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Assessing Interpersonal and Communication Skills.

I nterpersonal and communication skills (ICS) are at the heart of every health care relationship. These verbal and nonverbal skills allow us to elicit and convey important information. In the dayto-day practice of medicine, good communication fosters effective patient care, builds trust, establishes rapport, develops teamwork, and leads to successful patient outcomes and optimal therapeutic relationships. Poor communication leads to mistrust, inefficiency, increased costs, and potentially higher morbidity and mortality. Physicians with poor communication skills are more likely to be sued—as many as 30% of medical lawsuits stem directly from a failure to communicate. While natural empathy and winsome personalities facilitate rapport and likeability, they are not substitutes for effective, clear communication. Good ICS skills are learned behaviors that can be broken down into component elements with demonstrable assessment of progress. Interpersonal and communication skills are one of the 6 core competencies identified by the Accreditation Council for Graduate Medical Education (ACGME). In Milestones 2.0, ICS is subdivided into 3 categories delineating widening circles: patient and family-centered communication, interprofessional and team communication, and communication within health care systems. This article focuses on ICS assessment of both verbal and nonverbal communication with patients/family and the health care team. While not a comprehensive review of the subject, this summary can be used as a platform from which deeper dives into specific methodology can occur depending on the needs and resources of a particular program or setting. Program directors are encouraged to engage with their national program directors’ associations to collaborate on specialty-specific best practices for ICS assessment.