Breaking bad news-Quo vadis?

Almost everybody has heard horror tales of someone who was shocked after a doctor told him or her bad news in a rude manner. Breaking bad news represents a communication challenge. It is taught as a situation, where things can go utterly wrong. It has been viewed as the culmination point of difficult conversations, where the quality of a health care provider’s communication skills will be exposed without mercy. What the term ‘professional’ refers to, has been defined mainly by professionals themselves and goes back to seminal papers in the nineties of the last century (e.g. [1– 3]).