Are We Making Our Patients Feel Dumb?

Dr. Kuba and Bethany dig in to an all-important topic – patient communication. In this episode, Dr. Kuba shares a recent restaurant experience and how the communication was off throughout the entire meal. Ultimately, she felt like she was treated like she was an idiot. She began to wonder how often patients feel like idiots in our office. She and Bethany discuss the value of good listening to ensure that smooth and respectful communication can occur. 

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Transcript

Are you looking for a podcast where you can hear from real people regarding their real dental drama? If so, then
0:09
you've come to the right place. Join hosts Bethany Penny and Dr. Reena Kuba
0:14
as we dive into the solutions we've created and the mistakes we've made while managing dental drama.
0:22
Let's get started. Before we kick off today's episode, I want to warn you that Dr. Kuba starts this episode with, what
0:30
do you know, drama. She then has a little bit of an epiphany later on that
0:36
she wanted to make sure went on air before she jabs half of our listeners.
0:42
So, I'm going to tee her up here with a voice memo that she left for me when she
0:48
saw a different perspective. So, here we go.
0:53
I have I thought of another example. not another an example of um so that the
1:00
guys could see like things that they have to deal with that we don't. one that um came to mind the other night
1:06
when we were at study club when you and I were presenting and one of the doc in
1:11
the audience said something about um dealing with like sexual harassment and I was like you know what that is
1:17
something that females typically don't have to deal with but in in general most
1:23
dental offices are full of women very few men and if you're a male assistant
1:29
you can or a hygienist you cannot be caught in a room with a female patient by yourself. Same with the docks. Or
1:34
even if you did nothing, like the odds of somebody complaining and claiming
1:40
sexual harassment if they get let go is far more for a male. Like I've never had
1:46
to worry about that. I don't even think about that. Um and and I've had male associates and and I just have never So
1:52
that's something that the guys have to worry about just because they're men. That women for the most part we don't
1:57
have to. Um, and the other thing was was like if it's ever any maternity type
2:04
whatevers, I just feel like guys can't say a word. Like they'd have to just pretty much put their hands up and and
2:10
deal with whatever a a pregnant female says versus me. like, yeah, I mean, it
2:16
might take a minute or it might take something really extreme for a female employee to come at me with something
2:23
about pregnancy because she knows I've been pregnant, too, and I could probably call her bluff versus the guys don't
2:29
don't get that luxury. So, guys, I I there are examples where just cuz you're
2:34
men, you do get the short end of the stick. Um, but but the point of those female episodes was there are things
2:41
that that y'all won't be able to understand. just like I can't understand all the fear y'all have with a sexual
2:47
harassment claim. So anyway, I was trying to stir them up. This is me trying to be more levelheaded and fair,
2:54
but really wanted to come up with an example to um kind of show that there are things just by being male that they
3:00
have to deal with that we don't. And I acknowledge that. Likewise, I just would hope that they would acknowledge there are things that females have to go
3:06
through that they don't have to. The end. Hey, hey, hey. Um, okay. I do have a
3:14
topic for today. Uh, but I can I rile up at least 50% of your audience with the
3:20
comment? Oh gosh. Okay, bring it. Bring the drama. Um, apparently gentlemen, y'all are all up in arms
3:27
about our females have it tough um podcasts that we did
3:34
and y'all have like major voices heard to Bethany that that y'all don't agree
3:40
and that um y'all have these problems too. And
3:46
uh so I just wanted to put in my two I don't know how you're handling all these comments, Bethany, but u my two cents.
3:53
I firmly stand behind what we said. I firmly believe that females do have it
4:00
different. That's not saying that you guys don't have the same challenges or problems.
4:05
And and it's not saying that it's your fault. You can't help that you're male and you can't help that that's how things are perceived. But
4:12
make no mistake, you and and I don't expect y'all to understand. You can't. You won't. So that's fine if you want
4:19
just like a female won't understand a ma a male's a male practice owner world like we just it's just different
4:24
perspectives ultimately it's just different perspectives but I just had to get my two uh riled up
4:32
started off down and dirty anybody want to spar off I'm happy to go at it come
4:37
on down to Dallas let's spar uh actually I don't want to spar because it it don't even matter it it's like religion we
4:43
don't need to talk about it because we're just not going to agree at the end of the Okay. But I just I just felt like
4:50
starting with that knife wound right in there. We hear you. We hear you and we don't agree.
4:57
We don't agree with you. You don't agree with us. Well, and honestly, I think it is that feeling of like, oh, you made it
5:04
seem like it's so easy for us. And no, I know practice ownership is not easy for
5:10
anybody. Male, female, black, white, it doesn't matter. It's hard for anybody. I
5:15
just think it's hard in different ways and and that's why we were trying to stay in those episodes. Yes. Yes. And we're trying to put a
5:22
little spotlight on how it's hard in different ways for females in particular. And so yeah, that ruffled
5:27
ruffled some feathers, but no, it's hard for everybody, but I I still want to ruffle.
