Navigating Difficult Conversations (Dental Confidence and Connection Course)

All right, let's talk a little bit about navigating difficult conversations, difficult interactions, whether or not they are patient-oriented or not. First and foremost, one of the statistics that I had come across in my years as a dentist was that one in three adults in the United States has an irrational fear of dentists. One in three adults? How is that irrational if it's 100 million people in the United States? I think that's not irrational. I think that's normal. Okay, so most of us human beings don't do well in a dental treatment setting. So we need to acknowledge that people generally in a dental setting are going to be at a higher anxiety and stress level. And then having a conversation with them in this particular state of mind sometimes requires tiptoeing a little bit and softly having a conversation with them, not voluminous, but in a gentle way so that the understanding that we provide to them is not necessarily to elevate or increase their level of anxiety. So how you frame a conversation, how you approach them, whether or not it's more distraction, or it's that we have 80% of dentures, or maybe you need to go to the on-surfing dentist, how you frame these things and how you approach them is really critical in helping to mitigate or to improve a patient's anxiety and stress level. Now, there's no way to completely eliminate having to confront some of these issues in a way that's, you know, not going to increase anxiety and stress. But if we have already or can continually work on having a genuine and authentic connection with our patients, then that helps to decrease the net stress level in the beginning. And then as we move forward with the conversation, as we discuss things that are difficult for that patient, we can manage that communication in a way that doesn't push them out of the practice. Now, financially, many times patients will choose certain things based on income and finances, and I hope that we have some ways that we can assist them in navigating these difficult situations. And presenting things in a way that doesn't make them feel like an idiot or like they've done something wrong their whole life, it is really, really critical. We can identify concerns, identify problems, concerns, talk about consequences, and recommend solutions to them without demeaning, degrading, or diminishing them. And again, it all comes down to having a human-to-human connection, an authentic and genuine connection with this other human being through unhurried time, which allows us to collaborate more effectively. So I'm open to conversational communication. I'm hoping that they can share more about what's causing them to feel like they feel. You know, if I presented a treatment plan for, you know, three teams that need to be extracted and the patient had no symptoms and didn't even know there was an issue, that's going to throw up some immediate barriers in the patient's mind. But if I could present in a way that, you know, you're really concerned about this other guy, but there is some substantial friction around three of these teams. You're broken down, and I don't think there's any way to fix that. You're not concerned at all. I don't think you have any symptoms of that. But what do you understand about the infections that might be, you know, persisting as a problem? Is that something you can solve? You know, softly tiptoeing toward the appropriate treatment while helping the patient understand that there's an issue that they can't necessarily change without doing certain things is really important. So if I can say to the patient, I want to help you. I need you to understand the issues are here. However, I'm here to help you through these challenges. This is really important. So, these are difficult matters. As we approach them from a compassionate, caring, meaningful, we really want to connect with our patients before we even deal with them. It allows us then to create high-quality collaboration, which then yields to an additional level of confidence that we're not going to be able to change the treatment that they can't get to. But it's hard. It's hard. So, good confidence, good communication, good connection, and seeking to understand, that active listening, that empathetic seeking to deeply understand that goes a long way. And we all know that perception, since we're going to tell this to dad and we're going to tell this to anybody else, perception is nine-tenths of an hour. Nine-tenths of an hour is an exercise. Oh, great. I told this to dad. Anyway, it's all about how they perceive it's coming from us. Whether we are seeing something in a kind of gentle way or not, if they perceive it is coming in a kind of gentle way or not, that's what's more important. A patient's perception is nine-tenths of an hour. We need to think about how we are going to say it to them. So, difficult conversations can be difficult, but we seek to understand, listen actively and empathetically, and our choice and collaboration can give the patient freedom to communicate their attitudes with us. That will go a long way to allow us to facilitate their choice and ability to get the treatment that they need and want according to their timeline.