Pulmonology Coding Alert

Learn how empathy training can protect your practice.

Practicing empathy in your pulmonology practice benefits you and your patients. By taking a few extra minutes with your patients, you’ll understand how they want to be treated, which can improve your patients’ health outcomes.

Learn how empathy training can benefit your practice.

Feeling Uncomfortable Showing Empathy in Healthcare

During the COVID-19 pandemic, applying empathy when interacting with your patients is as important as ever. However, putting this into practice is another story. Providers are facing higher volumes of patients on a day-to-day basis. Providers’ schedules are stretched thin due to the high volume of patients, which doesn’t allow for extended one-on-one attention.

“There’s a study that shows that about 70 percent of healthcare providers feel uncomfortable demonstrating any kind of empathy in healthcare, and that’s something we need to drive through and work with,” says Rhonda Buckholtz, CPC, CPMA, CDEO, CRC, CMPE, CHC, COPC, CGSC, COBGC, CPEDC, CENTC of Coding and Reimbursement Experts. By making empathy a priority for your pulmonology practice, patients will feel at ease, welcome, and trusting of everyone in the office — from the front desk and billers to the physicians.

Remember the Golden Rule

The Golden Rule, “Do unto others what you would have them do unto you,” is at the forefront of building empathy in your practice. Another approach to the classic phrase is to examine how others want to be treated.

Putting yourself in the shoes of the patient allows you to view the visit from a different vantage point. “You might have done (a procedure, order a test, given bad news) a million times, but this is the first time for the patient. You have to treat the patient like it’s the first time, every time. You have to show empathy because if you don’t, you start to lose traction,” says Buckholtz.

Through empathy training, physicians can learn how to communicate bad news, manage difficult interactions, and recognize their patient’s emotions. Not every encounter with a patient is going to be a cut-and-dry evaluation and management (E/M) visit, so knowing how to respond to challenging situations with empathy will have lasting positive effects on your patients.

Take the Time to Listen to Your Patients

When providers are interacting with their patients, listening is crucial to building empathy in your practice. With our overstimulated world, phone notifications, e-mails, and numerous other disruptions that occur throughout the day can easily distract us from our daily duties. These distractions prevent you from actively listening and being present with patients.

When providers ask questions of their patients, and respond by listening with thoughtful intention, they’ll have the chance to truly hear what’s happening with a patient’s medical condition or understand their fears or concerns about an upcoming procedure.

For example, a patient who is experiencing a myriad of symptoms and visited multiple doctors to get the bottom of their condition comes into your practice. If your provider takes the time to actively listen to them about their concerns, symptoms, and origin of the condition, they could be able to order the right tests, issue a referral to another specialist they trust, or correctly diagnose the patient.

Additionally, listening to your patients can lead to better health results. “To be able to influence, we have to use empathy in healthcare. Otherwise, we’re going to continue chasing out tails and having noncompliant patients, and not be able to get the results that everybody deserves,” says Buckholtz. If your providers listen to their patients and empathize with their fears or concerns, they’ll have more compliant patients who will follow the directions ordered by the physician.

Proactively Promote Empathy

Staying proactive about empathy in your practice helps providers have better interactions with patients and can protect themselves in the event of a lawsuit. Requests for more compassion in medicine have been increasing over the past 16 years, and the COVID-19 pandemic has shown the need for empathy in medical care is even greater.

By engaging in empathy training, physicians and the employees in the practice can show patients and each other respect throughout every interaction in your facility, via telehealth visits, and when scheduling appointments. Studies show doctors rediscover personal satisfaction when connecting with their patients in meaningful ways.

Additionally, providers that practice empathy and engage in training will lower their risk of medical liability claims. With empathy training, physicians can “have honest informed consent discussions without causing undue fear, while also preparing patients for all possible outcomes,” says Helen Riess, MD, CEO at Empathetics, Inc. and Associate Professor of Psychiatry at Harvard Medical School (URL: www.mplassociation.org/Web/Publications/Inside_Medical_Liability/Issues/2021/Q3/articles/Empathy_Training_Patient_Satisfaction.aspx). Patients treated with empathy during their encounters feel increased trust, a greater understanding of a procedure’s outcomes, and an understanding that the physician truly cares about their well-being, which can help reduce the risk of liability claims.