Teaching Students How to Talk and Act with Patients

To the Editor: The recent article on teaching interactional skills by my professors, Drs. Werner and Schneider,¹ makes an important point: medical students can be taught interviewing skills in a structured manner because recent research has clarified what these skills consist of. The course described, emphasizing interactional analysis, in conjunction with later courses emphasizing interviewing content, combines to teach the student how to get information out of a patient. An equally important problem in medical practice is how to get information into the patient, after a diagnosis is reached and a management plan selected. To my knowledge, no course in.