We are considering to try and implement a new patient orientation/class. We have tried these before without much luck in getting people to attend. Any ideas?

My Response:

The challenge you mention is an age-old one which doesn't have too many solutions. And those that I know of depend heavily on your commitment level and how dogmatic you intend to be.

From the lowest threshold of confrontation to the greatest:

1. Record your program and supply it to patients on a cassette or CD. Voile! No confrontation.

2. Have a sign up sheet at the front desk and reminders by the staff and throughout the office (white boards, etc.) announcing your "seminar." (I recommend using a name other than workshop, class, lecture, etc. You may be "seminared out" but rarely is the lay public.) When presenting this opportunity to your practice members (and their guests) frame it in terms of the specific benefits those attending receive. The potential benefits include: 1) get well faster, 2) save money and 3) avoid a relapse.

3. Consider an office policy that their visit following their attendance is complimentary.

4. Patients are more likely to utilize what they pay for, so include a modest charge for the seminar in your new patient examination fee, say, $20, collecting it on the first visit. Explain that this fee is part of your new patient processing fee because it provides the opportunity to dramatically effect the success of a new patient's experience in the office. (Reiterate patient benefits above.)

5. Establish a policy that the seminar is mandatory--only if you are willing to refer the patient out if they don't comply by a reasonable time frame. Making it mandatory as an empty threat without ramifications as to whether the patient would be still welcome in the office is inauthentic. Either the information you present is so essential as to disqualify the patient from care if they don't receive it, or it isn't. (How committed are you to sharing the information you present? Is it worth alienating or losing the patient? Would want practice members in your audience openly hostile or put out because they don't want to be there?)

It's the old, "leading a horse to water" problem. Most patients I have spoken to in focus group settings have observed that they enjoyed the program they attended, and were glad they did, but they didn't want to. Kinda like trying a new food, investigating a new church or paying just a little extra for a higher quality product!

Bill