Consent For Education

We ask for consent before we touch a patient, but what about asking before we educate them?

Most of us assume patients want to know everything we know, but more information isn't always better, and sometimes, it's actually worse. A patient who hears "mild degenerative changes" on an imaging report may walk out feeling broken, fragile, and afraid to move. It’s a common and unremarkable finding, but they heard something scary and permanent.

What we share, and how we share it, changes how a patient sees and feels in their body.

So before you unload everything you found, consider asking: "How much information do you want about what I'm seeing?" or "Are you someone who wants all the details, or would you rather focus on what we're going to do about it?"

The goal isn't to withhold, it's to give patients enough information to have agency in their care, without giving them more than they need to carry.