Dilemmas and Strategy When Companion Participation During Appointments Differs from Patient and Companion Expectations

ABSTRACT

Cancer patients often attend medical interactions with at least one companion. The degree to which companions participate varies, ranging from passive observer to active advocate. However, the structure of the medical interaction often promotes dyadic rather than triadic communication, creating ambiguity about to the degree to which companions can and should participate. Participants (N = 34, 16 dyads) included gynecologic cancer patients who were undergoing chemotherapy treatment (n = 18) and their companions (n = 16); all participants were separately interviewed. Interviews included discussion of dyadic communication patterns within medical interactions. The normative rhetorical theory (Goldsmith, 2019) was applied as a guiding framework. Patients discussed the dilemma they experience when companions are expected but absent. Patients and companions provided positive reports of companion communication when behavior aligned with expectations. Alternatively, patients and companions experience dilemmas when companions participate more than or differently from how patients and/or companions had expected. Companions provided one strategy for managing the dilemma of how to participate in medical interactions. Implications and limitations are discussed.

Acknowledgements

Authors would like to acknowledge the contributions of Dr. Maria Checton, Kristine Levonyan-Radloff and multiple research assistants to this project.

Disclosure statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the author(s).

Notes

1. The presence of a companion does not generally influence visit length (Street & Gordon, 2008) as unaccompanied patients produce similar utterances as patient and companion dyads (Wolff & Roter, 2011).

Additional information

Funding

The author(s) reported there is no funding associated with the work featured in this article.