Dr. Elaine Mo explains the importance of communication and a pleasant patient experience in developing long-term relationships with patients.
Dr Elaine Mo, a GP and Fellow of the Royal College of Surgeons of England’s Joint Faculty of Dentistry, joined our Dental Leaders Podcast to share her journey. Dr Elaine explains what she learned from running a restaurant business and how she applied it to dentistry. Specifically, Dr Elaine goes into detail about how she uses her communication skills to build rapport with a patient.
Prav Solanki: Can you draw a parallel between what you learned as a child in the restaurant industry, in the family business, and how it helped you become a better dentist today?
Elaine Mo: I think it definitely shaped me, not specifically as a dentist, but as a person in general. It's about service at a restaurant, it's the same as a patient journey and, at the end of the day, you make customers feel special, just like you make patients feel special.
For me, if I go to a restaurant, I can have the most amazing food. Just like a dentist can do the most amazing filling, but at the end of the day, it's a filling. Food is food, and actually, what shapes it is the experience itself.
Right: Very true.
Elaine: And you know what? At the end of the day, for my patients, there are a lot of dentists who, even though we're at the same level, can provide the same filling, but What makes everything different is asking the patient how they are feeling, their family, making them feel at home and actually being a person, rather than just your dentist, and be someone you can really talk to.
Payman Langroudi: A big difference is that, in a restaurant, you can see the food, you can taste the food. Often, the patient has no idea what is happening in their own mouth.
Elaine: No. I really don't know. I think that's why photography... people say, "Take photos, it protects you from getting sued." Actually, no, The most important [part of photography] for me is patient education. Because if you take pictures at different stages, you're showing them exactly what you're doing, even if it's not the proudest submission you've ever made, you're willing to show the patient, which to them means, "Oh, wow, if he's taking pictures, then it must be good enough to show people, which means it must be at a certain level.".
Right: What is the biggest clinical mistake you have ever made and what did you learn from it?
Elaine: There have been quite a few. I think everyone would be lying if we said we didn't make mistakes. You know what? I have to raise my hand and say, "You know, a few years ago I might have drilled the wrong tooth." But you know what? Explain it to the patient and, if you have a good relationship, they will understand.
“What’s different is making them feel at home and being a person rather than a dentist.”
Payman: Was it a left and right issue?
Elaine: Yes, because the X-ray was flipped wrong and I didn't check, and that was my fault. But this goes back to how you deal with your patient. Raise your hand and say, "I'm really sorry, this is what happened. "I take full responsibility."”. But the thing is, if the patient likes you and you have treated them with respect and honesty in the past, it's not going anywhere.
Payman: So what happened, they just dropped it?
Elaine: They said something like, "Oh, yeah, don't worry. Things happen.".
Payman: How much did you drill before you realized it?
Elaine: Literally, it wasn't much. I was like, "Where is it?" But what saves you is how you treated that patient in the past, isn't it?
Right: The relationship, yes.
Elaine: If someone made the mistake for me, if I really liked them, I still wouldn't sue them. I wouldn't, you just don't sue people you like. It just doesn't work.
Payman: No, me neither.
Elaine: For me, my motto for my nurses, as well as when patients get mad or kick you, is: smile. Nobody can yell at a smiling face. That's it. You can't. Even if they pick on you, just smile and nobody can say anything. Nobody can be mean to a smiling face.
“When patients get angry or kick, in your head it should be: just smile. No one can yell at a smiling face.”
Right: Can you take me back to when [your clinical mistake] happened?
Elaine: Panic. This is the moment when you look at your nurse and you're like, "Jesus." The nurse says, "What happened?" And then it's like a little nudge in the side and you're like, "Well..." But then at the end of the day, you have to fix it, fill it in, and tell the patient, "I drilled into this tooth and I can't see what it is and I just realized what the mistake was. I'm so sorry, I didn't check properly before.".
And you know what? Honesty is actually the best policy. If you try to hide it, you'll dig yourself a hole and you won't be able to get out of it.
