Improving Medication Safety in Pharmacist-Patient Interactions: Making A Case for the Use of Communication Accommodation Strategies

Effective communication between pharmacist and patient is crucial in ensuring medication safety as it enhances the patient's knowledge and understanding of their medication and increases their adherence. Communication Accommodation Theory (CAT) postulates that the speaker’s adjustments in communicative behavior to accommodate the interlocutor’s needs and capabilities enhance understanding and improves communicative effectiveness. The pharmacist’s use of accommodation strategies may increase the clarity and comprehensibility of the information provided and lead to improvements in medication safety. The study examines the pharmacist’s use of accommodation strategies in their interactions with patients at a public hospital in Malaysia. A detailed turn-by-turn analysis revealed the pharmacists’ use of accommodation strategies such as avoiding medical abbreviations, avoiding medical jargon, clarifying medication indication, providing explanation, and repetition. These strategies increased communicative clarity and contributed to enhance patient understanding of their medication. Pharmacists must pay heed to their language choices and adjust their communicative behaviors to align with the patient's capability for understanding.