The “how” of patient experience: What this week means to physician recruiters
Posted by Alexandra Cappetta
The roles of physicians and recruiters differ in many ways. However, one of their goals is the same: to provide patients the best possible experience at their facilities. Exceptional treatment and healing are a big part of patient satisfaction, and your impact is finding and recruiting the physicians who deliver this exceptional treatment and strive to give patients a positive experience.
This week, the healthcare industry will observe Patient Experience Week to celebrate healthcare staff who create positive patient experiences every day. It’s also a reminder that as a recruiter, your impact on the patient experience is just as great as the physicians you hire. If physicians shape the patient experience, recruiters who find and hire those physicians set the stage.
In the midst of unprecedented times, unorthodox approaches to facilitating patient care have become a reality for health systems nationwide. Hospitals gearing up for an influx of COVD-19 patients are making arrangements to create space and keep units separate, causing makeshift hospitals for non-COVID-19 patients to spring up. Suddenly, treatments that would usually take place inside a facility are being administered in tented fields and parking lots.
Oddly enough, this is the "what" of the patient experience in our present healthcare landscape.
What will be unique to each organization and their staff is the "how":
How are physicians and staff representing their health organization?
How do they communicate with patients and other physicians under pressure - and is it as compassionate and clear as it is confident?
How capable are they of reassuring individuals they’re in good hands?
Especially in COVID-19 units where patients are isolated, now more than ever, doctors and nurses are taking on the role of family member and friend. That’s why the physicians you’re seeking need to be well-prepared for this dynamic and have the attentive bedside manner, poised temperament and growing skill set necessary to create positive patient experiences. In other words, the "how."
When usual approaches become disrupted, physicians should have the instinct to quickly adapt and ensure that even during the most unusual or challenging circumstances, they’re still delivering their best care. In the same way, it should be instinctual for a good recruiter to pick up on those qualities in their potential hires.
As you get to know physicians-of-interest, you might ask yourself: "Does this candidate show initiative and personability that can give patients the experience they’d want? What about the experience I’d want for myself or for my loved ones?" You know what you’re looking for when you’re undergoing treatment or seeking it for someone you care about, so look for candidates that can bring those same qualities and experiences to life at your health system as you recruit.
This week, while you celebrate your organization’s healthcare heroes and the positive experiences they create, you can also use Patient Experience Week to be thinking about whether the candidates you’re seeking can contribute not only to the "what," but the "how" that makes a patient experience a positive one.
To find more candidates at a PracticeLink Virtual Career Fair, or for other resources to advance your search, visit www.practicelink.com/employers.