Medical Communication: From Theoretical Model To Practical Exploration. Tao Wang

to accurately identify groups that need medical communication and keep track of them. This may be the so-called “precision communication”. For those patients who are obese, having high blood pressure or diabetes, medical staff are more likely to prevent the spread and tracking of cardiovascular disease because they are at high risk of cardiovascular disease. For patients with a family history of tumors, medical staff will do more about tumor prevention and screening since their prevalence of tumor is several times higher than in the general population. In the field of medicine, precision medicine is currently promoted. Precision medicine refers to emerging approaches to disease prevention and treatment that take into account an individual’s genes, environment, and lifestyle. Similarly, in the field of medical communication, precise medical communication is also required. Precision medical communication is a personalized medical communication that combines an individual’s family background, family history, living and eating habits, working environment, and so on. Only precise medical communication can achieve the greatest benefit of the audience. Suppose there are two middle-aged men. They are similar in age, live near to each other, have the same nature of work and similar levels of obesity; meanwhile, both of them usually lack exercise, like desserts and meat, and both like smoking. One has a family history of colorectal cancer, and the other doesn’t. When coming to the analysis of the situation from the perspective of medical communication, these two men both have bad habits and diets and lack of exercise, and they are high-risk populations of cardiovascular and cerebrovascular diseases. Because the former has a family history of colorectal cancer, he is also a high-risk group for colorectal cancer. The medical communication for these two men is about the need to have healthy life, diet, and behavior; scientific weight loss methods; and regular screening of cardiovascular disease. The former also needs to be educated to receive regular colorectal cancer screening to have early detection and early treatment, which may not be needed for the latter. This proves that medical communication must be carried out by medical professionals since only professionals can judge the risk factors for different diseases. Then precise medical communication will be provided. The general public does not have such ability.

      Medical communication is aimed at people with urgent health needs, such as patients, family members, and sub-healthy people; they are the core of direct contact with medical information. In addition to their own access to useful medical information, they can also radiate it to their loved ones and friends. The information may be disseminated on other issues such as health needs and health systems. Of course, throughout the communication process, professional medical staff are opinion leaders in medical communication and have an important role in leading emotions, spreading issues, and organizing actions. In this form, the transmission and radiation of information belong to the form of interpersonal transmission, but this kind of human-to-human transmission is not a single layer-to-layer transmission. Because a single layer of communication cannot guarantee the accuracy of the content of the communication, loss or even errors are possible in the communication. Interpersonal communication in medical communication does not advocate too many levels of human-to-human communication. Medical communication should be organized and regulated. The person who organizes and supervises is a member of professional medical staff. In the field of medical communication, the subject of communication and the content of transmission are more important than the widespread nature of dissemination. In other words, medical communication pays more attention to the connotation and quality of transmission than to the breadth of transmission. What is needed for medical communication is to pass on medical knowledge to all by medical personnel. The process can be long. To widen the range of spread, more medical personnel are needed to participate or to use more effective means of communication rather than spreading quickly through word-of-mouth in the crowd.

      For these reasons, we believe that it is not possible to simply categorize medical communication into the context of scientific communication and fully follow the paradigm of general scientific communication. Medical communication has natural public participation attributes, so we suggest that in practice and theoretical construction, medical communication and general scientific communication should be distinguished.

       Chapter 2

       Basic Model of Medical Communication

      As the communicator of medical communication, the character of medical professionals taking part in the practice of the medical communication is different and inseparable from the usual medical treatment for curing sickness and saving lives. Focusing on the central goal of popularizing medical knowledge, cultivating medical scientific concepts, and shaping social science and culture, the theoretical models of medical communication at different levels have been developed. On the basis of reviewing the model of science communication, we will put forward a contextual participation model under the multi-knowledge framework, which conforms to the current situation of the medical communication practice in China. And then, we will make suggestions on the relationship between the medical communication and research for case analysis.

1.The model of science communication

      As mentioned in the first chapter, the practice of science communication has experienced three stages in history: popularization of science, public understanding, and public participation. However, just like the change of social science paradigm, the new paradigm cannot completely replace the old paradigm.¹ So the three paradigms coexist today. At the same time, due to the complexity and diversity of science communication practice, many kinds of science communication models are applied in different conditions.

       1.1.Types of scientific communication activities

      In October 1999, the British Science Charity Foundation (Wellcome Trust) commissioned a market research company (Research International) to conduct a comprehensive survey of the current status of science communication activities in Britain. The survey analyzed the objectives, audiences, topics, locations, and efficiency of various science communication activities. Based on this analysis, they explored whether these activities needed to be changed, how the public participated in the discussion of science topics and how the communication strategies could be established. This survey had been done through a combination of literature research, quantitative, and qualitative investigation. Qualitative surveys (face-to-face interviews and telephone interviews) and quantitative surveys (telephone interviews and online surveys) are mainly concerned with the themes, objectives, role of organizers, efficiency, evaluation criteria and funding sources of past scientific communication activities, strategies for future scientific communication activities, experiences of other scientific communication activities, and views on science communication activities. After the investigation, various types of scientific communication activities were summarized in the report “Science and the Public: Atlas of Scientific Communication Activities”. Of the survey, the target audience including the general public and policy makers, the communication objectives including promoting public interest, deepening scientific understanding and influencing scientific policy, and the types of scientific communication activities all showed their diversity and complexity (Figure 2.1).

      At the same time, the use of media is also rich and diverse in different scientific fields. There are traces of scientific communication in the domains of mass media (such as television, magazines), new media (network, mobile media), scientific competitions, and public lectures. Finally, the report argues that hands-on and interactive approaches are efficient for science communication. Interactive science communication activities can break the barriers between the public and the scientific community and establish their dialogue mechanism. However, this interaction should be tailored to local conditions at the right times. The scientific community should and has begun to understand the public, rather than just asking the public to “work harder” alone. Some of the public has not been covered, so more efforts are needed in this regard. Media using has both opportunities and challenges in science communication, so improving the relationship between scientific community and media is conducive to the development of science communication (Figure