| Summary: | Bibliography: leaves 113-117. === The medical interview is often the first point of contact between doctors and patients. For patients who have suffered a stroke, this interaction is often a frustrating attempt to tell the doctor how they are feeling and a struggle on the part of the doctor, to obtain the necessary facts. In this study, a group of 6th year medical students were trained to use supportive communication strategies for the specific purpose of obtaining a case history from an adult with aphasia. These strategies were based on principles of Supported Conversation for Adults with Aphasia (SCA [TM]) (Kagan, 1998b). Results showed that students who received communication skills training as opposed to a theory lecture improved significantly in their abilities to acknowledge the abilities of their patient, reveal their competence through different modalities and verify patient responses. In addition, students in the experimental group were significantly better at establishing initial and developing rapport with their patients, exploring their patients' problems and providing structure to the interview as compared to the students in the control group. Further, the experimental group rated their post-training interviews and the quality of their interactions with their patients as significantly better following their training. The results of this study provide strong evidence that medical students show significant improvements in a number of skills following supportive communication training. These findings have implications for medical education and service delivery.
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