Frequently used terms and their working definition
| Term | Working definition |
| Participants | Patients, oncologists/haematologists, language-mediators |
| Communication problems | Lack of understanding/misunderstanding among participants in the medical consultation |
| Interactional processes | The ways in which participants in the medical consultation interact with each other by employing a wide range of semiotic resources (eg. using gestures to alert each other to misunderstandings) |
| Semiotic resources | Resources which participants in the medical consultation employ in order to co-construct meaning with each other and to relate to each other (eg. speech, gaze, body orientation, gestures) |
| Communicative processes | The ways in which participants in the medical consultation try to reach understanding (eg. seeking clarification, confirming understanding) |