Strive to take care of your seniors with these techniques.

When an ophthalmic practice works with ocular diseases, such as cataract, age-related macular degeneration, or glaucoma, it likely sees many elderly patients. While some people age more gracefully than others, many seniors eventually experience challenges like memory loss and failed motor skills. Senior patients can also have systemic health issues that directly affect vision and quality of life. Given this, it’s clear that our aging population requires a unique approach to customer service. Make their experience in your office the highlight of their week by implementing the techniques below.

1. Use humor

With any complex, serious topic — such as healthcare — humor can bring levity, which helps people feel more at ease. When working with your older patient population, try to subtly acknowledge their situation by injecting humor. For example, you might use self-deprecating humor to demonstrate that you too forget things or make mistakes. Helping people laugh, despite their anxiety and potential pain, can be an extraordinary gift to patient well-being.

2. Show empathy

Using empathy — the ability to understand or share the feelings of another — can help you imagine what your patients feel during the aging process. For instance, a manager invited her team to participate in a team-building exercise with the goal to teach staff members appreciation for the vision and mobility issues their patients face. Once participants put on winter gloves and thick glasses to recreate those limitations, the manager handed staff a wallet stuffed with papers and told them to find the insurance card in the billfold. While team members laughed as they struggled with the task, they understood the point — many of their patients show up with disabilities, making a simple task, such as finding their insurance card, challenging. It also taught them that their customer service approach needs to match their patients’ abilities and requirements. Whenever possible, offer patients the benefit of the doubt.

3. Show respect

Pope Francis once shared: “Where there is no honor for the elderly, there is no hope for the young.” This sentiment illustrates the importance of showing respect to your older patients. One of the more frustrating ways youth show disrespect is by making patients feel dumb when they do not know certain facts or become confused easily. To correct, establish a rapport with the older population by showing compassion, clarity, and competence.

You also can support elderly patients by flexing your communication style to meet their needs. If you can tell patients are in pain or having a hard day, meet them with a kind word. If they are grumpy, be kind and take care of them quickly.

4. Understand your business

Though many eye-care practices serve a large senior population, your office will often see other generations for medical care, routine eye exams, and refractive surgery. To best meet your patients’ needs, review the demographics for your group. This data can be found by running reports in your practice management software and identifying your patients and their age brackets.

Once you have this information, ensure your practice focuses on the needs and preferences of each age bracket. If your business has patients mostly 55 and older, you may want to reach out more often by phone. Research published in the Educational Gerontology found that, for older adults, phone calls are the most frequently adopted mode of communication, with face-to-face conversations being most preferable.

Additionally, when designing materials for patient education, consider multi-generational preferences. Senior patients registering for cataract surgery may select printed copies about the procedure, while their son or daughter attending the appointment might prefer online access to educational materials. Create multiple touchpoints to inform patients about their surgery options.

5. Adjust music

As you learn more about your patient demographics, evaluate the atmosphere of your clinic. Music can really set the tone for your practice. The power of music is implied in this funny quote from the book I Thought Growing Old Would Take Longer, “Am I getting old, or is the grocery store playing great music these days?” Depending on your generational mix, select streaming services and play music for the decades. Change up the channels to provide a fun and relaxed atmosphere.

Embrace the rewards

Assisting older patients can bring many rewards to caregivers, including the knowledge that you are honoring the elderly during this phase of life. To reap these benefits, strive to take the best care of your seniors by making them laugh, demonstrating empathy and respect, learning more about your patient population, and playing some music. You’ll have better, happier patients in the end. OP

Ms. Monroe is a senior consultant with BSM Consulting in Phoenix, AZ. Ms. Monroe specializes in helping practices with operations, planning, customer service, and HR.