Great Explanations

We see patients all the time who ,more than any drug or cure, just want an explanation for their symptoms, to understand why they feel the way they do. But giving an explanation isn't necessarily straightforward, we're unsure of the diagnosis, we might worry about how the explanation might be received, or a 10 minute appointment just isn't time to go into all the details. In today's episode, we've enlisted the help of consultation skills expert, Roger Neighbour, and hear how important a great explanation is from The BMJ patient editor Amy Price. Our guests: Roger Neighbour is a retired GP and a former president of the Royal College of GPs. He has written the books on consultations skills, and teaches courses on how to put those skills into practice.

Amy Price is a patient, a researcher editor for The BMJ's patient and public partnership, and a senior research scientist at Stanford School of Medicine.