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Handoff from Doctor to CA

First the doctor must finish the ROF by helping the patient realize that they do in fact want to get healthy and they are signing up for the recommended program of care. Next there are specific things that need to happen when the doctor hands off the patient to the CA to "finish things up" before the patient gets their first adjustment.

We want to address:

1. Reserving appointment times and the importance of keeping those appointments

2. Money

3. Getting their entire family in for an evaluation

4. Getting them and their spouse to the Health Care Talk

Let's dive into the details.

When the doctor finishes up with the patient and the CA comes into the room it is CRITICAL that the doctor says out loud in front of the patient something like, "Kathy (your CA), Joe (your patient) is going to be doing this 12 month program (and point to the form... hopefully you are using cashpractice.com), he is choosing option 2, he does want to get his entire family checked and he and his wife Sally will be coming to the health care talk. Please make sure you get him set up for all of these. Joe, Kathy is going to get you all set up and then you will receive your first adjustment."

The reason why it is CRITICAL to say it out loud in front of the CA and the patient is because of Robert Cialdini's "Authority" law. We are going to use tools of compliance every step of the way. Your patients have clearly stated what they want. We will employ these tools and principles to help them do what they say they want to do. So we will engage the law of "Authority" by you the doctor, the "authority" saying it out load in front of them and your CA.

The CA is then going to go through each of the steps with them AND the patient is going to initial and sign a form (see below) addressing each of the four areas we want them to comply with. This utilizes Cialdini's "Law of Consistency."

1. Reserving appointment times and the importance of keeping those times.

Your CA will want to say something like, "Joe you will be coming in three times per week for the next 8 weeks. We pride ourselves on being on time and not wasting your entire day. To that end the doctor has asked me to reserve times that will work best for you. We are in the office M-Th. Which days would you prefer? M, W and Th will work great. Would you prefer morning or afternoon? Great would 9 am or 11 am work better for you? Great, so we have you down for 9 am Monday, Wednesday and Thursdays at 9 am. If anything comes up and you can not make an appointment will you please call us ASAP? (Wait for them to say yes... again utilize the law of "Consistency.") Now the doctor wanted me to review that if you miss an appointment it can literally set you back a week in your healing process and obviously we don't want that. So if you do miss an appointment we will do everything in our power to help you make that appointment up. Sound good? Great! If you do miss an appointment and we do not hear from you we will call and check up on you to make sure everything is O.K. and we will help you reschedule that time. (The reason why this is so important is not only to let them know all this info, but also so the CA's do not feel like they are "hounding" patients but instead they are living up to their end of the bargain.) Along those lines if a patient is one of those "late" patients the last thing we want to do is let their chaos upset our flow but we also don't want to make them wrong! They never get it together and stop being late but they do eventually stop coming in. The first thing to realize is there are some people who are continually late. It is part of their M.O. So we are not going to fight with them. Instead we will work with their chaos. My recommendation is to first find out if they realize they are not on time. "Mary, we had you down for 9 am what time did you have you down for?" That sounds better then, "Mary, you're LATE!" Sometimes there really is just a miscommunication about the time. But more often than not they will acknowledge that life got in the way and they are late... again... We can then see if another time may work better for them. If not I recommend seeing if this might work for them. "Mary, I realize that you have a very full schedule and getting here at a specific time may not always work for you. And we really do want to have a time reserved for you so you don't have to wait and we don't have to make others wait. May I make a suggestion? If you would like we can know that you are going to come in Monday, Wednesday and Thursday afternoons. You can just give me a call when you think you can come in. I can then tell you to come on in right now, or to run an errand or two and we will set a time for the next available time." Any way about it we can not let their chaos get us behind, make other people wait or have them have to wait. AND we do not want to give them a hard time about being late. They are late for everything in their life and we are not going to change that, instead we will just lose them as patients. There is quite a bit to this procedure and more importantly headspace and you may want your CA's to talk this down with me on a call. CA has patient initial the form.

2. Money. The CA needs to review the financial plan option with the patient. Go over all of the bonuses etc. and sign all of the paperwork, automatic billing etc. Have them initial the form.

3. Getting their entire family in for an evaluation. To deal with getting families in we need to hit the back space button a bit. This is a several step process.

a. In your Cashpractice.com handout you are using I recommend showing that they can get their families checked. The value of this is $XX per person. And this is something you "throw in as a bonus." This helps them feel the value of getting their families checked and they do not have to pay for it. Of course you may want to have them pay some or all of the fee and that is totally up to you. Also you have to make sure that giving discounted or free evaluations is legal in your state.

b. At the end of the ROF after the patient has agreed to the program but prior to meeting with the CA I recommend you use the "family rap." You have that in your LAASR ROF Part 3 Training Module. It is the story about the weather and when should people get checked for nerve interference? By the end of that discussion nearly all of the patients will want to get their families checked for nerve interference.

c. Doctor says in front of the patient and the CA that the patient does want to have their families checked as we discussed above.

d. CA uses the form and has patient initial and sign the form. "Joe, the doctor wanted to make sure we gave you the opportunity to have your family checked for subluxations. We can do that now." CA sets up the appointments and then has them initial the form. "Joe, please initial right here that we set up your entire family for their health assessments." Again, using the law of "Consistency." If the patient does not know their families schedule it is the CA's JOB to follow up and make sure they either set their families up or say they don't want to. In other words the CA can say something like, "Joe, I get off tonight at 7 pm would you like me to call you at your home tonight to set a time for the rest of your family?" If that won't work the CA needs to keep a log and follow up with that patient. We promised them this valuable offer; let's make sure we give it to them. Again, if they do not want to take us up on the offer that is up to them and of course we have no charge if that is the case.

4. Getting them and their spouse to the Health Care Talk. Again we will hit the back space button.

a. During the Cashpractice.com portion of the ROF we show value for the health care talk but it is at no charge just like with getting their families checked.

b. I would recommend that you read the article entitled, "How to Get People to your Health Care Talk" and implementing these strategies.

c. CA has the patient initial on the form that they did get to sign up for the Health Care Talk.

My experience is if you will utilize these procedures you will get phenomenal results!!

Below is the information for the check off form.

Due to limitations of the "article section" of my site this will not look pretty. But it is the information you will want on your "pretty form."

Rosen Chiropractic

Checklist/Agreement

Patient name: __________________

Appointment's

________ Reserved appointment times

Financial Plan

________ Discussed Payment options/Bonus

Family & Friends

________ Schedule family for Complimentary Health Assessment

________ sign up to attend health care talk

________ sign up friends & family for HCT

________________________ ________

Chiropractic Assistant Date

________________________ ________

Practice Member Date

Russ Rosen, D.C. - Feb 13, 2008