5:32
So that's why I'm here ruffling away. Okay, 50%. Keep listening. There's more
5:39
to come. More. I don't No, I'm kidding. I'm kidding. I'm kidding. No, please keep listening. Um, so I just wanted to start
5:45
off with that jackass comment just to get, you know, the ball rolling here. Um, and so now on to the topic. You want
5:51
to move on? Yeah, let's move on. Okay. So, the topic here is uh I uh we
5:58
visited family in California um over the long Labor Day weekend. And
6:04
my in-laws were super excited cuz they had a uh not a Techmex, I guess, cuz it was California, a California mech,
6:11
whatever. and they've always loved Texmex and they're like, "Oh, we just don't get food this good in California."
6:18
Um, so sorry to Californians. It's not me who's saying it. It's my in-laws that have lived in California for 50 plus
6:23
years. Like they're the ones who are like, "Oh, we just don't have this this great like TMEX type food. But we
6:29
finally found a restaurant. We can't wait for y'all to come visit next to take y'all to this restaurant." So they knew that that was one place where we
6:36
were going to go eat. So we're like, "Okay, cool. We're excited." We show up at the restaurant and the uh it was a
6:43
beautiful restaurant. It's in this, you know, California. It's just the picturesque like Bay Area, mountains in the background everywhere, perfect
6:49
weather everywhere all the time. So, we get seated and um the it takes forever like the
6:58
there's nobody to be found like to come to our table. So, like 10 minutes go by, nobody comes to to serve us, whatever. I
7:04
think my husband finally kind of flagged somebody down. So eventually then maybe 2 or 3 minutes later waitress shows up.
7:11
She's probably mid-50s I would say. Um and you know
7:17
kind of mumbled whatever she mumbled at us and you know do y'all want drinks? And we're like well can we get a menu
7:22
like do you have a drink menu and like a kids menu whatever. Disappears for a while again comes back gives us some
7:28
menus disappears again. Like, so this was just taking like forever. And finally, so she comes back and we
7:36
had already decided at that point like we need to order our food and our drink together because, you know, we we were hoping to
7:43
leave there before dinner cuz it's lunchtime. So anyway, I'm at the head of the table
7:48
on one side, my kids on the other end of the table. There's eight of us, so it's, you know, a decent sized table. And I
7:55
could hear the woman and I hear my kids say something like, "Can I get a chicken quesadilla? And the woman says something
8:00
to her and my daughter's like, "I'm sorry, what was that?" Woman repeats. And my kid turns to me at the end of the
8:06
table. She's like, "Mama, can I don't I'm like, "Sorry, what what is it? What's the question?" Well, do you want
8:12
chicken blah blah or chicken asado? And I'm like, "What is the difference?"
8:18
Like, you're giving two options. Clearly, it's not anywhere in your menu that there are two options and there's no description of either one. I guess to
8:24
me my thought was you clearly this kid has had to this is
8:30
the third time now we're asking you about what this is and you just keep repeating the same thing chicken blah
8:36
blah chicken asado chicken blah blah chickenado chicken to finally where I was like what is the difference what is
8:41
chicken assado and what is chicken blah blah whatever and she's like well one is pieces one is shredded oh okay then
8:46
we'll go with the pieces okay then we move on and the rest of us order and
8:52
then I hear my husband say something like, "Oh, I mean, I I wanted to make sure mine was on the rocks salt." She's
8:59
like, "Yes, you ordered a classic margarita." Then my father-in-law said, "Well, I didn't want salt, but you know,
9:06
I wanted mine on the rocks as well." And then she repeats back something. Then my mother-in-law,
9:11
so I'm already like, I guess I had tuned out. Um, but to me, I'm like, I don't know, maybe I'm just kind of in Texmex
9:18
land here, but it's pretty standard when you order a margarita. The pretty standard question is rocks or frozen,
9:24
salt, no salt. And then it gets more complicated from there depending on the venue and like what they pride as their,
9:32
you know, signature drink or something like that. Exactly. So, I'm kind of tuning in going, why why are they having to repeat
9:37
their margarita orders? And my mother-in-law is like, no, I wanted frozen. I'm like, did this woman not ask
9:43
them what they wanted? Like, who's being the dummies here, my family or this woman? like it cuz to me it seemed kind
9:49
of like they were going back and forth over this. And so finally my my mother-in-law is like, "Yeah, I ordered
9:55
the classic. I want a a Frozen." Well, that's not a Frozen. Huh? Which one's not a Frozen? So So like now you've got
10:02
my in-laws, the elders kind of going, "Huh? What? Huh?" You know, and my husband, huh? Who? And I'm just like,
10:08
"What is going on?" So the woman's like, "Well, a classic is this one. What you
10:14
ordered is a Luna. That's the frozen whatever." And in my mind, I'm like, who cares what it's called?
