Humanization in Healthcare and Dentistry: The unpaid debt

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Humanization in healthcare is a concept that includes, not only the humanization of the patient’s needs beyond the technical aspects but also includes kindness in the environment of the Healthcare Systems and in between colleagues. Not forgetting the treatment that healthcare workers received from patients and their employers.

Humanizing care for the sick encompasses inclusion, solidarity, and the fulfillment of individuals' rights. Illness impacts every aspect of a person's life, including physical, spiritual, ethical, and social functioning. Recognizing patients as whole beings, encompassing biological, psychological, social, spiritual, and cultural dimensions, is essential for meaningful care. This holistic approach necessitates the involvement of patients, families, healthcare workers, and the work environment. In response to this need, The Joint Commission implemented new workplace violence prevention requirements for accredited behavioral health care and human services organizations, aiming to ensure comprehensive care and safety for all stakeholders. (1,2)

The idea is to guide effective workplace violence prevention strategies. The requirements address the following: (2)

1-Outlining leadership oversight

2-Developing worksite analysis processes

3-Developing policies and procedures for the prevention of workplace violence

4-Reporting systems, data collection, and analysis

5-Implementing post-incident strategies

6-Providing training and education to decrease workplace violence.

In Dentistry, the technical aspect of dental education is very strong and has been prioritized for decades to employ the best techniques and materials in the most diverse clinical situations, the real challenge is to answer this: is the resolution of oral health problems resolved by using the best techniques and materials? The answer is no. Students need a better understanding to provide a comprehensive diagnosis for each patient that includes general, oral, mental, and social health. Thus, the best technique is that which will resolve the patient’s problem in its entirety, not just temporarily. (3) Front-line care providers frequently lack knowledge and sensitivity to social and structural determinants of underprivileged patients’ health. (4)

One of the clearest manifestations of the dissatisfaction of some dentists is the high suicide rate, one of the highest, in comparison to other medical professions. Dental work is often unwelcome and unappreciated., so the dentist-patient relationship becomes strained when the dentist, poorly prepared by his education, is faced with patients affected by the complex consequences of pain, or very emotional. (7)

Humanized care not only focuses on the public sphere, but on the universe of health and the human being, represented by Dr. Adair Busato’s dictum “We take care of people and not just teeth”. (5)

Patients feel safe and confident when they feel treated by an ideal dentist who has professional and technical skills, but above all, should maintain humane and friendly contact with the patient. Dental anxiety is still a common fear among patients, but it is believed that this feeling will be minimized soon through new humanization policies within health services. In this point, the use of Digital Health tools can be of great help to treat and ease Dental phobias. (6)

The old biomedical model, related to disease-oriented and focused on intervention, has changed into a person-centered model, that puts medical attention on the person's needs and concerns, rather than the doctor or only the disease.

The humanization model in dentistry combines 3 pillars: Understanding, decision -making and intervention. Understanding the patient as a whole person also attains the dentist to the fear’s patient can have and to validate, guides the practitioner in fine-tuning the intervention process. The decision-making puts the dentist in a role as an advisor in the process of the therapeutic alliance. The dentist recognizes the patient’s autonomy and appreciates individual values. This reinforces the central relationship of trust with the person-patient. Finally, the intervention pillar means not only the therapeutic but also being able to properly refer to another colleague or to a medical practitioner. (7)

Nowadays “the training of competence in humanization implies both theoretical and practical training, with current immersive tools such as virtual reality (Metaverse) being a possibility for the improvement of these teachings. It would also offer the chance to combine education on humanization with skills in teledentistry.2 Critical training from a humanized point of view will help students consider measures to solve problems in different communities, to analyze and verify possibilities for enhancing existing actions that positively impact the quality of life of the population. (5)

References

1. Andino ACA. The humanization, an ethical issue in the accreditation of health. Revista Colombiana de Bioética. 2018;13(2):68-86.
   

2. A Trusted Partner in Patient Care | The Joint Commission
   

3. Vargas, K. F. de, Wuttke, I. C., Brew, M. C. C. da C. H., Busato, A. L. S., Bavaresco, C. S., & Moura, F. R. R. de. (2020). Formação humanizada em Odontologia: um olhar diferenciado para a subjetividade. Revista Da ABENO, 20(1), 33–43. https://doi.org/10.30979/rev.abeno.v20i1.869jj
   

4. Lévesque, Martine C., Alissa Levine, and Christophe Bedos. "Ideological roadblocks to humanizing dentistry, an evaluative case study of a continuing education course on social determinants of health." International journal for equity in health 14.1 (2015): 1-14. https://equityhealthj.biomedcentral.com/articles/10.1186/s12939-015-0170-2
   

5. Gonzalez-Moreno, Maria, et al. "Improving Humanization through Metaverse-Related Technologies: A Systematic Review." Electronics 12.7 (2023): 1727. https://doi.org/10.3390/electronics12071727
   

6. Humanization in dental care: reception of the subjectivity of patients treated by undergraduate students in dentistry. Arq. Odontol. [online]. 2012, vol.48, n.3, pp. 151-158. ISSN 1516-0939.
   

7. Apelian, Nareg & Vergnes, Jean-Noel & Christophe, Bedos. (2014). Humanizing clinical dentistry throug a person-centered model. The International Journal of Whole Person Care. 1. 10.26443/ijwpc.v1i2.2.