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Ruth Strudwick, Stuart Mackay and Stephen Hicks discuss the 'caring' part of healthcare with particular regard to the situation faced by diagnostic radiographers in the current health environment.
Introduction
Since the publication of Lord Darzi's report 'High Quality Care for All'1 , there has been much debate about the quality of services provided for patients within the National Health Service. This is set against a culture where targets have been set and throughput is seen as a priority Within diagnostic radiography there is a constant balance to strike between patient throughput and care of the patient. Diagnostic radiographers may feel under pressure to increase their throughput of patients, but this may result in a reduction in patient care.
In this article we will define caring, outline the relationship that diagnostic radiographers have with their patients and, based on data from a recent Doctorate study, explore whether diagnostic radiography is a caring profession.
What is caring?
The relationship that diagnostic radiographers have with their patients is quite different from the relationship many other healthcare professionals have. The diagnostic radiographer spends a relatively short period of time with their patient and the interaction is task focussed, ie, the production of a diagnostic image.
This relationship is therefore quite transient and the radiographer does not really have the time to get to know their patients. This could be seen to be quite different from the more long term caring relationships that other healthcare professionals appear to have with their patients2.
The diagnostic radiographer has a transient, goal- focussed interaction with the patient. They appear to be primarily concerned about the product of the interaction, the radiographic image, and consequently it may appear that they do not care for the patient in the same way that other health professionals care.
Murphy2 (pi 69) says: 'The role of the radiographer, in an area requiring highly skilled technological knowledge, may appear to be in opposition to high quality patient care'. The diagnostic radiographer has to both understand and use the equipment to produce a diagnostic image (product) whilst at the same time interact with the patient, in order that the image produced is useful for diagnosis (process).
As early as 1978, these two seemingly contradictory roles of the radiographer...