Patient Experience Tip o' the Month - August 2023
I recently heard from a patient who described the strong, positive experience he formed with his primary care provider over a five-year period. The patient had come to highly-value this relationship, and was saddened to hear that he, and his family, will need to establish care with a new physician when the provider moves to another clinic. The strength of this relationship was obvious, and a picture of mutual respect quickly emerged.
Indeed, this is the recipe for maximal patient adherence to a shared goal and satisfaction for both patient and clinician. Obviously, this clinician’s communication with the patient has been highly successful. However, sometimes we don’t achieve this level of connection with our patients. Why not?
Of course, we all have “bad days” and can be distracted by things at home or at work. But, are there other reasons we might fall short of our goal to provide caring, empathetic, and collaborative care for our patients?
Are we being influenced by our own attitudes and biases in a negative way? Is a patient’s race, ethnicity, weight, or sexual identity interfering with our equitable practice of medicine? A study in 2016 looked at clinician respect for patients in relation to the type and quality of interaction with their patients. The researchers found that:
“Encounters between patients and clinicians with higher respect for them had more positive clinician emotional tone [regression coefficient 2.97 (1.92-4.59)], more positive patient emotional tone [2.71 (1.75-4.21)], less clinician verbal dominance [0.81 (0.68-0.96)] and more patient-centeredness [1.28 (1.09-1.51)].”1
Looking inward to assess our own conscious or unconscious biases and attitudes is not easy nor necessarily comfortable. However, if we’re not feeling satisfaction in our practice or if patients are expressing dissatisfaction with our interactions (or both) then the answer may lie within us. Recognizing and facing this is the first step to closing that gap and growing beyond our current limitations and moving towards our own self-actualization as clinicians.
- Flickinger TE, Saha S, Roter D, Korthuis PT, Sharp V, Cohn J, Moore RD, Ingersoll KS, Beach MC. Respecting patients is associated with more patient-centered communication behaviors in clinical encounters. Patient Educ Couns. 2016 Feb;99(2):250-5. doi: 10.1016/j.pec.2015.08.020. Epub 2015 Aug 20. PMID: 26320821; PMCID: PMC5271348.
- Health Equity Continuing Education | Washington State Department of Health