Motivational Interviewing Skills for Patient Telephone Encounters

Motivational Interviewing has four basic skills, open ended questions, affirmations, reflective listening, and summary statements also known as OARS (Braastad, J. n.d., p. 2-3).

• Open-Ended Questions - encourage the patient, not the nurse, to  do the talking
• Affirmations - help individuals acknowledge their positive behaviors and strengths
• Reflective Listening - deepens the conversation by allowing the individual to hear again what they said
• Summary Statements - pulls together what was said and helps transition to the nest topic

This type of conversational style creates an open space where the patient can explore issues. Using OARS helps to elicit change talk from the patient.

View the Active Listening Glogster below for more information on active listening techniques in Motivational Interviewing. Then view the video and take the knowledge check before moving on to Module 4. 

Active Listening Glogster

Reference

Braastad, J. (n.d.). Using Motivational Interviewing Techniques in SMART Recovery. Retrieved from: www.smartrecovery.org/resources/usingmlinsr.pdf