Communication Skills - UK vs Malaysia

Luckily I attended a course and did attachments in UK before my MRCP PACES exams. Got the chance to adapt to some ways of communication with patients which are different from back home. Let me illustrate some of them...

#1

Malaysia...
Doctor : AUNTY, sudah kahwin kah?
Patient: Belum lah dokter.

UK...
Doctor : MADAM, are you married?
Patient: What do you mean 'are you married'?! Are you discriminating against those who are not??

(Should have asked, "Madam, may I know who do you stay with?". If the patient is married, she'll probably say "I stay with my husband". Or else, she'd say "I'm staying alone." Understood - either single, divorced, or whatever!)

#2

Malaysia...
Doctor : UNCLE, itu ubat semua ada makan kah?
Patient: Adalah dokter.
Doctor : Betulkah ada makan? Kalau ada, apa pasal itu gula dalam darah manyak tinggi?!
Patient: Hehe... kadang-kadang ada lupa lah dokter.
Doctor : Kadang-kadang? Apa maksud kadang-kadang? Satu minggu lupa satu kali ke, satu minggu lupa tiga kali ke, hari hari lupa?
Patient: Hari-hari ada lupa juga la dokter...
Doctor : #@*$&% Ini ubat ha, manyak mahal punya tau, hospital bagi free kasi u u pun tak mau makan kah?!

UK...
Doctor : SIR, are you taking your medications regularly?
Patient: Doctor, are u implying that I'm a bad patient who don't take my medications as advised? I want to see another doctor!

(Should have said "Sir, I can see that u're on quite a number of medications. I have patients who have similar illnesses as you have and are taking many medications as well. Some of them find it difficult to take so many medications that they tend to forget to take their medications. Do you have similar problems?" Duh! Make a big round... same also what!)

#3

UK...
Doctor : Sir, we've got the investigation results back. It does show some problem. We SUGGEST that you start taking this medication called prednisolone, which is a type of steroids. Have you heard of this drug before?
Patient: Yes doctor, I heard that there are a lot of side effects with this steroids.
Doctor : Yes you are right. What side effects do you know about steroids?
Patient: I've read somewhere that steroids can cause (blah... blah... blah...)
Doctor : Wow I'm impressed that you read a lot and u're very concerned with your well-being. That's wonderful. But we are SUGGESTING this treatment to you as the benefits outweigh the risks, the reason being (blah.. blah.. blah...). WHAT DO U THINK?
Patient: OK doctor, in that case, I agree to take the steroids.

Malaysia...
Doctor : Uncle, itu result sudah balik lah. Ada problem sikit. Dokter CADANGKAN u start satu ubat la, nama ubat itu panggil prednisolone. Itu satu jenis steroid la. Uncle pernah dengar nama ubat ini kah?
Patient: Ya dokter, pernah.
Doctor : (surprised) Betul u pernah dengar?
Patient: Pernahlah dokter... you baru cakap saya pun dengar lo! Hahaha!
Doctor : *@!^#@*... Ok, ok. Ini ubat ha, baik untuk penyakit u la, tapi ia ada manyak side effect jugak. Antaranya (blah... blah... blah...). Fahamkah?
Patient: Faham dokter.
Doctor : Betulkah u faham. So APA UNCLE RASA? BOLEH START ITU UBAT KAH?
Patient: U dokter ka saya dokter? Apa pasal u tanya balik saya boleh start ke tak boleh start. U dokter ma... u patut bagi saya tau mau start ke tak mau start ma! Apa ini dokter... macam tak pandai punya.... U baru kerja kah?
Doctor : (faint! I'm MRCP UK Comm Skills trained ok!!)