The chair-shaped space
Lauren Laird
Drawing
GP Attachments – recollections :
Placement One
There was always a quiet, nervous energy sensed during our afternoon spent consulting. Possibly, because of our GP ‘handing over the reins’ to us as students, maybe around how the patients’ would react, or maybe it was myself, feeling nervous energy due to self-doubt, doubting my ability to converse with patients and grasp what was going on with them and their lives.
Looking back at this experience now, two years on… and the silence when the patient stops talking and my thinking about what I should do next, was daunting at the time – but an absolutely invaluable learning experience.
Being comfortable in silence is something I am now adapting to and this GP letting us take the consultation as it came, without taking hold, is something I learned much from. I also valued her trust in never actually encouraging or discouraging us to adopt certain practices, allowing me to think independently about the decisions I should take with patients – this led to further curiosity about conditions, pursuing management and related ideas after the consultations ended.
Placement Two
In a parallel consultation experience, we introduced ourselves, opened up the consultation to discover why the patient had presented to the clinic – then the GP jointly led the session. It didn’t feel that we as students were able to fully think through and connect the initial complaint, exploration of the symptoms, examination and management.
However, what I did learn from this dual approach was observation of the GP’s consultation skills. I admired how she treated these her patients like old friends, chatting and remembering personal details about them. Nevertheless, this GP always did what was best for the patient – even when it was not exactly what they wanted.
It has stayed with me how collaborative these consultations were and the sense of respect and trust between patient and doctor.
Reflecting on these clinical experiences got me thinking about shared space as a doctor, as a patient and as a medical student, and the arrangement of the consulting room; allowing us to have different views of each other, but with the common denominators of the chair and wanting the patient to be treated and become ‘better’:
The individual viewpoints within the consulting room were however different:
-the patient bringing lived experience and a troubling condition or circumstance
-the GP having the means to test, diagnose and treat
– and I, as a student, viewing both patient and the GP with fresh eyes – whilst scrambling to learn between the two…
– and of course, the GP and patient also had two viewpoints.
I then returned my focus to the patient’s chair within GP consultations and explored some of the concerns and clinical support it may witness and absorb through this drawing.
Effective Consulting, Year Two
The piece struck out to me due to the candid simplicity and use of only black and white in terms of colouring. While the chair may seem like an unimportant part of a consultation, the piece of art highlighted and made me consider the chair’s role in patient encounters. I was fascinated by the poetic nature of the phrases written on the chair and to see how many purposes the chair has for the doctor and patient.
I enjoy the juxtaposition of the black and white fairly plain artistic medium and the depth of the poetry that dresses it. It is, I suppose, comparative to the juxtaposition between the ‘bland’ exterior of a chair and the important, emotional interactions that take place on it. The physical chair provides physical support, whilst the doctor provides emotional support. We perhaps wouldn’t take any notice of a chair in a GP office normally, like certain symptoms are potentially overlooked, despite their importance.