The universal GP Training website for everyone, not just Bradford.   Created in 2002 by Dr Ramesh Mehay

Bradford VTS Online Resources

Consultation Skills

Skills for Explaining Risk

Explaining risk is not easy!

Explaining and conveying the level of risk to a patient is not easy.  But it’s something that has to be done frequently by doctors because not much we do can be done with 100% accuracy, reliability or validity.  Some patient’s trust us to make decisions for them, but helping explain risk to a patient and their view thereafter will help us make joint decisions that are truly more suited to the patient.  

Quick Tips for Explaining Risk

When explaining the risk of something…

  • Avoid using terms like common or rare
  • Avoid using %; instead, put the figures in context
    –1 in 100 rather than 1%
    –1 person in a town like Warwick rather than 1 in 30000
    – Instead of saying 5% risk…  1 in 20 chance
    – Instead of saying 5% risk…  5 out of 100 people like you
    – Instead of saying 5% risk…  5 out of 100 ways things may turn out for you
    – Many people think a risk of 1:25 is greater than 4:100; those people tend to be less interested in shared-care / informed-choice
  • Use picture diagrams (pictographs) to help – like the Cates Plot diagrams (weblink above)
  • Use simple tables, charts or infographics to display the risk in an easy to understand fashion (reading age 12)

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How IT ALL STARTED
WHAT WE'RE ABOUT
WHO ARE WE FOR?

Bradford VTS was created by Dr. Ramesh Mehay, a Programme Director for Bradford GP Training Scheme back in 2001. Over the years, it has seen many permutations.  At the time, there were very few resources for GP trainees and their trainers so Bradford decided to create one FOR EVERYONE. 

So, we see Bradford VTS as  the INDEPENDENT vocational training scheme website providing a wealth of free medical resources for GP trainees, their trainers and TPDs everywhere and anywhere.  We also welcome other health professionals – as we know the site is used by both those qualified and in training – such as Associate Physicians, ANPs, Medical & Nursing Students. 

Our fundamental belief is to openly and freely share knowledge to help learn and develop with each other.  Feel free to use the information – as long as it is not for a commercial purpose.   

We have a wealth of downloadable resources and we also welcome copyright-free educational material from all our users to help build our rich resource (send to bradfordvts@gmail.com).

Our sections on (medical) COMMUNICATION SKILLS and (medical) TEACHING & LEARNING are perhaps the best and most comprehensive on the world wide web (see white-on-black menu header section on the homepage).

4th February 2024 

WHAT's HAPPENING?

Here are some updates planned over the next 6 months

  1. Updating the SCA exam pages with cases and videos.
  2. Clinical Specialty areas all being updated with current guidance and easy to understand diagrams and flow charts.
  3. Videos being created for some of the pages for those of you who prefer to watch than read.
  4. We’ve got some bradfordvts helpers to contribute and develop their own pages or areas of interest.  If you would like to be a bradfordvts helper, email me rameshmehay@googlemail.com
  5. We provide all of this for free. But it costs us money to run.  If you could kindly donate something, that would be great.  We do all of this for you.   Please hit the button below. xxx