Healthcare communication for the Namibian healthcare context Review of the literature
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Abstract
Understanding the patients’ history, fears, understandings, and misunderstandings could aid the healthcare provider in effectively administering care to their clients. The current study is a review of studies related to healthcare communication and their relevance to the Namibian healthcare system. It is also intended to fill the existing paucity of literature of this nature in Namibia, making this paper timely and relevant. The researchers identified the need for a review study, which critically investigates healthcare providers’ and patients’ communication experiences in Namibia, through a critical review of available literature from Namibia, Africa, and the world. As clarified in the reviewed literature, there is a lack of sufficient empirical studies on healthcare communication challenges and how healthcare providers and patients deal with such challenges in Namibia. The main finding in this study is that in addition to linguistic discordance experienced in healthcare communication, other causes of dissonance emanate from the differences in cultural backgrounds, beliefs, exposure, and experiences.
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