Keeping it simple: Putting the patient first

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Among a sea of options, patients have a lot to consider when choosing an eye care provider. Even after deciding on a provider and visiting the practice for their initial eye examination, sifting through said options continues as they deliberate whether they should continue at their current practice or try out a new one.

To get a patient in the chair is one thing, but enticing them to come back is another, according to John Rumpakis, OD, MBA, president and CEO of Practice Resource Management. He said that establishing a method to maintain patient loyalty is at the core of any successful practice and that providers should take a patient-by-patient approach.

“When it comes to certain things in a person’s life, [such as] their eyesight [and] other types of health concerns, they want the best. That’s what they want,” Rumpakis said. “If you make them feel special for choosing you, and everything that you do during their encounter reinforces that that decision was the best decision that they made that day, then you’ve achieved [patient loyalty.]”

What is patient loyalty?

For many eye care providers, patient loyalty boils down to a sense of trust built between practitioner and patient. “It means earning a patient’s trust so that they understand your instructions and highly value your recommendations, all of which result in them returning to see you, referring family and friends to you, and remaining faithful to your practice versus other alternatives in the area,” said Chris Wroten, OD, staff physician at Southern College of Optometry. “The best advice I ever received was simply to always do right by the patient. Know your stuff as the doctor, listen to their needs, make trusted recommendations, and clearly and concisely explain what’s going on and why you’re recommending what you are. Treat them the way you would want to be treated personally if roles were reversed, and when you do, patient loyalty seems to take care of itself.”

For Rumpakis, setting up a patient so that their provider is top of mind for all things eye care is essential for creating a basis of loyalty. “Patient loyalty means that I as a professional would be top of mind for any consumer who would need professional eye care services,” he said. “I would want them to recognize that if anything happened with [their] vision, [their] kids’ vision, health issues with the eye, refractive issues with the eye, that their first move would not be to go to the [emergency department], it would be to contact my office first, and let me be the adjudicator of the care.”

Benjamin P. Casella, OD, FAAO, Optometry Times chief optometric editor and owner of Casella Eye Center in Augusta, Georgia, stated that it is the availability of many options, among insurance and vision benefit struggles, that makes a patient’s decision to stay with the practice poignant. “Patient loyalty [is] a steadfast alignment on the part of the patient in the face of possible inclinations to go elsewhere,” he said.

Additionally, Rumpakis said that one patient’s loyalty can easily turn into multiple potential new patients. He said that in the search for a new eye care provider, a stay-at-home parent will often be the first of their family to “try” a practice out. “They are the leader. They are checking it out, making sure everything’s OK,” Rumpakis said. “Then the kids come in, and then the spouse comes in, going, ‘Hey, I don’t know what I’m doing here, but they told me I’m supposed to show up.’ And that is what builds that family loyalty.”

The basics

Rumpakis said that patient loyalty doesn’t result from overthinking a new strategy but instead from identifying narratives within patients and keeping staff consistent in their methodology with each patient. “You have to be able to have these predetermined things in your mind that you can link up, so that way you can give the consumer a clear, concise summary of cause, effect, and solution all the way through,” Rumpakis said. “If you can focus on that patient during that encounter, that’s the most important thing, to establish that loyalty or that differentiation.” This approach also requires treating all of a patient’s ailments by addressing all of their concerns, not just the main concerns that do not require probing questions.

Additionally, differentiating your practice with quality of care makes a difference for patients, according to Rumpakis. He said many practice owners misplace their priorities when they try to set themselves apart from other practices. “They try to do differentiation through product and price, but they forget about their professional service component, which is really the key, or the hub for all other services and/or products that go through your practice or office,” Rumpakis said.

Additionally, a successful business method he has adopted is fiscally prioritizing the care of the physician over the product being sold. For instance, Rumpakis said while his servicing costs can be higher than his competitors, this allows him to sell the product itself for less. This also keeps patients coming back for follow-up appointments and routine eye examinations. “They didn’t mind if I did a good job differentiating myself,” he said. “I was worth every penny.”

However, Rumpakis emphasized the importance of not focusing on a monetary goal with each patient. “Don’t focus on the dollar. If you focus on the patient and you take care of them completely and wholly and fully, everything else will follow,” he said. “If you’re focusing on just a transaction, then there’s no loyalty. It’s price-driven. There’s no value, and that patient may or may not stick with you.”

Other key factors to building patient loyalty are being present and attentive to the patient and their concerns, maintaining open body language with each patient at all times, and making sure that pre- and postexamination communication is clear and concise.

Why loyalty matters

Ultimately, Rumpakis said patient loyalty is a result of a practice understanding the importance of what it does. “Providing professional service is the bread and butter of any physician-driven practice,” he said. “We serve people. Optometrists are in a very unique position within the health care field because we have a significant retail component to our practices as well. And I think that building loyalty is what builds the foundation for your practice in every aspect.”

Casella stated that patients tend to notice when patient loyalty is a priority for a practice. “I think it just looks really good from a consumer perspective to have loyalty,” he said. “People talk. They talk in small towns and in big cities. Good patient loyalty will be worth more than a billboard.”