12 min
No more waiting rooms, new book coming this summer The DocPreneur Leadership Podcast
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- Entrepreneurship
Pre-Orders Only — On Sale Now (% Discount Expires May 31, 2024) - On Sale $14.95 Original Price:$24.99
Release/Ship Date: May 31, 2024 (or sooner, if possible!)
How do your patients feel, really?
We’re not talking about their physical symptoms. We’re talking about their feelings.
Squishy right?
Patients walk into your practice each day with two things: feelings and needs. Typically, the Doctor is amazing at meeting the patient’s physical needs. However, feelings are just as important.
Consider how the patient felt when they waited on hold to make an appointment after navigating an overly complicated phone tree. How did they feel when no one remembered their name when they checked in? How did they feel when the clipboard of forms was given to them again? Or, how did they feel when they were escorted to the exam room, the door closed, and they were left alone with no ETA about when the Doctor would arrive? And how did they feel when your team helped them check out and didn’t explain the bill?
Every patient will leave with a feeling about you and your practice. In today’s rushed and impersonal healthcare environment, patients’ feelings and subsequent actions and reactions are born from their experiences. Think about your last five online reviews. When the patient spent 27 minutes waiting in an empty seating area with no updates from the personnel who sat just ten feet away, gossiping about their coworkers and making endless phone calls, how does that make them feel? When the doctor kept forgetting their name, how did that experience make them feel?
Patients are burning out. I know this because I am a Patient. We all are. We’re feeling unwelcomed, disrespected, rushed, ignored, and undervalued. Most medical office leaders would blame it on bureaucracy, insurance hassles, and busyness and cross their arms, ignore the awkward feelings patients get, and move on with their day. Few are willing to try something different and make the patient feel like they’re at home here.
Fortunately, even science backs us up on this. According to Harvard professor Gerald Zaltman, “95% of purchase decision-making takes place in the subconscious mind”. So, in essence, our emotions drive purchasing behavior and our decision-making 95% of the time. This means that if you and your medical office team are not habitually paying attention to a patient's feelings throughout the entire journey, from start to finish, patients will go elsewhere. Chances are they’ll find someone who pays attention to all the little details that make them feel a certain way about their healthcare beyond the doctor meeting their needs.
Let me be clear: this book does not advocate removing all waiting rooms from our healthcare culture. In many areas, they’re necessary. But we need to do more about addressing the small habits medical offices have become accustomed to under the business of busyness and hiding behind the excuse of “Well, that’s how we’ve always done it.” For patients in today's healthcare culture, the most challenging part is not the actual waiting but when we feel that the medical staff and our Doctors have forgotten about us and don’t meet our expectations. We get a feeling when we’re on the other side of you and your team.
Like it or not, this is a marketing book, but not in the traditional sense. Old-school marketing tells customers (i.e., patients) that you control the message. Today, that theory doesn’t hold water. Today, new school marketing, especially in healthcare settings, says, “The customers (i.e., patients) inform others about you.”
This is where feelings get involved, and a simple appointment can turn into a remarkable and memorable story for patients who will tell others about you and your team. You see, it’s about the front office staff talking with the patients until the insurance benefits and bills are really understood. It’s about the
Pre-Orders Only — On Sale Now (% Discount Expires May 31, 2024) - On Sale $14.95 Original Price:$24.99
Release/Ship Date: May 31, 2024 (or sooner, if possible!)
How do your patients feel, really?
We’re not talking about their physical symptoms. We’re talking about their feelings.
Squishy right?
Patients walk into your practice each day with two things: feelings and needs. Typically, the Doctor is amazing at meeting the patient’s physical needs. However, feelings are just as important.
Consider how the patient felt when they waited on hold to make an appointment after navigating an overly complicated phone tree. How did they feel when no one remembered their name when they checked in? How did they feel when the clipboard of forms was given to them again? Or, how did they feel when they were escorted to the exam room, the door closed, and they were left alone with no ETA about when the Doctor would arrive? And how did they feel when your team helped them check out and didn’t explain the bill?
Every patient will leave with a feeling about you and your practice. In today’s rushed and impersonal healthcare environment, patients’ feelings and subsequent actions and reactions are born from their experiences. Think about your last five online reviews. When the patient spent 27 minutes waiting in an empty seating area with no updates from the personnel who sat just ten feet away, gossiping about their coworkers and making endless phone calls, how does that make them feel? When the doctor kept forgetting their name, how did that experience make them feel?
Patients are burning out. I know this because I am a Patient. We all are. We’re feeling unwelcomed, disrespected, rushed, ignored, and undervalued. Most medical office leaders would blame it on bureaucracy, insurance hassles, and busyness and cross their arms, ignore the awkward feelings patients get, and move on with their day. Few are willing to try something different and make the patient feel like they’re at home here.
Fortunately, even science backs us up on this. According to Harvard professor Gerald Zaltman, “95% of purchase decision-making takes place in the subconscious mind”. So, in essence, our emotions drive purchasing behavior and our decision-making 95% of the time. This means that if you and your medical office team are not habitually paying attention to a patient's feelings throughout the entire journey, from start to finish, patients will go elsewhere. Chances are they’ll find someone who pays attention to all the little details that make them feel a certain way about their healthcare beyond the doctor meeting their needs.
Let me be clear: this book does not advocate removing all waiting rooms from our healthcare culture. In many areas, they’re necessary. But we need to do more about addressing the small habits medical offices have become accustomed to under the business of busyness and hiding behind the excuse of “Well, that’s how we’ve always done it.” For patients in today's healthcare culture, the most challenging part is not the actual waiting but when we feel that the medical staff and our Doctors have forgotten about us and don’t meet our expectations. We get a feeling when we’re on the other side of you and your team.
Like it or not, this is a marketing book, but not in the traditional sense. Old-school marketing tells customers (i.e., patients) that you control the message. Today, that theory doesn’t hold water. Today, new school marketing, especially in healthcare settings, says, “The customers (i.e., patients) inform others about you.”
This is where feelings get involved, and a simple appointment can turn into a remarkable and memorable story for patients who will tell others about you and your team. You see, it’s about the front office staff talking with the patients until the insurance benefits and bills are really understood. It’s about the
12 min