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[Link to a checklist of patient education procedures below.]
Educate your patients!
There are so many reasons why — let’s look at a few of them. Then, I will show you how your team can implement your patient education procedures.
1. Selling the Invisible. Unlike buying a refrigerator, your patients are purchasing something they can’t see.
They are receiving a service for which there are no concrete, tangible references for them to judge whether the services were excellent, complete, or long-lasting. Outside of immediate relief from their symptoms, they may wonder if you provided a great service, shortchanged them, or are recommending more than they need.
On the other hand, you know the length, breadth, and depth of what you provide. Virtually, you can see the outcomes, know the measurements, understand the symptoms and know what they point to. But to your patients… it’s all an illusion. They have to trust you and what you say.
Typically, once the symptoms are relieved, many patients believe that the condition is resolved. But through education, your patients can understand how your treatment recommendations are a pathway to fully resolving their condition.
2. Beyond Your Services – Your Patient’s Optimal Health. Beyond your services and the treatment program you suggest, your patients will benefit from general health knowledge. Health is a lifestyle, including exercise and nutrition, but the healthy way of living is distorted by unrelenting drug advertising and propaganda.
Low-fat diets, diet soda, statins and other drugs are still an accepted part of the conventional health model. Pharma is increasingly pouring billions into advertising — $328.6 billion in 2016 from $116 billion in 1997.(1 ) In addition, there are untold sums spent on lobbying your elected officials and paying for their election expenses.
Health reality is being manufactured for corporate profits rather than for personal and family health and longevity. Your patients and neighbors in your community don’t have a chance without your calm teaching of the facts on how to achieve a healthy and long life.
3. Customer Education — From a strictly commercial point of view, other businesses are seeing the advantages of customer education. According to learning industry analyst John Leh, “In a world where customer success increasingly determines overall business success, customer education has become an imperative.”(2)
Studies support the idea that customer education pays off. According to studies by ThinkJar, a customer strategy consultancy, “Customers are thirsty for more information and knowledge.”(3) And a study by Eisingerich and Bell conclude that customer education improves the trust in the company.(4)
Major businesses are investing large sums in educating their customers, and a leading customer education platform, Skilljar announced it has raised $33 million in funding. That is a significant investment! Their goal is to provide tools to companies to better onboard, engage, and retain customers at a large scale.
So if you want healthier patients and a healthier community, and if you would like to generate more profit, simply spend more time educating your patients. It is not that expensive! But as with most value-added programs in a practice, projects rarely start, and when they do, they are abandoned almost as soon as they begin.
To avoid this, use a checklist!!
Download the Patient Education Checklist for some ideas on what you can do to educate your patients. Assign a team member this checklist and give them 1-3 hours per week to work on selected projects and report on them at your meetings. They can take on the role of Patient Education Coordinator and help everyone on your team up their game in patient education.
The more your patients know, the further they (and you) will go.
Ed Petty
1. Consumer Reports, January 14, 2019 2. Avramescu, Adam. Customer Education: Why Smart Companies Profit by Making Customers Smarter. 3. Interview with Kolsky, Foundoer of ThinkJar. Huffpost, 10/15/2015 4. Andreas B. Eisingerich, Simon J. Bell, February 1, 2008 Photo from UCLA
Selling the Invisible – a favorite book of mine by Harry Beckwith