In the abstract to this very interesting article titled “What’s the Role of Time in Shared Decision Making?”, the authors point out that while shared decision making (SDM) is a desirable process and outcome of patient-clinician relationships, time is often insufficient and represents a barrier to SDM. The authors explore alternative ways clinicians can think about time, and steps they can take to have fulfilling SDM interactions despite time constraints. Most importantly, they discuss the need to shift to an approach based on quality vs quantity of time. When time is narrowly conceived in terms of quantity, they say, it diminishes potential solutions to what appears to be an intractable problem.
The article is open access and the full text is available at this link on the AMA Journal of Ethics web page.
Citatiion
Alexander T. Yahanda, MS and Jessica Mozersky, PhD, AMA J Ethics.2020;22(5):E416-422. doi: 10.1001/amajethics.2020.416.