This resource is one of the units on the Open University's OpenLearn website, which provides free and open educational resources for learners and educators around the world. This unit explores the ways in which difference and diversity impact on the nature of communication in health and social care services. Interpersonal communication in health and social care services is by its nature diverse.
As a consequence, achieving good or effective communication – whether between service providers and service users, or among those working in a service – means taking account of diversity, rather than assuming that every interaction will be the same.