10:21
Get the woman a freaking frozen margarita. It's not that complicated. Like, we're we're not sitting in a Thai
10:27
restaurant. That it might be a little offthe-wall to kind of clarify these question. Like, we are in a Mexican
10:33
establishment. Yeah. And you took the order, but you didn't clarify initially. Now, she's trying to
10:39
clarify, and she's calling it a frozen. And anyway, so I kind of just snickered
10:44
because in my mind, I'm like, "This is terrible service. So the woman like and then oh one more
10:49
thing then we ordered I said something about oh fajitas those are are paradas or whatever she
10:55
they had a different name on their menu for it and I remember looking at it going well they don't have fajitas on this menu that's odd and then as I
11:02
looked they called it whatever they called it maybe it's a more authentic term but sitting here in text land I'm
11:08
like over here like I I don't know but when I read the description I'm like oh that's what it is so she had to correct
11:15
us on that too. She corrected me on that and she walks away and I I think I kind
11:20
of snickered and I looked at my father-in-law and he was kind of had this look on his face too. We all just looked at each other. We just started
11:25
laughing going, you know, like this is clearly like in your lingo.
11:34
We are not we're not up to par with your restaurant's lingo. Well, and it's your first time here,
11:39
but to me like that doesn't that doesn't matter, right? And so it was like this really sirly waitress and then a as so
11:46
I'll I'll get to the other part of the incident that happened to where I don't leave negative reviews y'all because I'm
11:52
so sensitive about our own negative reviews and whatever. So if I've got a great experience I'll rave about that
11:57
all day long but if somebody like even on Etsy somebody sends a review this product I'll ignore
12:03
it if I don't like the product. Yeah. Because I'm not going to put something bad on your site. Um, and I know there's
12:10
pros and cons to that and am I helping other consumers and blah blah blah blah. Anyway, bottom line, my philosophy is I
12:16
don't really do it. This is the one time I've left a negative review because it was that um it was that annoying to me.
12:24
Um, so anyway, so so just stopping right there alone, I think to me I start
12:29
drawing parallels on like are our teams doing this? Is this where? Cuz I
12:35
remember we had one employee once and she was the our only employee to date who patients were like, I do not want to
12:41
talk to her on the phone. Yeah, that should have been our red flag alone to let her go a long time ago. Not only
12:46
did I not do that, I rehired her when she moved back in town like dummy
12:53
and had to turn around and fire her again later, right? But uh well, I guess the first time she left cuz she moved
12:58
and then the second time I had to fire her. But that was stupidity on my part. Like I I knew better.
13:04
Yeah. And yet I Anyway, live and learn, right?
13:10
Exactly. Again and again and again again. Um but I remember her like
13:15
several times would come back and be like this dad, you know, I'm he won't stop asking about
13:22
his co-pay. And I remember coaching her once and going, "Well, if you repeat yourself
13:30
and like, you know," well that's not covered by your copay. Well, that's not covered by your copay. Well, that's not covered by your copay. Like,
13:36
the problem is not him. The problem's you. And I remember I said that once and she looked like I had slapped her
13:42
and she, you know, cuz I should be defending her, right? lunatic man and the plight of us in our in the dental
13:48
industry against these like terrible dumb patients. And I'm like, actually, if you're
13:55
repeating yourself like three times with the same thing over and over again, it's not that parent, it's you, right?
14:00
You need to figure out what your verbiage is. What are you That's you not understanding what that patient's
14:06
asking. Not listening well enough to know what they're asking. Yes. Not thinking outside the box enough
14:12
to know. And I'm like, how many times a day does that happen in our office at the front or in the back, you know, with
14:18
the team? Like, oh, well, you know, we need to use the mouth prop and he wouldn't hold the mouth prop.
14:23
Well, he wouldn't let us use the mouth prop. The mouth prop. The mouth prop. Like, does the parent even know what you're talking about at that point,
14:29
right? We need to do a composite. Well, your insurance downgraded this to an amalgam. What?
14:34
The insurance did what? Dug out what? You know what I mean? It's like, well,
14:39
they downgraded it. They downgraded it. They downgraded it. That's why you owe a balance. Yeah.
14:44
So, is it the patient or is it us? And at the end of the day, we can blame the patient all we want to, but at the
14:51
end of the day, who's going to suffer for that? Us. Cuz somebody's going to leave us a negative review or not come back to our office.
14:56
Same as this restaurant. I will not go back to that establishment. Not over these little things. Something more happened and I can get to that later.
15:02
But anyway, I just wanted your thoughts on Oh, I think you're hitting the nail on the head and what a good way to to think
15:09
about it from a restaurant standpoint that's totally outside of the dental world. But I can't tell you how many
15:15
times I see that version of communication where it's like if we just repeat it
15:21
enough and keep saying it even the same way that somehow it's going to
15:27
eventually click and it just doesn't because we're not who cares if they're called the fajitas, the fagitas, the
15:35
Luna, whatever they are. Like break it down. Are we talking about a skillet
15:42
that comes out with chicken on it and some bell peppers and onions? Yeah, that's what we're talking about. And
15:47
instead, in the dental world, we focus on the technical terms. And even if we've come up with cutesy names of
15:54
calling it the fajitas instead of the Luna whatever you said like that we're
16:01
still if the parents not getting our layman's terms and they're still having to ask
16:07
questions well then are we truly explaining the nuts and bolts of it in a way that's just the simplest way we can
16:13
possibly get it or the ability to rephrase or is the patient it's like the patient
16:18
may not know what to ask. Yeah. And by repeating and repeating and repeating,
16:24
we a skilled person is going to go, "Ah, I see what you're asking here."
