Would you rather receive bad news in person or over the phone? Communicating bad news like a new cancer diagnosis to patients can have a major impact on their mental and physical well-being, but does the instrument of delivery matter? A study recently published in the Journal of General Internal Medicine (doi:10.1007/s11606-023-08323-z) decided to find the answer.
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March 2024The systematic review and meta-analysis initially screened 5,944 studies, finally using 11 studies in the qualitative analysis and nine in the meta-analyses, including four randomized controlled trials. All the studies investigated anxiety, depressive, or post-traumatic stress disorder symptoms in adult patients for whom bad news by telephone compared to in person were disclosed.
Researchers found that there was no difference regarding psychological distress when bad news was disclosed by telephone compared to in person. There were similar symptom levels of anxiety (three studies, 285 participants; standardized mean difference [SMD] 0.10 [95% CI -0.15 to 0.35]), depression (three studies, 284 participants; SMD 0.10 [95% CI -0.30 to 0.49]), and post-traumatic stress disorder (two studies, 171 participants; SMD -0.01 [95% CI -0.48 to 0.36]). The results were similar for participants’ satisfaction with their care.
There were relatively few heterogeneous studies—and few studies overall—and most had a small number of eligible patients, but the findings do suggest that the way in which bad news is given is more important than the mode of delivery.