Why Patients Don’t Hear You (and What to Do About It)

“I can’t believe that my dentist did this to me!”

A sentence that I hear often, people tell me all their dental stories thinking that I will give them validation, they expect me to tell them how “right” they are and how “wrong” their dentist was/is.

Unfortunately, this is never how the story unfolds.?

“How could he drill two perfectly healthy teeth down and put caps on them…?”

When you are a dentist, you know where this story goes.?

Stories like this tell me over and over again that we can do so much better in dentistry when it comes to communication. My friend's dentist didn’t do anything wrong, I am even sure that he/she explained exactly what was going to happen, but here is the thing: when people are in the dental share, they can’t hear what you say, even if they want to, it is very difficult for the mind to listen to two voices at the same time.

And that is exactly what is happening when a dentist is explaining to the patient what is going to happen. The patient’s internal voice is much louder than the voice that comes from outside.?

That internal voice is shouting:?

“This is going to be painful.?

You are not going to be able to eat for a while.?

This is going to be expensive.?

And did I say already how much this is going to hurt?

You will never be the same…”

One of the first things I recommend a doctor to do, is never to explain something that is more than a little filling in the operatory. NEVER.?

A patient in the dental chair is completely in right brain mode, while the dentist, explaining something technical, is in left brain mode. This kind of communication will fail, by definition.?

Take your patient out of there, put them in a consultation room and sit next to the patient, take a deep breath, be open and first LISTEN.?

Ask your patient: Are you OK? How does this make you feel??

Now you will get an idea of all the noise that is going on in the patient's head and at this point you can make sure that they understood exactly what is going to happen.?

When my friend's dentist would have done that, I am sure there wouldn’t have been any issue.?

Is vital to know how the mind works. Our mind, the patient’s mind, our team’s mind.?

Knowing how to “work” the rules of the mind is a big win-win-win. The above is only one example.?

If you are interested to know how to integrate Mindfulness and the rules of the mind into your practice, I love to help you implement this in your practice.?

This is one of the easiest and cost effective ways to not only have happy patients, but also your team is going to appreciate it, they will have much less stress having to deal with unhappy patients and the result of this all is that your practice will grow effortlessly.?

Patient happy.

Team happy.

You happy.?

Practice growing…?

Ready? Just schedule your discovery call.?