چکیده (انگلیسی):

Background:Gout is the most common form of inflammatory arthritis. It is associated with substantial co-morbidity
and often managed in primary care. A greater understanding of the communication process between patients and
healthcare professionals provides one way of improving the management of this condition. This paper describes
communication about gout medicines and treatment between patients and primary care health professionals during
routine consultations.
Methods:Video-recordings of 31 individual healthcare consultations between patients and a range of primary care
practitioners (general practitioners, practice nurses, podiatrists, dietitians) from an archived database were reviewed.
Consultations that encompassed any discussion about gout medicines and treatment were included (n= 27) and
were not solely restricted to those where gout was the presenting complaint. Themes were derived from an inductive
qualitative analysis, from clinical and linguistic perspectives, based on the conversation between patients and
practitioners about medicines and visual observation of these interactions.
Results:A number of factors were identified that had the potential to impact on the optimal management
of gout in primary care. These included level of patient knowledge, patient attitudes to medicines, and the
attributes of practitioner communication with patients. The latter related to the style of delivery and content
of the information provided, and the ability of practitioners to make use of opportunities that arose to discuss these
issues.
Conclusions:Patients with gout communicate at varying levels of complexity with a diverse range of primary care
healthcare professionals about the treatment of their condition. It is important that all practitioners engaging with
gout patients in this setting are knowledgeable about the current management of gout, provide clear, consistent and
accurate messages, remain aware that these messages may need repeating over time, and are supportive of patients’
medicine-taking preferences.