252 The Top 5 Complaints that Drive Patients Away

Welcome to the KC CHIROpulse Podcast.  

This week’s topic:  The Top 5 Complaints that Drive Patients Away 

The KC CHIROpulse Podcast is designed for Chiropractic professionals ready to elevate their practice to new heights.  This week, the show is hosted by Kats Consultants’ coaches Dr Michael Perusich and Dr Troy Fox, seasoned experts in Chiropractic business management.  This podcast provides invaluable insights and actionable strategies to help you create a flourishing and sustainable Chiropractic business.

In this episode, we discuss:

• The 5 most common patient complaints that drive them away from you
• Why your communication may actually be producing these complaints
• How your care recommendations may be working against you
• How your practice stats can tip you off to these complaints
• …and so much more…

In each episode of KC CHIROpulse, we delve into crucial aspects of building a successful Chiropractic practice, covering topics such as establishing a strong foundation, adopting a patient-centric approach, mastering marketing techniques, achieving financial fitness, fostering effective team building and leadership, integrating technology and innovation, and navigating common challenges in the field.

Whether you're a seasoned chiropractor or just starting your practice, the KC CHIROpulse Podcast offers a wealth of knowledge and personalized practical advice to help you navigate the intricate world of Chiropractic business. Join us on this journey as we explore proven strategies, share success stories, and connect with industry experts to empower you in your pursuit of building a thriving Chiropractic practice.

Don't miss out on the latest insights and expert guidance. Subscribe now and unlock the secrets to taking your Chiropractic practice to the next level. Your success is our priority at Kats Chiropractic Business Advisors.

DISCLAIMER:  The information presented in this broadcast is for educational purposes only and is not intended to offer legal, investment, accounting, or medical advice, and represents the opinions of the speakers.  Seek the consultation of a professional for advice in those areas. And remember…your results using this information may be different than described.

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Transcript

252 The 5 Complaints

Why Patients Quit Care

[00:00:00] 

Dr. Michael Perusich : Doctors, do you know why patients are leaving your practice? Hi everybody. Welcome to the KC ChiroPulse Podcast, brought to you by Kats Consultants in Chiro Health, USA. We are your hosts. This is Dr. Troy Fox. I'm Dr. Michael Perusich. We appreciate you joining in today. And, uh, Troy, we were talking about this a little bit here in the studio before we, before we went live, and the top five patient complaints that are driving patients out of our practices and we don't even realize it.

Think, oh, well, you know, it's the typical patient, they don't follow all the way through care. But there's a way to fix these things if we just recognize them and, and kind of lean into 'em a little bit. And I'm, I'm just gonna dive right into the first one, right? Because this is one of my favorites actually.

This is a silent killer of case acceptance. Mm-hmm. Patient says, I don't really understand what's going on. Now, whose fault is that? 

Dr. Troy Fox: Right? 

Dr. Michael Perusich : Yeah, doctors, come [00:01:00] on you, you, you gotta give. At least a good enough report of findings that your patients understand the recommendations for care. They have to understand why they're getting an adjustment.

They have to understand why they're getting muscle stim. They have to understand why they're getting shockwave. And you know, what are, whatever is built into your achievement plan. If they don't understand it, um, you're, you're gonna be lucky if all they do is wanna play a la carte with your treatment plan.

My gosh. If they say, I don't really understand what's going on, and they leave because of that, that's on you docs. 

Dr. Troy Fox: That is a serious lack of either spending the time with the patient or taking the effort to help them understand, I hear an awful lot of you gotta join out of place, or you. Even chiropractors talk about popping joints, and I'm like, Ugh.

Specific adjustments people. That's what you learned in school. But when we talk to that patient about that specific adjustment and we're looking at [00:02:00] what's going on with the patient, we had to somehow relay a very technical explanation. Not so much water it down. I don't like to water down my explanation to a patient.

What I like to do is relate it with stories. You know, if you're talking about a disc injury, and you guys have heard me talk about this before, take a water balloon, fill it with gel, and put a mesh Turkey bag around it and glue it to your hands. Boom. That's the explanation of a disc. That's a healthy disc.

And now let's talk about what's happened with you. Yeah, so there's a really quick, easy way. I just explained a disc, which. For most of us, if we tried to get into the technical portion, and yes, I left out the, the nucleus, but don't worry about that because it's really not important to the patient at that point.

