ©The Author(s) 2022. Published by Baishideng Publishing Group Inc. All rights reserved.
World J Psychiatry. Feb 19, 2022; 12(2): 323-337
Published online Feb 19, 2022. doi: 10.5498/wjp.v12.i2.323
Importance of communication in medical practice and medical education: An emphasis on empathy and attitudes and their possible influences
Henriette Löffler-Stastka, Guoruey Wong, Katharina Zervos, Dagmar Steinmair
Dagmar Steinmair, Henriette Löffler-Stastka, Department of Psychoanalysis and Psychotherapy, Medical University of Vienna, Vienna 1090, Austria
Dagmar Steinmair, Karl Landsteiner University of Health Sciences, Krems 3500, Austria
Dagmar Steinmair, Department of Ophtalmology, University Hospital St. Pölten, St. Pölten 3100, Austria
Katharina Zervos, Department of Internal Medicine I, KRH Klinikum Robert-Koch-Gehrden, Gehrden 30989, Germany
Guoruey Wong, Faculty of Medicine, University of Montréal, Montréal 2900, Québec, Canada
Author contributions: Steinmair D and Zervos K wrote the original draft of the manuscript; Steinmair D, Wong G, and Löffler-Stastka H edited and revised the manuscript; Zervos K contributed to the investigation; Löffler-Stastka H contributed to the supervision of the study and to the conceptualization of the study; Steinmair D and Löffler-Stastka H reviewed the literature; Steinmair D contributed to the visualization of the study.
Institutional review board statement: This study was reviewed and approved by the Ethics Committee of the Medical University of Vienna (EK-Nr. 1381/2015).
Informed consent statement: Participants were required to give informed consent to the study. No patients were enrolled in the study. Furthermore, the analysis used anonymous data that were obtained after each participant had agreed to the assessment by written consent.
Conflict-of-interest statement: We have no conflict of interest and no financial relationships to disclose.
Data sharing statement: Data is available on request.
STROBE statement: The authors have read the STROBE Statement-checklist of items, and the manuscript was prepared and revised according to the STROBE Statement-checklist of items.
Open-Access: This article is an open-access article that was selected by an in-house editor and fully peer-reviewed by external reviewers. It is distributed in accordance with the Creative Commons Attribution NonCommercial (CC BY-NC 4.0) license, which permits others to distribute, remix, adapt, build upon this work non-commercially, and license their derivative works on different terms, provided the original work is properly cited and the use is non-commercial. See: https://creativecommons.org/Licenses/by-nc/4.0/
Corresponding author: Henriette Löffler-Stastka, MD, Dean, Director, Professor, Department of Psychoanalysis and Psychotherapy, Medical University of Vienna, Währinger Gürtel 18-20, Vienna 1090, Austria. henriette.loeffler-stastka@meduniwien.ac.at
Received: April 23, 2021
Peer-review started: April 23, 2021
First decision: June 17, 2021
Revised: June 30, 2021
Accepted: December 25, 2021
Article in press: December 25, 2021
Published online: February 19, 2022
Processing time: 299 Days and 22.3 Hours
Core Tip

Core Tip: The findings in this study underline the importance of paying attention to core competencies in medicine and medical students’ socialization and training. Enriching self-assessments with observer-based reflections, as carried out in this investigation, seems to be a valid approach to identify training needs. Tolerance of ambiguity and openness to self-reflection, as demonstrated by the participants in our study, might be relevant in this context. Empathic relationships shape embodied empathy, result in embodied skills, and shift an individual’s perception.