How physicians respond to the emotional expressions of people with cancer

Objective: The aim of this study is to examine patient emotional cues to oncologists’ responses and explore the association between the concerns and emotional cues during the consultation and the physicians’ response to them throughout treatment, satisfaction, and the assessment of the patients’ perception of the established communication. Method: Cross-sectional design, involved 12 adults patients undergoing cancer treatment and eight physicians in the study. The twelve video-recorded medical consultations were coded (349 cues/concern) using the Verona coding definitions of emotional sequences (VR-CoDES). Results: A strong association between explicit with reducing space responses and the physiological symptoms cues (x²=6.029; p=0.014), and related to the repetition cue of the content by the patient (x²=5.599; p=0.018) was observed. Patients expressed fewer non-verbal behaviors (for example, crying, silence, silent pauses), as they had been undergoing treatment for a longer time, therefore, provided with more empathic responses from physicians. Conclusion: The identification of emotions can help physicians to further explore patients’ underlying cues that reveal emotional distress concerning illness and treatment in a less explicit way. There is a need for improvement in the physician’s ability to recognize patients’ concerns and to provide space for patients to have comprehensive health care, considering the severity of cancer disease and its negative emotional impacts for patients.