Patient-Physician Communication

The course provides students with the necessary tools for managing communication and relational aspects of their future medical profession. To this aim, the course comprises two parts: a first part in which, through frontal teaching, students will acquire the fundamental psychological concepts needed to understand the basic mechanisms underlying individual and social behavior; and a second part in which, through both frontal teaching and professional activities, students will acquire knowledge, skills and competences in the relationship and communication processes between patient and physician.

At the end of the course the student will attain knowledge on the building blocks of human behavior, its changes during the life span and its adjustment to life events and circumstances, including disease. The student will acquire tools and strategies to adequately manage the communication with patients, their relatives and other health professionals, taking into account one's and others' values; the ability and sensitivity to critically assess medical practices within the healthcare team through the knowledge of rules and processes characterizing team work; an interdisciplinary and inter-cultural openness, specifically aware of differences in values and habits within the current multiethnic society.