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He was “Butt” of the Jokes

How can your experiences as a patient improve your practice?

JACK RUNNINGER, O.D.

This column is an abridged version of “Lessons Learned” that was originally published in November 1995. (Dr. Runninger has written in some optometric journal every month for 41 years.) He will write his final “Lessons Learned” column in the June 2015 issue of OM.

I recently had surgery on a very unglamorous part of my anatomy, the region that looks south when a person faces north. Being on the patient’s “end” taught me some lessons on how healthcare practitioners, including optometrists, should interact with their patients.

I also discovered a great verity, namely: If you wish to have sympathy when you suffer, I would suggest you develop some malady other than hemorrhoids.

Snicker now, pray later

Our church has a men’s prayer breakfast every Tuesday. One of its functions is to pray for the suffering, which I certainly was before and immediately after my surgery.

But when my fellow church members learned the reason for my surgery, the most prevalent reaction was laughter. A dentist friend had the effrontery to quip, “If that’s the region they’re operating on, there probably won’t be anything left of him after surgery.”

To make matters worse, I had to endure numerous hemorrhoid jokes from all my comedic friends, such as:

“What in the world is that suppository doing in your ear?” a man was asked.

“Thank God you said that,” the man replied. “Now I know where I misplaced my hearing aid.”

My preacher phoned me in the hospital to say he was coming for a visit. “I won’t be there,” I told him. “I’m being discharged at noon.”

“Good,” he said. “I was afraid you might ask for a laying on of hands.”

Why joke about this?

There’s a point to all this levity. During my painful days, unlike my contrary friends, the surgeon demonstrated sympathy and understanding. He took the time to explain my problem and prognosis, and rearranged his schedule to operate on me and ease my pain.

He never made me wait long, and never made me the butt (sorry) of his jokes.

When you’re a patient, it’s a good idea to make a checklist of your reactions and learn from them. What did you like or dislike about the way you were treated?

Avoid what you disliked

Make certain you and your staff aren’t doing what you disliked as a patient and are doing what you liked. It will develop the patient rapport necessary for building your practice.

For example, an M.D. once kept me waiting for more than an hour, with no explanation from his receptionist, after I had rearranged my appointments to get to his office on time.

He lost me as a patient that day. The experience taught me to make certain that no patient waited longer than a few minutes without getting an explanation from my receptionist.

If you’ll but pay attention, you can learn a valuable lesson from almost everything that takes place in your life. OM

JACK RUNNINGER, OUR CONSULTING EDITOR, LIVES IN ROME, GA. HE’S ALSO A PAST EDITOR OF OM. CONTACT HIM AT RUNNINGERJ@COMCAST.NET. VISIT TINYURL.COM/OMCOMMENT TO COMMENT ON THIS ARTICLE.