Payman: You're in a much bigger hole.
Elaine: A much bigger hole. The trust the patient has is gone because you lied to them. If you're honest with them, that trust is maintained and it shows your integrity. You're going to get some weird patients who will try to take advantage of that, but A lot of the people there are actually nice people. They're not there to scam you.
“If you are honest with patients, trust is maintained and it shows your integrity.”
Payman: I don't want to put myself on a pedestal, you know, on big horses or anything like that, but at the end of the day, if we say we're professionals, That's when professionalism comes in.
Elaine: The problem now is that people panic too easily and the main thing is to stay calm and not get agitated, because when we get agitated, we make the patient feel like it's a bigger problem than it is. If you can stay calm and say, "You know, something's happening. I'm really sorry that happened to you. It's not normal, it's just a mistake." It's very calming.
Payman: It's interesting how quickly you got there... because Prav and I were talking about that Black Box thinking, you know about that?
Elaine: Yes.
Payman: For anyone who doesn't know about this, it's that When a plane crashes, they look at the black box. And then they don't blame anyone, but try to learn from the accident and make everyone understand what the learning outcomes are. But in medicine there is always a big cover-up and no one takes the blame. Blame is actually the problem.
Payman: So I was telling Prav about a left-right clinical incident I had and how every dentist has one or two like it.
Elaine: He would be lying if he didn't.
Payman: But what a great learning resource, because for me it was always about checking if the left and right were correct, the nurses marked correctly. If everyone in this room said, "Here's my black box story," we would learn so much.. But when we thought about it, we said, “It’s never going to happen.” Without it being anonymous, no one will say it.
Elaine: It's interesting. After that happened, I was a little bit like, "Oh my God, what am I doing?" So I brought it up in a practice meeting, because we're going through the shortcomings and how we can change that. And then I ended up saying, "Actually, no, the dentist will check all the X-rays. The nurses won't upload them. The dentists will save them to make sure.".
Payman: You actually made the black box.
Right: That's great.
Payman: I love it so much.
Elaine: I actually sent an email to the patient and said, "I'm really sorry that this happened. To make sure that we actually took steps to minimize this, and here's what we did." And I sent a thank you email. I said, "Thank you for helping us improve what we can and for helping us prevent this from happening again." They felt like they did something. So, when in doubt, if something bad happens, thank the patient afterward for doing something that will prevent this from happening to other people, because they feel like they did something positive.
“If something bad happens, thank the patient afterward for doing something that will prevent it from happening to other people.”
Elaine: As for me, even though I can focus on the clinical side of the job, I like to focus on the patient and the actual care.
Payman: The communication hack is really beneficial for you, yes?
Elaine: I think it's more important than anything else because I think the problem we have now is that there are so many clinical courses that people just throw themselves into. But how popular are these communication and personal development courses? You don't see people jumping on them, like they're doing a little composite course.
The thing is, here I think that We need to change the mindset, because at the end of the day, if you screw up, that's what's going to save you. If you can't find patients, that's what's going to make people sit in your chair, and it all goes from there.
Pravia: I know a few dentists who have recently qualified and would love to be where you are at that stage of their career and if you could give them your top three pieces of advice for the younger you. What advice would you give them?
Elaine:
- Take advantage of many opportunities and meet as many people as possible. Although some people you might think, “Oh no, they’re young or something.” No matter who you meet, you’ll learn something from them.
- Don't give up. I know there's a lot of negativity and workplace issues and things that people have these days that we see, but you know what? If it's not right for you, leave. There's always a better place. There are a lot of places out there and perseverance is the key.
- The third is to believe in yourself and, for me, personal development and your development as a person is what will change everything.
Right: I love this. Personal development is so important to me that I've invested so much time and money into it over the past two years. And I really believe in it.
Elaine: It's so interesting, because I don't think people realize the importance of it, and once you get the hang of it, you realize that it actually changes the clinical side. Even if you haven't changed anything clinically, change everything you do and it will bring you much more content and confidence in your life.
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Source: enlightensmiles.com
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