Difficult patient - angry about office wait - empathic

This is one part of a pair of scenarios demonstrating communication skills.
Comments are welcome - they will be used to refine upcoming videos in the series

[mjzulu]

As a GP practising in BC, I was unimpressed. I have found myself in exactly this scenario more times than I care to remember. Physicians often cannot help being behind but our patient's time is important too. This physician was condescending and spoke to the patient as if he were a child. He turned the patient's justified annoyance around and appeared to make him feel bad for not respecting the needs of his staff. Accept responsibility, apologize and move on. This is a service industry!

[MajorKreissack]

Am I the only one who finds the doctor very creepy? Those eyes were staring into my soul

[patientplus]

Vastly mishandled - the doc doesn't show empathy, but condescension.  Empathy requires more than just supercilious mirroring and NEVER involves blame-shifting and guilt-tripping.
Stupid

[harmeetmalhi]

Apologize without making excuses and make corrections to work flow to prevent such an unacceptable wait. That’s what I have learned in clinical practice.

[AutumnTeaLeaves]

The doctor could have started with a short apology and an understanding statement rather than just spewing out a patronizing analysis of the patient's feelings. He comes across as extremely defensive, and he purposefully made the patient feel guilty about being impatient with the receptionist. Not ONCE did he apologize for making the patient so upset. I would have changed my doctor if this happened to me.

[aaronscarpa]

Ummm, he made an appointment for a certain time. No meed to gaslight him, and downplay his concerns by making him sympathetic about a newborn baby.

[ttt]

Like others I felt the doctor came across condescending. The mirroring was so excessive that it sounded as if he was uninvolved and not present. The doctor should have owned up to the fact that despite his good intentions, his patient ended up waiting 2 hours in his office.

[lullanie]

I'm sorry but this went on so long it just sounded like insincere patronizing. The whole time all I kept thinking that it's not surprising that the wait is so long if he wastes that much time with each patient. The first thing out of the doctor's mouth should have been an apology followed by a brief explanation of the circumstances and then on with what the patient came for. 

[jfguidermphches]

Joe is not a "difficult" patient. If a physician is called away for an emergency, his/her receptionist should advise waiting patients and provide the option to reschedule or wait. The patient is not being unreasonable... His time is valuable and should be respected. Whoever wrote this script... is not connected with the real world.

[mslewan]

Lets unpack this from another angle: two hours for a med refill? for those who do not work behind the scenes, I still don't agree with the conversation from the pcp. But if the med could not be refilled over the phone, it was either a narcotic, the original prescription is expired, out of refills, new prescription from an ER or hospital discharge with progress notes to support the use, the medication is not on their formulary (they don't carry the brand/label which happens with a lot of new medications-especially the ones advertised on TV), no up to date labs, (kidney and liver functions can be critical), an outside medication from another practice-that was never filled or the patient hasn't been seen in over 6 months to a year. Yes two hours is excessive even for a walk in. But if the patient is notified up front that as a walk in, the wait can be long-and if more than 30 minutes is extraordinary, then reschedule. A refill of that importance definitely has more background than just the wait time. The above are not excuses-but reasons non clinical people are not aware of why 'simple requests' can become exorbitant delays.

[edwardjohn]

I’m sorry, that Doc was a jerk. He blamed the patient for his office’s inadequacy!

[Robert-wjmj]

Let’s face it patients have to wait a long time because the receptionist over schedules, that is the done purposely, there will be no holes in the Dr. schedule, Time is money, and that’s all that matters

[jayspriya]

The doctor wasnt empathetic. He would have failed thsi scenario in OSCE!
"I am sorry that you have to wait such long time without hhaving been informed about the delay. At thsi point, I can see why you are upset. I will discusss this in the staff meeting & let you know the outcome.However, If you want to make a formal complaint you can write to PracticeManager if that makes you feel better. For now, as your time is precious, can we start talking about the issue you came for?". Thats all

[katedaniels]

This the PAST. Gone. Today’s staff would label him aggressive and offensive

[shakeelasaleemi]

a simple apology would be nice, if its osce.its a fail. 

[sammucheru]

We are just revising for our part one exams and we came across this video. We feel like the doctor patronized the patient and took him on a guilt trip. Not good.

[seattlecathy]

This doctor is being obnoxious and condescending. He must be in a small town: in most places, a GP doesn't deliver babies anymore. The issue isn't whether he's more important: it's about creating an efficient system. As others said, the receptionist could advise people of the delay and offer to reschedule. Does he even need an in-person visit for a refill? Nowadays a lot of those are done by portal.

[okolemahu]

The guys obviously not a drug seeker or abuser. The doc seems to know him well. Why not just call in a refill without the office visit and forgo the insignificant copay. Like Spike Lee said, “Doctor, just do the right thing”!

[richardanthonijsz]

I am not so sure whether this was demeaning to the patient. The doc was very long-winded, a very quick apology together with an acknowledgement of the patient's feelings would have gone a long way towards patient care as well as time management. But this is only a demo showing us what is good and what is not so good, simply to help us make us think what we could do in a REAL situation.

[mistakenmillenial]

This is ridiculous. What humans behave like this.