Why you should stop using these 2 common tricks

Hey, folks, it's Chris from Patient Centered Training and today's video. I'm going to talk about a couple of techniques that I used to use and I used to recommend and teach that I've actually dropped. And I no longer recommend any of you use these techniques. We're going to talk about why, what they do, why I drop them, and some better approaches you can be using instead. Now, I thought about this because, as you might be aware, I'm putting together an online course. It's an online version of the live seminars that we were doing before COVID And I'm reflecting back on how a lot of this content I'm looking at has really changed and evolved over time. And what I really want is to put together a great course so that not only do you get better results for your patients, but it works out in better results for you. So you get more referrals, more reviews without ever having to ask, you know, you have happier, satisfied patients. And that's going to build your reputation as a go to practitioner in your area. And so I want to use any techniques that I can to help with this. And really it's all about building that trust, building that rapport. There's a lot of stuff out there, There's a lot of practitioners, a lot of coaches, a lot of mentors and gurus putting these techniques out, and some of it's pretty outdated. And I've been teaching this stuff for a number of years. I've been a PRT trainer for eight years now, regional tutor, doing events, the rcc, private trainings, all these sorts of things. And I've seen quite a lot and I've seen what does work, I've seen what doesn't work. But I've also looked into the research as to do these theories make sense and are there better ways of adapting them? And the two that stand out for me that I no longer recommend, even though I was getting pretty good results, are learning styles and mirroring. So, learning styles. I was exposed to this right when I first graduated, within my first year. The idea with this is that each person has a different learning style. And if you can categorize them into the correct learning style out of three, then you can better present your recommendations in your education and they're more likely to follow it. So the three styles are visual, auditory and kinesthetic, which is like touch. And the visual people, you can spot them usually the idea is because they're very fast paced, they're quite loud, they're quite rapid, you know, high volume, that Sort of thing. And they'll use metaphors around sight, is the idea. So I can see what you mean. Or that doesn't look right. The kinesthetic people are the opposite. That kind of lower, slower, calmer energy. They take a bit more time and they. The idea is that they learn through touch, through feeling. So these people, you want to show them on their body where it is, and they would use metaphors based around touch. Like, I can really feel that, or I can't quite grasp what you mean. And then the auditory people are somewhere in the middle, and they respond best to auditory learning. So the idea is you need to talk to them verbally. That's how they take that in. And they're kind of middle tone that again, they will use language around. Oh, really? Kind of hearing what you mean. Or that doesn't sound right, for example. So the idea is you listen to the patient, you pay attention to them, you work out which of those they are. And then whenever you're giving educational material or making recommendations, you need to use the right medium. And I put this into practice and it works. The first patient I ever use this on, I really remember I paid attention and she seemed much more auditory. And I knew that it worked because she left. And then she found out that her at the front desk, that her insurer wouldn't cover me, that I wasn't registered with them, so she had to transfer to another colleague. And the front desk said she was really upset. She's like, oh, it's such a shame. Chris was really lovely. I really felt like he really took care of me and she was nervous about seeing somebody else. So it works really well. So why am I not recommending it? Well, the reason is that the research has been done on this and pretty conclusively. We've known for a while now that this theory is not true, that it's just not borne out by the research. People do not have one learning style. We all have a blend of all three. And that blend will change based on the environment and the context that we're in. And our mood and emotions can affect that too. So somebody might come in being more receptive to one style, and that might completely change a few hours later or the next time you see them. People tend to learn best if we actually hit all three. So what I'm interested in here is that why it worked, because it did. I was building rapport quite quickly, especially with this case. She really stood out. The reason I think it works is not because I was hitting her right. Learning style but because I was really paying attention to all the nonverbal cues she was giving me. You know, the tone, the meaning behind the words. I was really listening, well, not just listening to the words she was saying. And I was trying to match my energy to hers. I'm naturally, if you haven't guessed, quite a fast paced person. And if I'd come in with that, I might have sort of missed her and just bowled her over. So it did work, but not for the reasons we thought it was. And if we just try and hit the learning style there on, we might end up missing where they're at. So I don't recommend this. I don't teach it even. There's elements of it that really worked. So when I realized that, the next thing I thought was like, okay, it's about matching where they're at. And this is something that in NLP they call mirroring and mirroring. The idea is that you're really trying to match their tone. Just wherever they're at, you're not putting them in one of three categories, you're just trying to appear very similar to them. Similar body language, similar positions, tone of voice, pace of talking, that sort of thing there. And the idea with this is that if somebody comes in, they're a bit unsure they haven't seen you before, it's their first visit, they don't know if they're in the right place. And if you can show them you're like them, they will feel safer. We're primates, we like to be amongst people who are like us. People who are very different can put us on edge. So hopefully they'd relax more, they'd feel safer, you'd build better rapport and then they're going to be more open to your recommendations there. And again, trying this stuff does work, it does get better results than not. But the research has shown it isn't true. If you just pair up. Studies have shown that you pair up high energy doctors and high energy patients. You compare that to high energy patients or low energy doctors or the other way around. What the doctor is exhibiting has no bearing on how well that patient rates that practitioner and it has no bearing on how likely they are to follow their advice. So it's actually come out as showing it doesn't make a difference. What does make a difference is are you matching where the patient wants to be and where the doctor is. So what I mean by this, for example, is if the patient is somebody who's quite high energy right now, maybe they're quite worried or Quite anxious. If you pair them with a doctor who's currently, you know, anxious as well, not currently anxious, but currently confident and high energy, that might not make a difference compared to low because you need to know what this patient wants. So if they're quite anxious and they want to feel enthusiastic, they want to still stay high energy when the problem solved, then they'll respond well to a high energy, enthusiastic doctor. But they might just want to relax, they might just want to be calmer, in which case you put them with a calmer, more reassuring clinician, they're going to rate them better and they're going to follow their advice and both of you are going to get better results. So what we need to do is, is we need to find out where does this patient want to be and then change our tone to be more like that. Now, initially, you don't know, you know, the first couple of minutes of a conversation, you're not going to get that sense on those first impressions. So mirroring can be useful here. But then you want to get a sense of where they're at and try and go a couple of steps away from where they're at in that direction. You know, if we say 1 is calm, 10 is excited and they're an 8, but you think, no, they want to relax a bit, maybe meet them at an eight and then start to drop down to a six and you can almost lead them to where they want to be from that emotional tone level there. And you'll find that again, you're going to get better results with this. And it's validated by research. We actually know that it is doing what we claim. So those two things, there, there's something that we're going to be talking about in detail, specifically how to do this step by step on the course. We're going to be revisiting them in different contexts as well. Because I really want to make sure that I'm providing as much value. And this can really change your practice. I know for me that of all the things and all the skills I've worked on, communication skills, has made the biggest difference to my success and my patient's success, but also just my satisfaction, just the fact that I love what I do and I'm a second gen chiropractor, I grew up loving chiropractic, but my own satisfaction, what I do, has really increased as well. And that's why I'm putting these videos out there. That's why I'm putting this course together, because I really want that for you as well, and we're going to be releasing that fairly soon. There'll be more info later. I'm not going to bore you with it now, but there will be a new video out in a few days. Keep an eye out for that. So this next video, we're going to talk much more about getting the patient where they want to be, finding out what it is they want, what do they want to get from care, where they want to be emotionally. And I'm going to go through a quite detailed video on how you can do that and then what you can do with that information to improve both of your results. So keep an eye out. That'll be coming up in the next few days. As always, questions, comments, let me know. Drop a comment below, drop me an email and get in touch. All right, then. Take care, guys.