16:31
Yeah. You keep repeating the phrase, you know, whatever copay. You don't mean
16:37
the co-ay, you mean the
16:42
estimated portion. I I don't know. Yeah. But it's like if it How can we train
16:47
ourselves to catch ourselves doing that? I guess. Yeah. Um, and how do you how do you train team
16:54
members to be more savvy than that? Yeah. Well, and I would say number one, my
17:00
number one rule of thumb, and I was trying to figure out if this equates to the restaurant. I can't I can't equate that right now. But to me, the
17:08
paraphrasing um, so it's interesting. I was talking with a client who was uh who had an upset parent and she was trying
17:14
to help this dad process what what they
17:20
were confused about insurance x-rays. Are they covered? Are they not covered? You know, the doctor needed the patient
17:26
to have these x-rays and the dad was fighting against that cuz he's gotten duped by, you know, by insurance not
17:32
covering it before. This is an everyday conversation, right? It's super challenging. Not duped by the insurance, duped by the
17:38
dentist. That's who they blame. The dentist. Yeah, the dentist is the one that ultimately duped me this last time. And
17:45
I don't want to be in that same situation again. And so, one of the tips that I was telling her was the value of
17:52
stopping to paraphrase what we think we're hearing from the patient or from the parent. You
17:59
know, pausing to go, let me make sure I'm understanding you clearly. you are
18:04
concerned about me taking the X-rays today because even though our verification shows that it looks like
18:10
insurance says they're going to help you with those, you're worried that you're going to be in the same boat with a big
18:16
bill because insurance ultimately doesn't help. Is that your concern? Yes.
18:21
I don't want an unexpected bill. Okay, I value that. I've heard that. Now, let's
18:28
continue the conversation. But just that moment to like pause and make sure that we're hearing the
18:35
question or the comment or the statement properly because so many times we're making assumptions in that process. So,
18:42
we could have listened to the dad saying, "No x-rays, no x-rays, no x-rays." And we could could have gone,
18:48
"Ah, this is a dad that believes in, you know, radiation poisoning."
18:53
And then we may go off on a whole tangent about the value of x-rays and how we have to have these x-rays in order to properly diagnose blah blah
19:00
blah. X-rays are safe. And we're not talking about anything, but just because
19:05
we assumed he doesn't want the x-rays due to radiation poisoning, we went on this whole different path. And so I
19:12
think pausing and going, let me make sure I understand this before I move on in the conversation. So
19:20
I feel like a lot of team members will struggle with that because I don't think they ever I I think there's a lot who
19:29
don't really understand the question whether whether they really haven't been trained to do so or
19:37
somebody else always comes and rescues them. Um any tips or suggestions on
19:44
so this is where and what you've done on your team and I think it's important for others to consider is we do need to put
19:51
more communication emphasis on those team members that are stronger in it doesn't mean that sweet Sally who's poor
19:59
at communication isn't going to ever communicate with a parent or a patient but can we restructure where her
20:05
communication impact is minimized and somebody who is stronger and able to be
20:12
trained in reflective listening and things like that that he or she takes on more of that burden of communication.
20:18
So, um that doesn't solve all the problems unfortunately, but I I feel
20:24
like we don't spend enough time thinking about who actually needs to be communicating on this particular issue
20:31
and who doesn't for that matter, right? Um, and then any suggestions you
20:37
have on where if you do have a couple of people you're like, you know, these two could
20:44
could, you know, they they present well, people seem to like listening to them.
20:49
How can I get them more training? Yeah. So, of course, there's a ton of communication books out there, but my
20:57
favorite way to practice communication is a professional version of charades.
21:04
Essentially, it's like you can take little index cards, you can write the
21:10
patient personality type, which again, go back to our personality episode to
21:15
learn more about those, but you can write the patient personality type. You can write the uh motivation that they
21:22
have. So they're uh you know motivated most by preventing problems. Um their
21:29
barriers they financially are struggling right now. And then you can write this
21:34
situation. I we're presenting this treatment plan to to this parent. So the
21:42
patient the the role play is that a team member of yours is taking that patient card and they're going, "Okay, here's my
21:48
character. Let me get in character. I'm this is my name. This is my motivation. This is my barrier. And I'm about to
21:54
have a treatment plan presented to me. Okay, got it." Then your team member,
21:59
uh, the other team member that you're working on communication with, they don't know what that card says.
22:05
And then they're doing their thing. Okay, Sally, present this treatment plan to patient. Looks like a team member,
22:12
but it's actually not a team member. And then the team is watching this dialogue
22:17
unfold and let it go. Don't stop and correct. Just let it go and let's see
22:23
how it plays out plays out for the first time. Then once you get to to the end of that fake scenario, you go, okay, what
22:31
was good about that? What what could we change? The team members that are watching this, by the way, should be taking notes, writing down or oh, I
22:38
would have said this instead or I would have asked this question. So, it's an a very active observation and then we're
22:46
dialoguing about that. We pick the top two or three suggestions that the team
22:51
made. So, we might have had 20 suggestions, but we're like, "Ooh, these are our top two or three favorite."