That's not where we're heading with it. So I can leave that part out or I can say, Hey, I know you're a technical guy. There is a nucleus in there too. But we don't need to worry about that right now because what we're really gonna talk about is that mesh Turkey bag, the annular fibers. That's what I wanna talk about today.[00:03:00] 

Make Care Plans Click

Dr. Troy Fox: So when you're talking to a patient. It's really easy if you can relate to them now. Oh, absolutely. Now it's also easy. Or if you can add, and this is a big one, and this is one that you're really big on as well. That's that emotional connection to the outcome. Yeah. In other words, what is your goal for care?

What are you, what can't you do right now? It's a really easy question. 

Dr. Michael Perusich : If you're presenting your care plan to the patient in a format that sounds to the patient, like it's your plan like you've designed this for you, for your clinic to make money, you're gonna lose every time. You've gotta tie it all back to the patient.

And you guys are gonna throw sticks and stones at me when I say this, but I, I'm telling you, it's the truth. If you're spending 10, 15, 20 minutes trying to explain the Chiropractic adjustment, you've lost the patient. Now, don't throw sticks and stones because I'm not saying the Chiropractic adjustment [00:04:00] isn't powerful, but the patient isn't in your office to learn about.

The physiology, the neurophysiology behind a Chiropractic adjustment. They wanna know, can you get me back to doing whatever it is they can't do right now. That's what they wanna know. That's what they're relying on you for. I. 

Dr. Troy Fox: When that is presented to the patient, how are we gonna get you back to where you want to be?

You know, uh, an example, I can't play with my grandkids. I can't get down on the ground because my low back hurts. That's my example, 

Dr. Michael Perusich : Troy. 

Dr. Troy Fox: Yeah. So when we're talking about that relates right back to your report of findings. You can very specifically go back to report of findings and then present a care plan.

Dr. Michael Perusich : Yep. 

Dr. Troy Fox: Because now we're not just talking about just paying. We're talking about pain, we're talking about function and long-term outcome. So when I do that, what is the first thing I say? Let's get you outta pain first. Yeah. But here's how we're gonna do [00:05:00] that. And then we start talking about the treatment plan itself.

So we validate our treatment plan based off of what does this patient wanna achieve? What do they wanna get out of this? I had a guy in just about half an hour ago that. Is 50 some years old, but still rides motorcycles and not like on the road. He does Enduro stuff. And I said, my first question was, what is this keeping you from doing?

He said, he smiles and he said, well, he said, you're not gonna believe this, but I'm 50 some years old and I still ride Enduro bikes because my son. Wants to ride Enduro bikes. And I started riding with him and I went, really? Tell me a little bit more about that and what you guys do. And I said, what's this keeping you from doing right now?

And that led right into, okay, here's my plan. Here's what we need to do. And it allows me, at the same time, to talk about what we need to do long-term care wise. You're gonna continue to do exactly the things that you're doing right now, so you're gonna continue to put yourself in harm's way. Right. [00:06:00] So how do we mitigate that?

We mitigate that with a cadence of care after we get you better. But let's worry about getting you better first. I just planted the seed. 

Dr. Michael Perusich : Yeah. And that's the perfect way to present a care plan. 'cause it's not about pain, it's about being able to ride that motorcycle, not only for the next month, but the next six months.

The next six years, yep. Maybe the next 20 years. And that doesn't. That. That means Chiropractic care doesn't really have an end point to it. 

Dr. Troy Fox: And I didn't start with pain. Right. I started with long-term care and looped back around to pain. 

Dr. Michael Perusich : Yep. 

Dr. Troy Fox: You notice that at the very end. I said, let's get you outta pain first.

Dr. Michael Perusich : Yeah. Yeah. And that's the first part of the treatment plan. 

Dr. Troy Fox: Yeah. 

Dr. Michael Perusich : It's not the end of the treatment plan. Right? So we can't let patients walk away not understanding what's going on. So if your report of findings, for example, is weak, this is gonna be a symptom of it. I don't understand what's going on, doc.

I don't I don't know why we're doing all this [00:07:00] stuff. If you have low conversion rates, high dropouts, those kind of things. This is probably what's happening behind the scenes. So we've got. Four more great examples of why patients are walking away from your clinic. So hang in there. Mm-hmm. We gotta take a quick break.

We'll be right back.

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Price Objections and Value

Dr. Michael Perusich : All right, everybody, welcome back. We are talking about the five things, the five [00:08:00] excuses, the five complaints. Put it that way that patients throw out the top five the patients throw out to quick care and walk away from your practice. And and we all are experiencing a lot of these, you know, number two, Troy, is this is more expensive than I expected.

