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A failure to communicate: patients with cerebral aneurysms and vascular neurosurgeons

University of Lille, Service de Neurologie B, Hôpital Roger Salengro, Rue Emile Laine, Lille 59037, France

Correspondence to:
Correspondence to:
Professor Didier Leys
dleys@nordnet.fr

Keywords: aneurysm; neurosurgery; doctor-patient communication

The first 150 words of the full text of this article appear below.

In the paper by King et al (this issue, pp 550–4),¹ an analysis of the communication between neurosurgeons and their patients with unruptured aneurysms was conducted immediately after an outpatient appointment in a neurosurgery clinic. Many patients had an inaccurate understanding of their treatment plan, and an exaggerated sense of the risks of treatments and of the disease. Despite methodological limitations discussed by the authors, the results of this study are consistent with those found in other specialties.

Communication is of special importance whenever there is a choice between two therapeutic options—that is, when the decision depends mainly on the patient’s preference. Practitioners should be sure that their information was correctly understood. This holds true especially when the event we want to prevent is potentially devastating, the therapeutic options invasive and risky, leading to irreversible changes, and the risk of spontaneous occurrence of this event is low. . . . [Full text of this article]

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