22:56
Okay, sweet Sally, you're going to try this again. Now you know a little bit more, but you're going to try these
23:02
suggestions and let's see how it rolls out this time. Obviously, it won't be exact verbatim as we did the first time,
23:09
but we're just going to see the impact of those two or three um comments. It is to me one of my favorite ways to
23:17
practice communication because we can talk about communication tips all day long. We can read books. We can watch
23:23
movies. There's fantastic movies of, you know, speakers that you're like, "Oh, they're such a powerful communicator."
23:29
But the act of putting it in our setting and practicing it is to me you can't you
23:35
can't beat that practice. Okay. I just got a really good idea. Yeah. Playbook. Can you give us Can you create
23:40
like a playbook that has like five scenarios, 10 scenarios, whatever. I will. That will be in the October
23:50
digest. By the way, shout out. We've got some new members that jumped on board in
23:55
September. So, welcome members. We're so happy to have you and you guys can um
24:01
look for role play communication roleplay in October. I mean that's something you could throw
24:06
out new scenarios every quarter in our playbook. Oh my gosh. Yes. Love it. I'm putting it
24:13
down. Brilliant. Yes. Excellent. Okay. So, that's for communication. I think um
24:21
so I guess how would you how would you discern if your team is
24:26
doing that? I mean, I think one one way, you know, is if there's a patient complaint. Yes.
24:31
Um, but would you suggest or how would you suggest like um like listening in at
24:36
your front desk every now and then or listening into treatment presentations or For sure. For sure. So, we focused a lot
24:44
on phones over the these last few weeks. And by the way, that is a part of September Digest is actually how to
24:49
audit phone calls and listen to those with um discretionary listening and and trying to give feedback. So to me, it's
24:56
much harder to find the ability to listen to conversations because usually
25:01
those aren't recorded. Phone calls, it's easy to go back and listen to them. So we do have to kind of insert ourselves
25:08
into conversations. Sometimes that's just lingering out in the hallway, especially if like you and I are in a
25:14
closed room right now. It would be hard to hear a treatment plan presentation or or education during a patient
25:20
appointment. But if we're in most dental offices, it's open doors and we can stand out in that hallway and listen. Um
25:27
I when I go into offices, a lot of times I'm observing. I'm never in the room. I'm usually
25:34
lingering out in the hallway. Now, one disadvantage is a lot of times I can't actually physically see what's happening
25:41
because if I were to be if I were to place myself where I could see, the patient can also see me. And so that's
25:48
one disadvantage. It's ideal if we can observe from an area where we can see and hear. And that may just be um if
25:56
it's in a closed room or if you want to insert yourself into the oper operative
26:01
room where you're in with the patient, then you're there through the whole appointment. Um it's odd to jump in just
26:09
at the end of the appointment and you don't get a full feeling of the communication that's been developed. And
26:14
so I would actually encourage if you're going to set sit in and actually listen to be there throughout the whole
26:20
appointment, you get permission from the patient. So you would uh let's say it's the hygienist that's going, "Oh, by the
26:26
way, you know, Joe, this is Sally. She's um you know, coming in and she's going
26:31
to be observing me and helping me to do just an even better job. So she's just going to sit over here. She won't she
26:37
won't interfere with us. Um is that okay with you, Joe?" And then Sally sits over in that corner and she is silent. Not a
26:43
word, no eye contact. I call it the fly onthe-wall mode. She wants to become
26:48
invisible so that she ultimately doesn't impact that communication. And the
26:54
longer that she's in there invisible, the more natural the communication will become from both Joe and the hygienist.
27:00
So, they'll kind of settle in. Um, but it's easy enough to observe from the outside of the room as well. And then
27:07
again taking notes and bringing those notes um to the team for feedback on hey
27:13
here's some things that we could do better. And I I was even just thinking about from the doctor's side kind of almost
27:19
like we were talking about like the the mystery calls. Yeah. in auditing phone calls like this
27:24
is another one where it is very tempting for me to just go to the office, shut the door and hope that somebody's
27:31
explaining it right and a parent is going to agree to do whatever that person talked about this amalgam and
27:37
this this and the space maintainer and the whatever right like
27:42
um I I'm hoping that somebody explains it better than that and the parent is on board. Um, but taking the time to kind
27:50
of eaves drop a little bit. I I think one of my best times to be able to do that is when I help in sterile.
27:56
Yeah. And y'all have heard me say this before, I love helping in sterile. Um, but that's a really good spot to stand
28:03
because you are kind of a fly on the wall, but you can hear a lot of what's going on. It's a good central spot.