Dr. Troy Fox: It is, and here's what's funny about that. When I first started into practice, I thought, oh, it's, even though they drove up in a brand new vehicle, they got out, they had brand new clothes on. They're talking about the trip they took to Maui last week. Oh my gosh, this is more expensive than I expected.

I don't know if I can afford this kind of thing. They don't say that to you, but they'll tell the front desk set. 

Dr. Michael Perusich : Sure. 

Dr. Troy Fox: You know what the problem really was? Again, it goes back to point number one of a good report of findings. They don't see a value in what I'm getting ready to do. 

Dr. Michael Perusich : Yeah. 

Dr. Troy Fox: And so if they don't see a value, they don't wanna follow through.

Yep. So it's about value perception rather than it is about the money. In other words, I have somewhere [00:09:00] disengaged with the patient at this point, or we wouldn't be having this conversation about the money. 

Dr. Michael Perusich : And let's take your motorcycle guy as an example. We can just carry that into this complaint.

Dr. Troy Fox: I 

Dr. Michael Perusich : if your motorcycle guy believes that he's only there to get out of pain. I'm sorry. We're kind of magicians when it comes to getting people out of pain most of the time. 

Dr. Troy Fox: Yeah. 

Dr. Michael Perusich : You're gonna lose them really, really quick. And I, I'm gonna ask you guys out there, I, is that the point where the patient is well enough to go out to do.

The ride, the motorcycle. Sorry, I lost my train of thought for a second. Mm-hmm. It, no, it's not, you know, there, there is orthopedic research out there. I think this was in spine, don't quote me on that many years ago, but it talks about the fact that it takes 18 months for spinal joints. Spinal mechanisms as they call it in the orthopedic research.

So that's the muscles, the bones, the disc, the nerves, all that. It's the complex. [00:10:00] It takes 18 months for that to fully heal. And that's only if you do everything right. 

Dr. Troy Fox: Mm-hmm. 

Dr. Michael Perusich : And are your patients doing everything right? No. The motorcycle guys out there, jumping off of 20 foot high hills and what happens when he lands?

Think about Wolf's law. Mm-hmm. Abnormal pressure on normal tissue causes it to. What Plastically deform. And so it's because of all the things that people do every day, all of us do every day on a daily basis that our patients aren't getting that 18 month healing time. And if you're telling them you've got a six week treatment plan, and then they're gonna be cut loose, whoa.

Did you fall short? In my opinion. Yeah. So we don't, we don't wanna create patients who think care is expensive, care is necessary. 

And go get your gallbladder taken out. You know, if you have a gallbladder issue, it hurts. 

But the doctor's not correcting the pain. He's taking something out of you that hurts, but he's correcting the problem.

And that's [00:11:00] what we have to help our patients understand. And it's in there that the value proposition exists and it's in that emotional goal, like we talked about. Number one, it's that motorcycle guy. Who wants to continue writing with his son, but he's going out and repetitive, repetitively causing insult to the spine.

By doing that, he needs Chiropractic for the rest of his life. 

Dr. Troy Fox: And it's amazing when you present it the right way, how well it works. Because sometimes we think, well, I can't do that. Let me tell you this gentleman was, was the uh, CFO at a hospital. 

Dr. Michael Perusich : Oh, nice. 

Dr. Troy Fox: And this gentleman understands value for care, but he also understands.

That there needs to be some sort of tie into, okay, here's what I got going on, here's what I'm looking at, and here's why. Mm-hmm. We would continue rather than just saying it. So we have to [00:12:00] have a good understanding ourselves of why patients are getting long-term care. And I think sometimes we tend to not even look at the research, like the research piece that you.

Referenced, and I've referenced that with patients as well, and they're like, whoa, it takes that long to get better. 

Dr. Michael Perusich : Yeah. 

Dr. Troy Fox: You may not feel pain that long, but it takes that long for your body to completely heal. And how many of us have waited 18 months to resume activities? None of us. 

Dr. Michael Perusich : None. None. 

Dr. Troy Fox: I mean, if you're a golfer, most of you guys that are that play golf or gals, I'm lucky if I can get you to set out for two weeks.

Right. Much less good luck. 18 months. Yeah. 

Dr. Michael Perusich : Right. 

