A Total Patient Education Experience

If you are still depending on old-fashioned patient education processes–you are not allowing your practice to function at maximum capacity. Remember that the world is changing quickly, and as the world changes your internal marketing efforts need to change with them.

In the over 300 marketing audits we’ve conducted of chiropractic offices, it is obvious that patient education is one of the most commonly found aspects of high performing clinics. Then why do so many clinics not have ‘great’ patient education efforts?

Consider that in today’s world, your patient education efforts cannot be ‘singular’. That is, they must be multi-sensory and multi-faceted. Rather than depending on a health care class, or simple word of mouth patient education–consider creating a TOTAL PATIENT EDUCATION Experience for your patients. Here’s how you do it:

1. Clarify your ‘key educational’ points. That is those 5-7 primary concepts that you want all of your patients to fully grasp. 

2. Create a list of educational opportunities or contact points: from the posters and educational material hanging on your walls, to the handouts you and your staff pass out, to your reception room television, to the verbal messages you and your staff share with patients–they are all part of the total educational experience.

3. Remember that people learn with all three senses: auditory, visual, and hands-on, so make sure all three are being utilized. 

4. Don’t forget the power of technology.  For example, we happen to believe that audio CD’s are an underutilized educational tool. They are easy for you to record; inexpensive to duplicate; and patients love them because they can listen to them at their own convenience.

5. Your external marketing as well as your internal marketing communications efforts can also support your total patient education experience. 

6. Be careful to consider the role of the doctor in your total patient education experience. If the whole thing depends only on the doctor, often it falls apart. So create an experience that runs itself. Systematized and automatic. The doctor can be the ‘icing of the cake’. You’ll immediately see the benefits.

7. Last, but not least, don’t forget to shape your new patient education efforts based on your patient’s point of view. Too many old-fashioned efforts are created from a doctor’s point of view–and they are not always well received by patients. Put yourself in their shoes, you’ll find that those messages are often more accepted.

So, step into the modern world. Don’t depend on on singular patient education efforts that don’t work in today’s rapidly changing world. Instead create a TOTAL PATIENT EDUCATION EXPERIENCE.

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