28:08
Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. And it doesn't mean that you're having to linger right outside the hallway. The exact point that you're
28:14
making is if you've got a good central spot, whether that's sterilization or there's a computer right beside your
28:20
pano that is very centrally located and so planting yourself there and you can
28:26
be getting stuff done while you're listening but you're just overhearing conversations and I don't think we do
28:32
that enough. And I think communication is so critical in a medical dental
28:39
field. It's so important like if there's anything that we're going to practice communication on, why would we not do it
28:46
in the medical dental profession where we're talking about people's health here? So, I think it's worthwhile to
28:52
spend time observing your team and to practice roleplay communication so that
28:57
we can get better at it. Um, okay. So, I'm going to finish what happened. Yeah, I got to I was going to say I got
29:02
to hear more. Um, so I think this goes back to again and I I'll I'll relate it
29:09
back to dentistry and my thoughts on this and it goes back to again it makes sense to us because we understand but if
29:16
we don't um proactively uh communicate
29:24
expectations just because we know it doesn't mean everybody knows it. So
29:29
anyway, after Sirly, as my father-in-law called her, she was very sirly. And so we laughed about that, she disappears,
29:36
whatever. Food comes and the fajita thing was actually pretty cool or the
29:42
whatever she called it. Um, but it was like this tower probably about a foot high and like I don't know 9 in wide,
29:50
like a square and the the fajitas were sizzling on top. It
29:56
smelled amazing. It sounded amazing. Like it was like, "Okay, this great." She sets it
30:03
down. That was that. So, I take the tongs and I'm trying to get the fajitas off and it's still like
30:08
splattering at me. So, I get a few like little burns, burn marks, but nothing big. Not a big
30:14
deal, whatever. I was like, "Woo, these are hot, you know." So, I put some on my kids plate cuz she and my husband were
30:19
going to share, and I was kind of the the middle point there. I put some on her plate and then I get my food and I'm
30:25
eating whatever. My husband's working on eating something else. Well, all of a sudden I kind of see him and he reaches
30:33
over and he's like, "Oh my god." And I was like, "What?" And he's like, "Those tongs are burning hot."
30:39
Oh, wow. So, what we had there in the foot high tower that the fajitas were in at the
30:45
top. I guess in Texas or any other time I've had fajitas, if they bring it out on a sizzling platter, there's usually
30:51
like the sizzling platter with like wood around it or silicone or something and
30:56
then they always put the plate in front of you and they're like, "Hey, it's really hot plate. Be careful." Well, certainly waitress said nothing
31:03
and just set the tower there. There's no border around this metal cast metal iron
31:09
and it's about like a an inch of a border and that you know kind of in one
31:14
dimension and then like 2 in in another dimension and it's you know piping hot which we knew they're sizzling. We know
31:21
they're hot but nobody bothers to tell us that there's still a gas can in it. So that
31:28
tower there was a gas can in the middle part that keeps it hot. And I mean, I
31:34
guess I saw the can, but I I just didn't register. It just didn't Yeah. And then these
31:39
metal tongs they give you, like those cheap metal tongs. So I, of course, I taken the fajitas and I left the tongs
31:45
on top of the plate of fajitas. So all of that like castiron heat has
31:52
now transferred to these tongs where my husband goes to grab the tongs and like burns his fingers.
31:57
Oh my god. So he was like, "Oh my god." And I was like, "What?" And I was like, "Oh my god." You know, like I felt terrible
32:03
because I'm the one who left the tongs there, but at the same time, who gives you these cheap metal tongs? Like in Texas, we don't they don't have that.
32:10
Yeah, they don't they don't give you poor quality. As mentioned, just from a liability
32:15
standpoint, you would think that they wouldn't do that. So, my husband, who's not a baby and
32:21
does not want to make a fuss, and so he was just kind of like, but I could tell he was uncomfortable. So finally, if you
32:28
burn your fingers, go to the bathroom, run your hands under,
32:34
which is not like him. Usually he'd be like, "Ah, never mind. Never mind. I'm fine." The fact that he got up to do it, I'm like, "He must be hurting."
32:40
It hurt. Then he comes back and he basically got a glass of ice water that nobody was
32:45
using and was his hand in there while trying to eat his bajitas, right?
32:51
So, I'm not one to usually say anything. I don't like confrontation. I don't. But I was just like, you know, just thinking
32:56
about it from a uh safety perspective and as a business owner to be like I would I hate if
33:04
somebody has something in my office that happens to them, but I would rather know about it than not. Like you've got, you
33:09
know, we tripped on that rug. Like can somebody fasten it down or whatever? Like I would rather somebody tell me
33:15
than not. Yeah. So I'm debating. A lady walks by and I kind of she she
33:20
ends up making eye contact with me and I was like, "Are you the manager?" And she's like, "No, but I can get them for
33:26
you." I said, "Well, I just wanted to let you know." She was like, "Well, what you know, is there something I can help you with?" And I said, "Well, you know,
33:33
y'all bring this tower here and it's burning hot. Nobody tells us that it's going to
33:39
continue to stay hot." Cuz that's what they say, right? Like most places, this place hot. Be careful.
33:46
She didn't say anything. But that's not enough actually in this place. This is going to continue to stay hot for the
33:52
next hour. And it did like it was you could you could hover your hand three
33:57
inches above the fajitas and it was still you could feel the steam coming up because that can is still lit inside.