Dr. Troy Fox: And any other sport really too. Most people are not willing to sit out for very long. Two weeks seems like an a, a a lifetime, an 

Dr. Michael Perusich : eternity. Yeah. It does. And 

Dr. Troy Fox: so you're there in a supportive role at that stand from that standpoint. So it's really easy to explain.

I'm here in a supportive role. Your body's going to continue to remodel over this time, but left alone to its own devices. It's gonna go [00:13:00] back right where it was, you're gonna be in the same position and now you're vulnerable to a much larger injury down the road. And I, 

Dr. Michael Perusich : yeah, 

Dr. Troy Fox: go ahead. Here's, here's what's crazy about that.

If you look at documentation. You look at documentation rules, what do the documentation rules say? They say that we need to counsel our patients on adverse responses if they don't follow our care recommendations. 

Dr. Michael Perusich : Yep. 

Dr. Troy Fox: Are you guys aware of that? I mean, if you're not aware of that, be aware because you are supposed to counsel your patients that they say, doc, I don't know if I wanna do that.

Well, here are the bad things that can happen. Yep. You don't have to say it quite like that, but I just said that when I told the patient that, and that goes in my notes. 

Dr. Michael Perusich : And I always framed that very thing around. An analogy that everybody understands and that's mm-hmm. Braces on your teeth. Yeah. And ironically I think the average length of time for, for braces is, guess what?

18 months. And if you take 'em off early, guess what will happen to the teeth? They go right back to the [00:14:00] snaggy tooth positions. They were in previously. And when you get done with the 18 months and they take all the bands and braces off, SNA 

Dr. Troy Fox: tooth, 

Dr. Michael Perusich : snag tooth, and they take the braces off, are you done?

No, it's the wellness phase. It's the maintenance phase. They put the retainer on, whether it's one you sleep in at night or a permanent retainer on the backside of your teeth. It you, it, the process is still ongoing. It's still ongoing 

Dr. Troy Fox: and the goal is that you wear the retainer so you don't end up in braces again, because if you go backwards far enough, now we have to go through this process again, or at least a portion thereof.

Guess what that sounds like, it sounds like Chiropractic care. 

Dr. Michael Perusich : Exactly. It's just how the human body works. So don't let your patients not understand the value of Chiropractic care. Mm-hmm. In my opinion. I, I know you'll, you'll agree with me on this, Troy, in my opinion, Chi Chiropractic is the jewel of value in all of healthcare.

Right? [00:15:00] My gosh. We do something nobody else does, number one and number two, we're also the least expensive. So why would anybody ever think it's too expensive? 

Dr. Troy Fox: Make 

Dr. Michael Perusich : sure that's because we let them 

Dr. Troy Fox: make sure when you get to that point a, that your patient's already now, so rather than trying to establish value by showing how cheap your prices are, establish value through your report of findings, and then present the patient at the front, because especially if they're a cash patient, right?

You have to present that, that plan. You have to show this is how much it's gonna cost. That's another legal requirement that you have when you're working with patients. So let's do it the right way. But if you don't wanna rely on that as a crutch to be what explains to your patient how it's a value.

That doesn't explain that it's a value that just tells me how much it costs, and I wanna know that, but I wanna understand in advance. 'cause here's what you hear when you go to someone and you're getting ready to get something done and they explain it well. You're all about it. Like let's go buy a new phone.

I'm all excited about a new phone. I go in and they're [00:16:00] like, man, this thing does everything. It'll slice your bread and butter it. I'm like, sweet. And then we get to the price, they go yeah, it is. And they, so we get to the price and they tell me, well, that's gonna be 1,089, or we can put this in payments and blah, blah, blah.

And now they're actually telling me what it really costs. What am I saying at that point? Yeah, yeah, yeah. Let's go ahead and do it. Yeah. Put it on that payment plan thing. Let's get going. I want my, I want that phone in my hand. 

Dr. Michael Perusich : Yeah. 

Dr. Troy Fox: So they have already stuff transfer 

Dr. Michael Perusich : over 

Dr. Troy Fox: it. Uh, you've established value.

Dr. Michael Perusich : Yeah. You established 

Dr. Troy Fox: that. I'm done with that. 

Dr. Michael Perusich : And I'll tell you one thing out there before we move on to number three. I'll tell you one thing. Get out of the insurance mindset. The insurance reimbursement model is broken. It will not allow you to make the kind of money. You should be making. And I'm not saying we, we built patients.

