Dr. Delaram Saidi shares tips on how to successfully consult patients and develop an appropriate treatment plan that will help the esthetician build trust with the patient and ensure the proper result of the selected treatment.
Patient consultation – this is a meeting during which the doctor discusses with the patient a problem, question, etc. In medical practice, consultations are the basis for building relationships between a doctor and a patient. This interaction sets the tone for a long-term doctor-patient relationship based on trust, experience and personalized care.
Counseling, when done properly, can go beyond finding a solution to a specific problem and provide a comprehensive step-by-step treatment plan for the patient's long-term care. In this regard, a natural question arises: how should a consultation be carried out in order to achieve this goal?
Successful holistic counseling consists of five main components, which will be discussed in this article.
1. Collecting a complete anamnesis
Although patients book consultations because of a specific problem, they are rarely concerned about a single case. The patient may not always understand the seriousness of his skin condition, as well as the importance of the information that needs to be communicated to the doctor. Therefore, before the consultation, it is very important to collect complete information about the patient's skin and aesthetic problems.
First, it is necessary to understand that the history of aesthetic procedures will help the aesthetic doctor not only solve the current problem of the patient, but also better understand the essence of their involvement in aesthetic procedures. When learning about previous procedures, it is important to understand a few critical points.
- First of all, when was the last procedure done?
This often helps to improve understanding of the patient's problems. For example, a patient booked a consultation to discuss body contouring, but his aesthetic history indicates that he has been taking neuromodulators for the past four months. This possibility allows you to take into account all the aesthetic needs of the patient, providing him with the appropriate information.
- Secondly, it is important to understand how the patient's skin reacted to the procedure, as well as being aware of the patient's level of satisfaction with the results.
This will help ensure that your treatment recommendations include treatments that meet your patient's needs and expectations.
- Finally, it is important to understand your patient's current skin care regimen.
Again, this will not only help you understand the aesthetic involvement of the patient, but will also give you the opportunity to discuss appropriate home care that complements the recommended procedures. According to recent questions, 60% of patients expect such a move from a doctor.
Important: Since taking a complete aesthetic history can take up the entire consultation, it is important to collect the relevant history prior to the consultation. There are two ways to do this:
- Send a questionnaire with questions about the aesthetic history to the patient's email. He brings the completed questionnaire to the consultation.
- The patient can fill out a paper copy of this questionnaire at the time of the appointment, or the nurse/assistant can conduct a quick 5-minute patient interview directly in the office. In order to save time for the consultation, you can ask your assistant/nurse to briefly inform you about the collected data.
2. Understanding the Patient Profile
Understanding the patient profile is important to ensure that your proposed treatment plan is effective and fits the patient's lifestyle, habits, and budget.
- Firstly, it is necessary to take into account the intensity of the patient's involvement in aesthetic procedures.
If the patient's history of aesthetic procedures and home care is not too rich, it is advisable to develop a treatment plan consisting of more advanced therapies. However, in the case of a limited amount of aesthetic intervention, it is important to introduce the patient more smoothly into outpatient treatment, regardless of the type or condition of his skin. Often these patients are recommended more invasive procedures that provide faster visual transformation. However, for 50-year-old patients without a history of procedures, it is more appropriate to start with a course of rejuvenation with fractional laser, fillers and neuromodulators. A step-by-step approach with a gradual increase in the number of treatments will be more effective in terms of comfort and trust.
- It is also important to understand your patient's lifestyle, habits, and acceptable recovery period – all of these are necessary to ensure compliance and satisfaction.
If treatment recommendations cannot successfully fit into your patient's daily activities, and their desire to receive treatment will decrease, which will negatively affect the results. In this case, it is also important to read between the lines. What is meant? Is the patient's visit due to a change in living conditions? Perhaps an important event awaits him soon? In any case, it is better to understand the motives for recording a patient for a consultation.
- Finally, it doesn't hurt to consider your patient's budget.
Treatment recommendations that are appropriate to the patient's resources will ensure that the same treatment is available and increase the chances that he will stay with you.
3. Engage a unique visual experience
Memorable experiences are always the most impressive, and with imaging technology, consultation can become visual and interactive. The most efficient and affordable skin imaging devices allow your patients to look under the surface of the skin to assess pigmentation, vascularity and textural characteristics.
With the help of images on a large screen, you can accurately show and explain to the patient the condition of his skin, as well as the possibilities for eliminating existing problems. As the saying goes, it's better to see once than hear a hundred times – so use this wisdom to provide a concrete and accurate understanding of the patient's skin condition. Such technologies will also make it easier for the esthetician to track the improvement of the patient's skin condition during the treatment.
4. Create a comprehensive strategy
Patients often do not fully understand the technology of the procedure, its mechanism of action and benefits. To interest and convince the patient, it is necessary to present him with a comprehensive strategy with time frames, stages of treatment and proper home care.
This allows the patient to get a global picture of the treatment plan with rationale, goals and results. Armed with knowledge, the patient can become a full participant in a meaningful conversation aimed at reaching a consensus.
5. Use a call to action
When a patient has already understood all the intricacies of his skin condition and treatment strategies, it is important to transfer the patient from theory to practice. Since the patient receives a lot of information during the consultation, it is advisable to make a summary of it in writing and hand over the treatment plan to the patient. Such a written plan should contain recommendations for the procedure with timelines, additional comments, and skin care instructions. Be sure to ask the patient if they have any additional questions.
Because aesthetic medicine is characterized by a rather high level of competition, it is very important to use all available knowledge and tools both during the consultation and during the treatment. The doctor must draw up an individual treatment plan based on the needs of a particular patient. Correctly collected information about the patient will help to transfer him from the consultation directly to the practical part of the treatment.
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