34:03
Yes. Um and I said and then there's no border here. There these cheap metal tongs like just from a safety perspective like my
34:10
kid could reach over right now to grab say I mean as awful as it sounds. Thank goodness it was your husband but what if
34:15
it would have been the kids? Yeah. But even like 30 minutes into the meal, she could still touch that and
34:20
burn her finger on it because it's still actively lit. And the waitress said nothing.
34:25
And then y'all aren't helping yourself. So, I just wanted to point that out like y'all may want to get different tongs or y'all need maybe need to have a team
34:31
meeting to remind everybody to say something. Yeah. Because not everybody's going to know.
34:37
And so the whole time I'm talking, she's like, "Okay, okay, okay, okay, okay,
34:42
okay. I'll let the manager know." And she disappears. And so I kind of was like, "Could you check to make sure he's
34:49
okay?" Yeah. Like he couldn't bother. No, she couldn't do that. She disappears. 2 minutes later, the manager comes up
34:56
and he's like, "Hey, she told me this happened. I'm so sorry that that happened. You know, I'll take care of this meal for you. Like that shouldn't
35:02
have happened." Whatever. Yeah. And in my mind, I'm like, I'm not I'm not squabbbling about the bill.
35:09
The food was good and we ate it. Yeah. I'm just trying to point out that this is a safety thing. And before we can
35:15
finish saying before we can say anything actually because now he's heard the version that she's told him. So he's
35:21
coming in going hey you know I'll take care of this but just you know uh you know I've worked here for a year and a
35:27
half and this has just never happened before. Huh? Okay. Well it happened now.
35:33
Yeah. And I'm like well it's it's still hot. I was like why don't you touch it? Oh no. It it's hot. I know it's hot so I'm not
35:40
going to touch it. And in my mind I was like there's hot and then there's like scalding hot
35:45
scalding hot and that's anyway. So at the end he just kind of kept going oh this has never happened
35:51
and oh we know it's hot and oh you know sorry that that happened and I'll take care of it and whatever. And then my
35:57
husband said something to him and he was like oh well I mean are you okay? Do I need to call an ambulance? And I think
36:03
that for me was the moment where I was like you know what you a-hole like get the f out of here. Yeah. like you you are
36:10
you're you're making fun of this now, right? And so anyway, he leaves and my husband was just like, you know, you
36:17
shouldn't have been basically it was like when I was asking him to touch it and he was like, no, it's hot. My
36:24
husband's like, basically, he was like, no, you idiot. I'm not going to touch it. Neither should you cuz it's hot. Yeah, that's what he was saying.
36:29
That's what he was saying. But to me, I'm like, no, I know what hot is, but 30 minutes later it shouldn't be this hot.
36:35
Right. And if you're not willing to touch it, why are you letting my kid touch it? Right? Um, and serve it with, first of all, warn
36:42
your customers, but then also serve it with tongs that can't transfer the heat cuz you're going to dish the food up
36:48
with the tongs that clearly conduct the heat, right? But apparently we're the idiots who should have known that.
36:55
And so my husband's like, this whole establishment from the sirly waitress to being like, you didn't order the the
37:01
heat or the margaritas the right way and you didn't know which chicken was which. He's like, "You can clearly tell from
37:06
top to bottom this is a place that thinks their customers are a pack of idiots." Yeah. And so I was like, that is exactly how I
37:13
felt when I left here. Yeah. And it goes back to almost like when we've talked about in other episodes, too, um about if a patient complains and
37:21
the the reaction is, well, I'll just give them their money back. Well, but they may not want their money back.
37:26
Yeah. I didn't care for that to be waved. I was perfectly ready to pay it. Yeah. But to me, I would have rather you
37:33
taken it seriously to go, somebody could get hurt here. Which then prompted me two days later to still go, you think we
37:40
were this pack of idiots. Like y'all are sitting there going, "Oh, dumb asses. The touching the hot thing. Of course, it's hot, dummy."
37:47
Yeah. Yeah. But it I don't want to keep repeating, but you know what what I mean there. So I think
37:53
for me then that prompted me to leave my first one-star review, and I was very detailed in it. So people might think
38:00
because they that restaurant has a lot of good reviews. People might think that I'm the crazy one.
38:05
Yeah. And a lot of people might be like, "Yeah, ding-dong. Of course, the pea plate's going to be hot. It's sizzling." I get that. But the fact that you did
38:12
nothing to forewarn us. So the dental things that I kind of think about too where when a
38:19
patient bites their their lip. Yeah. Well, of course you're going to bite your lip. It was asleep. Duh.
38:25
Yeah. Is that how our teams are handling it? Yeah. Or your um I don't know the varnish.
