often only to return in even worse condi-tion, are the ones whom we have failed, most miserably, to enlighten. Our research has found the lack of an effective system for patient education to be the most common contributor to practice failure. The truly successful practitioners – whether in practice two years or 52 years – affirm that it is the rapport generated one-on-one that creates the trust needed to turn “patient” into “advocate.” The big surprise is finding that the clinical results you achieve with that patient play a smaller role in the creation of an enthusiastic referrer than we have been led to believe. From a patient’s perspective, “getting them better” is a given. Educating them so that they understand what you are doing, feel involved and in-vested in their own care, and know how you can help them to optimize their well-ness in the future, is the element that can make the difference between retaining these patients – as well as having them send you new ones – and living with an empty ap-pointment book. ADVOCATES BUILD PRACTICES Everyone has patients, but what we really want are advocates. Patients come for their appointments; advocates not only keep their appointments, but are eager to actively spread, with enthusiasm, the features and benefits of your service within their sphere of influence. The sad but overarching reality is that unlike most of the other major players in health care, we have little third-party en-dorsement enthusiastically pushing the wonders of chiropractic care. This, com-bined with unjust external factors that chal-lenge our credibility with consumers, has created skepticism regarding our efficacy, and clinical and cultural authority. Even those formerly predisposed to chiropractic care are questioning their position. This has served to statistically reduce our market share over the last decade, impacting even those previously converted. Our experience continues to reinforce the belief that, even in these seemingly bleak times, opportunity abounds – you just have to recognize this potential, and make it work for you. It is of interest to note that “the other guy” isn’t doing so great ei-ther. That is, public confidence in the con-ventional medical approach to health provi-sion is at an all-time low, and consumers are looking for effective alternatives. Building advocates often means laying out the foun-10 • CANADIAN CHIROPRACTOR | OCTOBER 2010 Education of any sort has three purposes: 1. It creates a revised understanding of previously held belief. Most peo-ple who come into our clinics already have a preconceived idea as to what chiropractic is. Education serves to broaden the understanding by provid-ing relevant information designed to reinforce the positive aspects of what we do and dispel the negative misconceptions. As you try to glean new patients’ levels of understanding, remember that the quality of the “ask” will very much determine how effective you will be at identifying their negative preconceptions and biases. Never forget that you cannot educate until you understand and break down established barriers. It just won’t work because you are going up against an already established belief system (see “Breaking It Down”). You must neutralize this first, to change the paradigm. 2. It provides new information on the broader benefits of chiropractic that will allow that patient to understand the relevance of treatment to his or her particular needs. As the clinical experience unfolds, then, and the belief system is being cultivated, that person becomes armed with the right tools to advocate in an effective and proactive way when discussing the features and relevance of care with family and friends. 3. It creates better questions. The science of human behaviour has proven that the broader the education in any subject studied, the better the person is equipped to ask more meaningful and provocative questions. This in turn, further broadens their scope of understanding (in this case of chiro-practic) and its personal relevance to their needs and those of family and friends. In short, the more one understands and the more positive rein-forcement one receives, the greater one’s enthusiasm for the product/service become as well as the likelihood of that person advocating on its behalf. Abe Lincoln once said, “Education creates empowerment and this in turn creates the power of enthusiastic accountability.” dation for new attitudes through effective patient education. As well, the emerging body of evidence supporting the overall health benefits asso-ciated with the maintenance of mobility and an active lifestyle play in well with the tra-ditional chiropractic paradigm. As we said, opportunity abounds! The only way to craft opportunity is through creating awareness/ understanding of the service you are pro-viding. This is done via effective education. Why spend time on this? From a con-sumer’s perspective, it is very difficult to need something you don’t understand. A consumer must possess more than a basic awareness of how the features and benefits of a product or service can either satisfy a need or make an improvement to his/her life, in order to fulfil a purchase equation. For the majority of the public, there is little or no understanding of chiropractic; there-fore, no apparent need for the service. Alter-natively, their understanding is polluted by mistruths or innuendo that create suspicion and distrust. You must create the aware-ness that will help people to understand why they need your care, and then build on the knowledge that will, in turn, spur them to become advocates for the service you provide. BREAKING IT DOWN To more fully understand the critical im-portance of patient education, let’s break it down fundamentally by examining the fol-lowing two questions: What is the purpose of educating a patient? Who does patient education really benefit? What is the purpose of educating a patient? Although at first blush, it seems that patient education is merely “sales,” if you penetrate a little deeper, you can better appreciate the following benefits of doing it well: 1. Understanding equals ownership – The more information we have on any item or service that we are considering pur-chasing, naturally the greater the level of understanding of the related features and benefits associated with it. Once the tipping point has been reached intellectually to move from a “want” to a “need” to an actual purchase, all of that accumulated informa-tion then, in turn, serves to buttress up or www.canadianchiropractor.ca
Chiropractic + Naturopathic Doctor October 2010: Page 10
