Email should not replace face-to-face conversation, other workplace interactions
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Hospitalist Aaron Jacobs, MD, associate chief medical information officer at University of New Mexico Hospital in Albuquerque, deals with the intersection of HM and technology for a living, particularly email. But perhaps email’s greatest use to him? A reminder that for all it is, it isn’t a face-to-face conversation.
“I more and more am reminding myself: Pick up the phone. Walk down to their office. Go to the coffee cart and see who shows up there so you can actually have a conversation,” he says. “I really enjoy those interactions.
“[Email] is an absolutely vital form of communication, but it’s just one of many and has obvious limitations.”
In the years-long discussion over whether email is antiquated in the face of instant-messaging services and other mobile applications, Dr. Jacobs clearly sides with those who see a future for email. It’s just too ubiquitous in hospitalist workflow at this point.
But the debate is a clarion call that hospitalists should take some time to focus on the clearest interpersonal interactions they can. It’s a message echoed by hospitalist pioneer Robert Wachter, MD, MHM, who used his annual closing lecture at HM15 in National Harbor, Md., last year to note that the advent of communicative technology has reduced the role of face-to-face meetings among hospital staff from different specialties.
For his part, Dr. Jacobs tries to focus as much as possible on making sure that email is just one piece of his communications spectrum.
“We rely too much on technology,” he says. “We’ve seen that with computerized physician order entries [CPOE]. For some reason, people put an order into a computer and they assume that it gets communicated effectively to everybody that needs to get that message.
“I think it’s the same with emailing or text messaging. You assume it gets there. People sometimes forget … a common-sense approach. Why don’t you follow up on that email? Why don’t you talk to the nurse, as well? Make sure that there is no misunderstanding. That’s where the errors are really going to hurt us … when we stop doing those other things to follow up on the messages.” TH
Richard Quinn is a freelance writer in New Jersey.