38:31
Well, duh. That's sticky in your mouth. That's just a varnish. So, are there things that we are
38:38
assuming the patient knows? Yeah. And are we making it wor our team's making it worse and therefore you don't
38:44
sound empathetic, which is why you got that board complaint, right? Because you were like, "Well, I mean,
38:50
yeah, your gums are going to bleed. I did a scaling or planning on you. You hadn't. Your gums have been bleeding for
38:55
the last 5 years of your life. Of course, they're going to bleed. But if we didn't take the time to tell the patient what to expect,
39:01
just cuz it's clear as day to us. And same with this guy kind of going, "Well, no Plate of fajitas are going to
39:07
be hot. Stupid you for touching it." Yeah, I can see where he has a point to a
39:12
degree, but overall, if that's how you're going to conduct yourself, you are opening yourself up to
39:18
having a lot of pizzy clientele. And not only is it communicating things that we
39:24
think are common knowledge in a way that is not there should be no attitude there
39:30
should be this is us realizing we have privileged knowledge that this patient
39:36
does not have but also going so far as to prepare them in advance for um things
39:44
that they might experience. Uh Dr. Ledllo, who's been on the podcast before, I was in a team meeting with him
39:51
recently and he was talking about this very scenario and he was saying that if
39:56
we if a patient calls back in after getting fillings done and they're experiencing sensitivity and then then
40:05
we choose to explain to the patient, oh that's a normal part of the filling process. It's very common to have
40:11
sensitivity for a few weeks afterwards, you know, just let us know if that doesn't go away. He was like, "Well, now
40:17
it looks like we're defending that." He was like, "It's an excuse. It's an excuse." But he was like, "If we
40:22
proactively communicate about that and we go, hey, I know you've had some feelings before,
40:28
but just as a reminder, these composite feelings do have a tendency to make you a little bit
40:33
sensitive. So, you might have some sensitivity for the ne next few weeks. That's totally normal. If at any point
40:39
it's lingering sensitivity or it doesn't seem like you're feeling any better or if it hurts when you're biting, then it
40:45
may mean that we need to do some adjustments and give us a call. In that case, he was like, then if they call in
40:51
and say, I've got sensitivity, they've already been told that it's this is normal and we're not having to then say
40:58
it in a in a border. It seemed like a defensive way. And so this goes back to like we may think it's common knowledge
41:05
that people get feelings and yeah, you've had two feelings before. You should remember that you're going to
41:10
have sensitivity. No, that's common knowledge to us because we see it every day. But taking something as simple as
41:17
that and going, "Hey, you might experience this." Or, "Hey, we put that
41:22
fluoride on today. Don't forget, it's going to feel a little bit sticky. It's totally normal. It'll wear off by the
41:27
end of the day." Just little things like that that are our everyday lives, but
41:33
just slowing down to communicate that to the patient is so valuable. And then not making them feel dumb.
41:39
Well, yeah, we did a deep filling on you today. You're going to be sensitive for a little bit. Yeah.
41:44
Uh-huh. Right. So, it's like how how are we handling those? And I think that to
41:50
me it it it was just a really stark reminder of me going I need to start listening again in my office to make
41:55
sure my team isn't doing that or making anybody feel that way. Yeah. And even I think you made such an
42:01
important point when you said that they came over and they were addressing the problem but never looked and asked your
42:08
husband are you okay? And so many times I think this happens in our offices.
42:13
A patient calls in and says man I'm sensitive. and we're like, "Oh, yeah, that's totally normal." Blah, blah, blah. We haven't even stopped to go, "Oh
42:20
my goodness, tell me more about that. Yeah, okay." And it's happening all throughout the day. Or just, you know,
42:26
we don't even like, we know what they're going to say. We already know the answers to the questions. For the most
42:32
part, we know what they're going to say. Let's go with the sensitivity after a feeling feeling. But why just dismiss
42:39
that and not actually hear them? Like, just slow down. Take 30 seconds to show that you're concerned. and oh, I know
42:45
that sensitivity is so annoying. I totally get that. Let me ask you a few questions about it. Okay, let me remind
42:52
you. Everything you've said sounds normal, right? So, we're just being gentle with that and checking on the
42:58
patient to make sure that they're okay cuz I think that's first and foremost what we need to do. I think the other way feels dismissive.
43:05
Yeah. and you get a, you know, or like like my husband who's not a sensitive
43:10
Sally and for him to go they clearly view their clients as idiots.
43:15
Yeah. And uh I think that for me stuck out with me and I'm like fair game I'm I'm
43:21
not saying I'm the sharpest tool in the shed, but yeah, there comes a point here where yeah, I
43:28
shouldn't have left the tongs on the hot thing. Yeah. But I don't think the most of the misstep was with us. It was definitely
43:34
with y'all. Exactly. Yeah. No, this is such a good topic and it brings us back to just the value of communication in a
43:41
different way. It's like we focused on it pretty heavily with phones um this this last month, the last few weeks, but
43:48
the in-person communication and um how we handle that is just critical.
43:53
I think it's just easy to get in your rut, especially this time of year. It's like,
43:58
oh my god, September, Christmas is coming, summer, just God. Yeah.
44:04
And it's just like, yep, she just got some fillings. Her lips going to be down. Blah blah blah. So,
44:09
just maybe a refresher to pause and make sure that you are delivering
44:15
that outstanding communication with every patient. Yes. Yeah. Love it.
44:21
Thanks for joining the conversation today. We hope that you are comforted in knowing that you are not alone, but we
44:28
also hope that you're walking away with some really great tips and tricks to try in your practice.
44:35
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