On my recent release post-surgery, I was given a sheet of instructions covering the goody-bag of drugs I’d been handed:

I suggested to the nurse that the information – really very important, and quite complicated – seemed to be a jumble of what, why, when & whether, with no real order or structure. Why present such varied messaging as an undifferentiated list of bullets?

Subsequently, and with a head full of opiates, I nevertheless came up with:

Doubtless this could be further refined, but compared with the original….

I do find it strange that communicating with the patient is palpably given such low priority in the overall scheme of things, when you would have thought it one of the key success factors.