Negotiating the Birth Plan

Conversations between health practitioners and expectant mothers regarding their birth plan are often characterised by advisory behaviour on the part of the practitioner; such advice refers to statistics, risk factors and an appeal to facts and figures. There is often an implicit assumption that such information will be received uniformly and will inform decisions rationally. When such information does not inform decisions the way the practitioner expected, this can cause anxiety and frustration for the practitioner. More importantly, this form of communication has limitations in nurturing trust, understanding and cooperation between practitioner and patient. With the aim of improving the experience and outcomes of these interactions for both parties, this theoretical paper proposes a highly evolved model of negotiation as a bridge between negotiation theory and negotiation practices in healthcare.