As a primary care physician you treat all kinds of patients each and every day. Some of those patients are an absolute joy, and some are… rather challenging.
Here are the 10 most common types of patients and ways you can manage them effectively.
1. The Needy Patient
Not only do you need to treat their physical ailment, you need to treat their emotions with kid gloves. They are super apologetic when they come in to see you, expressing their knowledge that you have more important patients to see. Though it can get tiresome having to constantly address their meekness, simply explain to them that you care about all your patients equally and you are happy to be able to help them today.
2. The “I’m Seeking a Second Opinion” Patient
They have myriad …show more content…
The Patient That Never Seems to get Better
These are tough ones because you obviously can’t always tell who is being honest with you and who isn’t. There are those individuals who feel good when they are getting medical attention – period. But you simply can’t assume who is really sick and who isn’t. Again, you should absolutely exhaust all treatments with a patient and then at that point, refer them to a specialist or another primary care physician who may be able to give them a second (or 9th) opinion.
7. The Senior Patients
There typically comes a time when treating an elderly patient when they are no longer able to remember their own symptoms or what recommendations you have made in the past. When this happens, it’s time to speak with a family member or caregiver and ask that someone comes with your patient to all future appointments so all of the pertinent information is shared.
8. The Addict
It is a sad truth but many patients are narcotics addicts. Perhaps they weren’t before that fender bender but now that they have been on Vicodin for 8 months they are hooked and seem to be coming to you more frequently for higher dosages or simply more …show more content…
The Everything Hurts Patient
There are those patients who feel they won’t be taken seriously unless they present as VERY ill, so they will answer yes to all of your questions. “Yes” they have a headache and dizziness and nausea and chest pain and shortness of breath and abdominal tenderness.
While some illnesses do have multiple and serious symptoms, generally someone presenting with all of them at the same time would go immediately to the ER, not make an appointment a month in advance to see you. Your best course of action is to remain cool, calm and collected and let your patient know that with all of their symptoms you may have to order numerous tests which all costs quite a bit of money. Those who really have the symptoms won’t care about costs – they just want relief, while those who are perhaps… exaggerating, will suddenly remember that they really came in because of an earache.
No human being is perfect, obviously. And as doctors, you interact with just about every type of personality out there. At the end of the day all you can do is your absolutely best to treat them not only with the utmost medical attention but also with the utmost
Here are the 10 most common types of patients and ways you can manage them effectively.
1. The Needy Patient
Not only do you need to treat their physical ailment, you need to treat their emotions with kid gloves. They are super apologetic when they come in to see you, expressing their knowledge that you have more important patients to see. Though it can get tiresome having to constantly address their meekness, simply explain to them that you care about all your patients equally and you are happy to be able to help them today.
2. The “I’m Seeking a Second Opinion” Patient
They have myriad …show more content…
The Patient That Never Seems to get Better
These are tough ones because you obviously can’t always tell who is being honest with you and who isn’t. There are those individuals who feel good when they are getting medical attention – period. But you simply can’t assume who is really sick and who isn’t. Again, you should absolutely exhaust all treatments with a patient and then at that point, refer them to a specialist or another primary care physician who may be able to give them a second (or 9th) opinion.
7. The Senior Patients
There typically comes a time when treating an elderly patient when they are no longer able to remember their own symptoms or what recommendations you have made in the past. When this happens, it’s time to speak with a family member or caregiver and ask that someone comes with your patient to all future appointments so all of the pertinent information is shared.
8. The Addict
It is a sad truth but many patients are narcotics addicts. Perhaps they weren’t before that fender bender but now that they have been on Vicodin for 8 months they are hooked and seem to be coming to you more frequently for higher dosages or simply more …show more content…
The Everything Hurts Patient
There are those patients who feel they won’t be taken seriously unless they present as VERY ill, so they will answer yes to all of your questions. “Yes” they have a headache and dizziness and nausea and chest pain and shortness of breath and abdominal tenderness.
While some illnesses do have multiple and serious symptoms, generally someone presenting with all of them at the same time would go immediately to the ER, not make an appointment a month in advance to see you. Your best course of action is to remain cool, calm and collected and let your patient know that with all of their symptoms you may have to order numerous tests which all costs quite a bit of money. Those who really have the symptoms won’t care about costs – they just want relief, while those who are perhaps… exaggerating, will suddenly remember that they really came in because of an earache.
No human being is perfect, obviously. And as doctors, you interact with just about every type of personality out there. At the end of the day all you can do is your absolutely best to treat them not only with the utmost medical attention but also with the utmost