Conflict with Patients and the Role of Customer Service

Conflicts are common in workplaces, including healthcare settings. The conflicts can involve healthcare providers, patients, or patients’ families. Whenever they occur, the conflicts should be resolved amicably. Different customer service techniques can be utilized to ensure that the best solution is chosen. Healthcare provider-patient conflicts can impair the provision of quality patient care. The trigger factors must be identified before the patient leaves the healthcare facility. A resolution must be arrived upon and ensure that the patient leaves the facility in a satisfactory mood.

The two possible factors that could have contributed to this patient conflict scenario are poor communication and differing opinions. The patient’s opinions and expectations could have differed from those of the doctor. The doctor could have used his professional knowledge to deny the patient his autonomy. This occurs when the patient’s decision puts his health at risk. Therefore, the doctor could have insisted that the patient must strictly follow his recommendations and treatment plan. This led to the disappointment and resentment displayed by the patient.

The second factor is poor communication. The doctor could have rushed during the provision of instructions to the patient (Song, 2018). This could have led to insufficient information and misunderstanding. Furthermore, poor communication could have occurred due to information overload. Information overload denies the patient the opportunity to grasp key points. This creates confusion, and the patient becomes frustrated. Therefore, resentment leads to conflict between the patient and the doctor’s results.

Different customer service techniques, tools, and skills can be used to resolve the conflict. The first technique is listening to the patient’s grievances. After listening to the patient, his grievances should be summarized and repeated by the personnel involved in conflict resolution (Jokanović, 2018). This makes the patient feel that his grievances have been understood. After listening, an acknowledgment must be made to demonstrate that the patient has been heard and understood.

The next technique is taking responsibility. Responsibility entails making personal stances rather than involving the patient. Empathy should be demonstrated when taking responsibility. The next technique is exploration. It entails exploring the viewpoints of the conflicting parties (Gren & Lenberg, 2018). The doctor involved should be contacted. This will make the patient feel that his grievances are being addressed. If the doctor’s actions are right, they should be explained to the patient and ensure that he understands them. Compromises are the other technique that can be used. Compromises can be made after discussing the doctor’s decision with the patient and his family. The patient’s opinion is sought. This leads to conflict management since the patient will be satisfied with the final decision. The customer service tool applied in this scenario is discussion forums involving the conflicting parties.

Excellent customer service is important for this conflict. It will make the patient satisfied with the final decision. This will make him take his medications as instructed by the doctor and follow all recommendations. By so doing, the patient is most likely to recover from his illness and have a good quality of life. Excellent customer service is also good for the health care organization. It represents the organization’s values and brand image. The patient is most likely to visit the hospital in the future because of the excellent services. Furthermore, the patient and his family members are most likely to refer other people to healthcare organizations. It also serves as a marketing point that the healthcare organization can use to maintain a competitive advantage over its competitors.

Healthcare provider-patient conflicts commonly occur in the healthcare setting. The trigger factors need to be identified, and the conflict resolved promptly. Customer service tools, techniques, and skills, such as listening to the patient, can be used during conflict resolution. Excellent customer service is beneficial to the patient and the healthcare facility.

References.

Gren, L., & Lenberg, P. (2018). The importance of conflict resolution techniques in autonomous agile teams. ACM International Conference Proceeding Series, Part F147763. https://doi.org/10.1145/3234152.3234185

Jokanović, B. (2018). Organizational Conflict. Organizational Conflict, 446–451. https://doi.org/10.5772/intechopen.69420

Song, J. (2018). Application of social contradiction analysis in the conflict between physicians and patients. 1(2), 40. https://doi.org/10.12032/life2018-0811-002

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