I'm just saying you provide a great service, chiropractors and you should be paid for it. You know, I saw, uh, an EOB the other day from one of our clients and a 9, 8, [00:17:00] 9, 4 1 by one of the insurance companies. They're getting paid $14. I'm sorry. Stop billing insurance. When it's like that. And if you wanna, if you wanna understand a better way and a, and a direction moving forward towards a cash practice, I, we practically invented it.

So give Kat's consultants a call 

Dr. Troy Fox: and I have a bigger problem with insurance as well. And the, the other problem is, is that it is built. To make you look like a, a horrible person that over utilizes care. When you put patients on a treatment schedule, that may be real similar to what a physical therapist would do with a patient, and all of a sudden or less you're overutilizing.

Dr. Michael Perusich : Yeah, 

Dr. Troy Fox: which is absolutely ridiculous. Did the human body change in the way it heals When I work with the patient as opposed to anyone else? No. No. It is built to make you look bad and it's built to underpay you. So anyway, there's our ran on, right on insurance, right? 

Dr. Michael Perusich : We could go another hour on that one.

Dr. Troy Fox: Yeah. 

Dr. Michael Perusich : Okay. 

Consistency Drives Results

Dr. Michael Perusich : Here's number three. Number three. I [00:18:00] don't feel, doctor, I don't feel like I need to come in as often as you're recommending. We've all heard that. 

Dr. Troy Fox: Mm-hmm. 

Dr. Michael Perusich : Why? What? I didn't expect to be coming in for the next three months. I didn't expect three times a week starting out, or four times a week. And patients will want to try to reduce their frequency of care because they don't understand that consistency matters.

Dr. Troy Fox: So 

Dr. Michael Perusich : this is part of, again, goes back to our, our Good Report of Findings. It's part of our report of findings to explain to them why the repetition, why the repetition with braces. Why do I have to go in every week and get 'em tightened down? Well, they won't, nothing will happen if you don't do that.

So we, we, we have to make sure that we're explaining those kind of things. 

Dr. Troy Fox: And I do it really simply. I repeat several times. Time and repetition. Time and repetition. Time and repetition. When we go in and put motion in your joints, what are they gonna do? They accept that motion, right? Yep. Then what your [00:19:00] body wanna do, oh, let's go back to that defensive position, and it is gonna consistently do that until it decides.

In other words, think like the brain would think until it decides it's safe to do something else. It takes time and repetition to create that safety for your body to then fully mobilize. 

Dr. Michael Perusich : Yep. 

Dr. Troy Fox: It's really simple from that standpoint. 

Dr. Michael Perusich : It is. 

Dr. Troy Fox: With with with time and repetition, we're gonna get your body to actually rethink the way that it affects that joint.

Mm-hmm. So we've gotta put that physiological explanation, you know, your adaptation, your remodeling through the area. 

Dr. Michael Perusich : Yeah. 

Dr. Troy Fox: And if you don't, and it's the 

Dr. Michael Perusich : time, it's the time and repetition that that got you here. 

Dr. Troy Fox: Yeah, if you don't, it feels like basically, well, I'm gonna leave here. And I feel like he just needs to treat me two or three times to get me out of pain, and the rest of it's optional, not necessary.

So you miss the whole point if a patient leaves your office feeling like that. 

Dr. Michael Perusich : And I, I, I, I love the, how [00:20:00] you present the time inconsistency, because that, that truly plays into, we all know this. I, I said it a few minutes ago. That plays into one of the major. Primary physiological laws out there, and that's Wolf's law.

Dr. Troy Fox: Mm-hmm. 

Dr. Michael Perusich : Abnormal pressure on normal tissue will cause it to remodel. Yeah. And to me, that's the best explanation of Chiropractic ever because that's what we're trying to unwind. 

Dr. Troy Fox: Mm-hmm. 

Dr. Michael Perusich : Is the time and consistency of riding that motorcycle over and over, for example. We're trying to unwind that. 

Dr. Troy Fox: Yeah. 

Dr. Michael Perusich : And we gotta work together so we have the time and consistency to undo it.

So you know it, if you've got patients saying this to you, I don't feel like I need to come in that often, or why do I need to come in that often, or I didn't expect to come in that often. And you'll see it, you'll see it several places in your stats. If you're paying attention, you'll see your patient visit average drop, you'll see your dollar visit average drop because you won't be billing as much as [00:21:00] many services.

Dr. Troy Fox: Mm-hmm. 

