Medical Jargon: A Barrier to Quality Care

Have you ever suffered from dyspepsia or been diagnosed with viral shedding? Chances are you have. Sound scary to you? Well, those two conditions are definitely not scary at all. Dyspepsia is more commonly known as indigestion, and viral shedding? That’s just a fancy phrase for a cough.

Medical terminology can be confusing to even the most educated of us. There are even guidebooks written specifically to decode medical jargon.  According to a report from the Center for Disease Control, almost 9 out of 10 American adults find medical terminology difficult to understand.

Medical Jargon in the Doctor's Office Can Be A Barrier to Quality Care

Often, health care providers don’t have enough to time to break down diagnoses for patients. In turn, many patients just don’t ask their physicians to clarify.  My mother is a medical social worker who works with patients of all ages and social classes.  Most of the time, she and her program’s nurses need to break down diagnoses to patients so that they can better understand them. According to my mother, most of the time, her patients are either slightly intimidated or afraid to sound stupid in front of physicians, and often forgo asking questions.

Although all doctors complete years of extensive education and training, many common folk just do not have that same level of education.  Some patients speak limited to no English—even native English speakers can’t even decode what some physicians are saying.

When people are confused by medical lingo, they are less likely to follow up with tests and drugs—leading to more severe health problems in the future.  For patients with chronic diseases, understanding the diagnosis is critical to managing the disease.  Lack of treatment compliance can lead to higher medical costs in the future. A study by Kaiser Permanente found that half of 14,000 diabetes patients had problems understanding their conditions. Those patients had higher rates of hypoglycemia than patients who understood their doctors’ medical information. By improving communication between doctors and patients, the government can improve health while saving on cost.

The Center for Disease Control and other government officials are working to improve communication between doctors and patients. The Health Literacy Action Plan, a new government initiative, hopes to improve patients’ understanding of their health by simplifying medical language.  According to the program’s web site, target groups include minorities and lower income individuals, two groups likely to lack basic health literacy.

One step health insurers have taken is to use a program that essentially translates medical jargon to plain English.  The program, marketed by Health Literacy Innovations, scans a doctor’s document and suggests simplifications. Meanwhile, many state Medicaid programs have opted to provide health information written for people with fourth to sixth grade reading level, ensuring that people understand the medical treatments they need.

These three initiatives are steps in the right direction.  People in the United States come from a variety of different ethnic, social, and economic backgrounds, and it is definitely time to target these people instead of the highly educated.  With sky-high medical costs, it is ever more imperative for doctors and patients to communicate efficiently. All in all, reducing medical lingo can only help, rather than hurt, public health in the United States.

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Tags: doctor bad handwriting, health literacy action plan, management of chronic disease, medical jargon, medical jargon in the doctor's office, medical social worker, quality of care