Are we treating patients or customers?
I was in a recent discussion with some doctors on social media. I know what you’re thinking, “why bother with that stuff?” These discussions are great article material, and far more constructive than watching most of the trash on here.
Anyways, I came across this comment;
“Patients are not "customers." The word "patient" recognizes they are highly vulnerable, and need professionals totally dedicated to their well-being.”
That sounds good, in theory, but I would argue most of our current medical industry is NOT totally dedicated to their well-being. Some doctors and nurses are, but the system makes that very difficult. My reply was;
“I understand your point of view, but in my experience, customers are treated better than patients. I think most patients will agree, at least under our current medical industry mess.”
Customer service
If you go in a store, it’s unlikely that you were told to show up 15 minutes early, are greeted behind a sliding glass door, told to sit and fill out a half dozen pages of paperwork, half of which is info they already have, taken back to a room, and told to sit and wait. The doctor will be with you, sometime…
The service might cost $150-400, lasted 15 minutes, they may not touch the parts that hurt, and it may not work.
The doctor’s side of the story
Their reply is also valid;
“Agree here to an extent, but it is not all for the wrong reasons. The goal with CUSTOMERS is to satisfy them. Give them value for their money. Have them leave happy and hopefully return as a repeat customer. So they are treated like royalty and the red carpet is rolled out. The goal with PATIENTS is much more complex. It is not all about satisfying them. Sometimes it is about protecting them from themselves, their own bad decisions, their biases as best as we can. This, by nature will lead to a patient feeling “less satisfied” on average than a customer. Because customers get what they WANT, patients (should get) what serves them best as an organism and individual. Lots of nuance obviously and no arguing that our healthcare system is a mess, but there needs to be a difference in how they are treated!
I understand my friends’ point of view. I still prefer to think of customers. I used to own a clinic, and customer service was vital to our survival. We didn’t take people back to a room, and tell them to wait. Our front office enjoyed talking to these people while they waited. And the wait time was minimal. We never wanted anyone waiting for more than 5 minutes, if possible. Granted, we weren’t emergency services. Sometimes the doctors and nurses are overwhelmed with patients.
Customer service didn’t mean we agreed to everything. You can’t please everyone, that’s impossible.
Many angles to this. Would love to hear your worst “customer service” trials in health care in the comments. We also have foreign readers so their system and experiences are also great to learn about.
I'm sympathetic with the doctors' point of view...up to a point. But it's not all about medicine itself.
The system that is supposed to deliver it can be completely broken, as it is here.
You may never even get to the "medicine" bit at all. I was going to write a long story here, you wouldn't even believe the bs in getting seen, the bs in staff not being able to communicate with other staff because it's "not their job", the bs of failed scans that were supposed to happen and now your appointment with the specialist is set back months. Not to mention creepy weird people doing physio who really shouldn't be.
Another good one!