Dr. Michael Perusich : There's a big difference between billing. Three times a week for four weeks. That's 12 visits. I'll do the math for you, as opposed to two times a week for four weeks. That's only eight. That's a difference of four visits. Your dollar visit average is gonna go down. Your collection visit, average is gonna go down.

You know, you're gonna plateau your practice. You unintentionally, unintentionally without intention.

Dr. Troy Fox: Without intention. 

Dr. Michael Perusich : Without intention, 

Dr. Troy Fox: yeah. 

Dr. Michael Perusich : All right. 

Busy Clinic Without Feeling Rushed

Dr. Michael Perusich : Let's move on to number four. I feel like just another number, doc, your practice is so busy. It seems so crowded all the time, and I just feel like you just heard people in and heard people out, and I know you and I both have heard this before. 

Dr. Troy Fox: Oh yeah.

Dr. Michael Perusich : You gotta explain the process of what's happening in your clinic to patients. It's not just the care plan. You've gotta introduce them. I, as I always put it, you have to introduce them to your practice. 'cause their perception may be that, you know, you should only be seeing one patient an [00:22:00] hour. Of course we'd all starve if we did that 

Dr. Troy Fox: right.

Dr. Michael Perusich : And they may not be expecting that you see a patient every four minutes. But we have to explain to them that, Chiropractic. Adjustments are not a necessarily a long process. Mm-hmm. 

Dr. Troy Fox: Now, 

Dr. Michael Perusich : some patients need longer. I I get that. I'm not saying you can see everybody in four minutes, but 

Dr. Troy Fox: Right. 

Dr. Michael Perusich : But you, you've gotta make sure that part of your communication strategy with the patient is to do that introduction to the office.

Why is it busy? We're busy because we see a lot of patients with your condition. 

Dr. Troy Fox: That's exactly right. And the easiest way when I work with patients is again, goes back to report of findings. Here's how this is gonna work. Now, the first time I saw you, we spent 15 minutes with you, 30 minutes, whatever your new patient slot is, right?

We spent time with you to find out what was going on, what we need to do, how we were gonna do it, and we kind of explain all that to you. Now, when we go into the adjustment time, it doesn't take [00:23:00] long to apply an adjustment. You're gonna be with me. Three or four minutes, five minutes, whatever it takes for me to adjust you.

And quite frankly, we've heard in the past, sometimes in our practice, oh my gosh, you don't spend very much time with me when you adjust me. It's, it, it's kinda like when you're making cupcakes, once you pour the batter into the pan and it's ready to go in the oven, it doesn't really help but to stir it more So when I go work with a patient, I'm gonna adjust you and get you moved on.

And I can assure you. I spend about the same amount of time with my wife and kids when I adjust them. 

It takes three to four minutes to get somebody adjusted. So as I work with you, the expectation, unless you have a new problem that we need to take a look at, or you're having a significant problem with what we are working on and you need a little bit more time, you're just gonna let the front desk know we're gonna schedule more time for you.

Dr. Michael Perusich : Yep. 

Dr. Troy Fox: Or we're gonna schedule time for an exam on a new problem that you come out in with. Otherwise, when you come in, you're gonna come in during normal adjusting hours, and it's gonna take just a [00:24:00] few minutes to get you adjusted and moved on to whatever specific therapy we may have recommended for you.

Really easy explanation. Yep. Now you don't have to worry about the patient wandering, what's going on. They then don't feel like a number. They just realize that they're there to get an adjustment. 

Dr. Michael Perusich : And I always told my patients, you know, Chiropractic Care, the actual care is kinda like a racetrack. If you think about a racetrack, it has the straightaways and it has the turns, and we're gonna fly down that straightaway.

For about six treatments, and then when we hit the turn, we're gonna slow down just a little bit. Mm-hmm. So every sixth visit, we're gonna do a progress exam, and that's where we're hitting that curve. We're slowing down just a little bit. We're turning the corner into the next phase of care. Unless you're not progressing like we think you should.

Right. And, and those simple analogies, I think just really help people kind of mentally visualize how your care recommendations work. Mm-hmm. You know, another thing to not make p patients feel like they're just a number in the practice [00:25:00] is to get them engaged in the practice. Hi Bob. Good to see you today.

When they walk in the door. 

Dr. Troy Fox: Mm-hmm. 

Dr. Michael Perusich : Call 'em by name. And this is a team sport. Your staff should be doing this as much or more than you doctors. In this regard, they should be engaging the patient to make them feel like they're at home. 

Dr. Troy Fox: Mm-hmm.

Dr. Michael Perusich : Anything else on that one? Trey? 

Dr. Troy Fox: I think we're good on that one. I mean, and, and we could talk longer about staff engagement and all that, but that's a whole different podcast. That's a whole nother podcast. I mean, that's kind of one of those, when you said it, I went I'm gonna pause right there because we can go on forever on that.

Yeah, 

Dr. Michael Perusich : exactly. 

Dr. Troy Fox: Because it really is an experience when a patient comes into the office, so 

Dr. Michael Perusich : it needs 

Dr. Troy Fox: to be patient. We can talk about patient experience later, but just know that your staff is involved in this as well. 

Dr. Michael Perusich : Yep. 

Dr. Troy Fox: It really makes a difference when you welcome a patient into your practice. 

Dr. Michael Perusich : Huge.

Huge. 

Dr. Troy Fox: And they know what's gonna happen when they get there. 

Dr. Michael Perusich : Yep, exactly. Okay, let's hit number five. Oh, wait a minute. We gotta take a break.

Dr. Troy Fox: [00:26:00] Let's take 

Dr. Michael Perusich : a break. I'm gonna tease, I'm gonna tease you on number five, quick word from our sponsors. We'll be right back

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Feeling Better Isn’t Finished

Dr. Michael Perusich : alright, everybody, welcome back to the KC ChiroPulse Podcast. We are talking about the top five excuses, complaints that patients have and why they use these sometimes to leave your practice. We've already been through four of these. Number five, I started feeling better, doc, so I, I just, I thought we were done, so I stopped coming in, I started feeling better.

That is nails on a chalkboard. Mm-hmm. You ever hear that? And again, the that excuse that complaint falls on our shoulders because that's a patient that somehow fell through the cracks and we didn't explain the process of care enough, and they got fixated in their mind on pain instead of riding that motorcycle with their [00:28:00] kid.

Dr. Troy Fox: That's exactly the way that it goes to is the patient walks in, they've lost sight of what you're doing. So there is report of findings, but let's talk about what we do after the report of findings. Do we talk every time about how's the weather? I saw it rained outside last night. We can talk about those things.

It's okay to make small talk while you're adjusting a patient, but let's talk about as well where we're at in your care plan. Okay. Your, so your pain level right now is, you started out at an eight out of 10, and now you're down to a two out of 10. Fantastic. We're really starting to get ready to move into more of what we would call that corrective.

Phase at this point, not just relief care anymore because we've about got you out of pain now we're really gonna make leaps and bounds on trying to get the motion of the joint back to a more normal level or a more normal function at this point. Yep. And so we're looking at the long term with you and the next step beyond that, Bob.

It's gonna be when we have a [00:29:00] cadence of care, we just periodically adjust you to maintain function. So right now we're still working on your problem, but it's gonna be below the surface. Now, we've really done a great job of getting you there. So you notice that we framed it in a way that, Hey, we've done our job.

We have done our job and we did it really well. We're actually a magician at how quickly we got you out of pain. The next step is to continue that correction, and I'm talking about that while I'm adjusting it, so I don't really have to have a separate time. 

Dr. Michael Perusich : Mm-hmm. 

Dr. Troy Fox: What I have to do is I have to quit talking about the weather long enough to address that with the patient.

And then accept any objections that they give me at that point. Oh, but Doc, I thought I was just coming in here for a few visits. Well, I did a bad job when I explained the care plan to you. Then I'll say that. If somebody says that to me, I did a really horrible job. Yeah. Talk and then I, then I'm gonna, 

Dr. Michael Perusich : I really messed you up with this.

Yeah, exactly. 

Dr. Troy Fox: Yeah. I'm gonna get off schedule for a couple of minutes because of that. But it's okay because it's important that patient understands how important their treatment schedule [00:30:00] is. So if I treat it like it's important, I. Relay that to the patient like, it's important and I own the fact that I didn't do a great job in the report of findings.

Now we're good to go. And in a lot of cases patient goes, oh, I didn't realize that. Okay. Or they didn't hear it because they were in significant pain. That happens more often than you know that they focus so much on. Am I gonna feel better? And how soon am I gonna feel better? They forget everything else you sent.

Dr. Michael Perusich : And that's why that first progress exam fairly early in care is so important. Yeah. 'cause especially if the patient was in a lot of pain, like you said, we, we've gotta have that opportunity to show 'em the progress, but also remind them what care is actually all about. And it's not about the pain, feeling better just.

One of the first early steps, and once you get feeling better, now we can get to function, get your function better. Now we can get you back on the motorcycle. And then the wellness phase is the piece of resistance in [00:31:00] if you will, of that was a little French for you. 

Dr. Troy Fox: Yeah. 

Dr. Michael Perusich : Of Chiropractic care because that's what's going to keep you functional.

For the long haul. So we've gotta set those expectations with patients. 

Dr. Troy Fox: We do. And I'm gonna tell you don't take this as you've done a bad job. You can always tweak what you're doing. Also, don't take this as if you follow the steps that we just told you that every single patient's gonna follow through with care.

There was one earlier this morning before motorcycle guy. I could have beat over the head with a two before, multiple times, and she still wouldn't have gotten it. She was so focused on her pain level and she was so focused on all the other things that she was doing. Well, if I stretch, it makes it feel better if I do this.

Literally, I had this discussion with her, and I will tell you guys that sometimes, sometimes no matter what you do, you're gonna have a failure. I told the gal, you know what? And we were, we were kind of [00:32:00] spreading the care out at this point. I was trying to get her to a maintenance level. She went through relief and corrective care.

Fine. She was balking on maintenance. And I said, I'm gonna see you in three weeks. We'll adjust you, we'll do some needling again at that point. 

Dr. Michael Perusich : Mm-hmm. And 

Dr. Troy Fox: I walked out of the room hoping that that would stick, because quite frankly, there was nothing else that I could do. And I heard her as I walked out of the room.

That's not what I'm gonna do. What I will do is I will call you and I went. And that's the point. Sometimes you just have to put your hands up in the air and go, I did everything that I could do. Yeah. Did I miss anything? Maybe, but I can't think of anything. When I went back through and looked at it, I went back through and went, is there anything that I did wrong?

Yeah. Is there anything that I missed? Did I dotted not dot an I across a T? I felt like I handled that one, like a champion, and I still got that response. Now do I get that often? No. But when I do, it still makes me take pause. So we should take pause, but we should know that [00:33:00] we are dealing with human individuals and every once in a while they're gonna make a decision.

And it could be that they made that decision because they've got a spouse that's got cancer at home and that's their primary focus. Or they've got they've got a, you know, a job that is just running a ragged, but yet they're worried about losing their job. There are personal things that happen that that affect affect.

Sure. 

Dr. Michael Perusich : You'll never have a hundred percent retention ever. 

Dr. Troy Fox: No. No, 

Dr. Michael Perusich : no, but you know, if, if your reti, or sorry, if your dropouts are more than 13%, and don't just count new patient dropouts. A dropout is anybody from the first day of care to 20 plus years in care. If they've dropped out, they've dropped out. It's not just if they started this month.

So count your dropouts correctly. And if it's more than 13%. I'm gonna tell you, you got a problem in your practice and you need to be calling us because we can help you fix that problem. And it's probably somewhere in one of these five complaints that we just talked [00:34:00] about. 

Dr. Troy Fox: Yep. That is so true. 

Dr. Michael Perusich : All right.

I think we beat this horse to death, so don't accept complaints in your practice that are driving patients away. Let's fix these problems. So if you need help with these kind of things, give us a call. Go to katsconsultants.com. Our phone number's on there. You can contact us or our website. You can check out all the free downloads and, and things that we have on there and how, and really see how we're helping doctors drive very professional.

And profitable practices at the same time. Troy, anything to add? 

Dr. Troy Fox: I think we're good. Just focus on that report of findings. 'cause I think everything tied back into that. If you listen closely today, all five and reported findings and financial reported findings that your staff should be doing. And if you don't know what that is and how your staff needs to be doing it, again, those are the things that we teach.

We teach your staff as well. They're gonna understand how to do. Yeah, financial, what we call a Fin Roth. I love calling it that [00:35:00] 'cause it sounds really cool. Financial report findings, right? So if you don't understand how to do that stuff, give us a holler. We're more than happy to help you. 

Dr. Michael Perusich : Absolutely.

Absolutely. Alright, so from all of us here at Kats Consultants, I wanna thank Chiro Health USA too for being one of our sponsors. Troy, thanks for being here today. We'll see you guys next time. 

Dr. Troy Fox: See y'all later.