Empathetic listening for clinicians
All right. How are you feeling today?
Hey guys, it's Doctor Sai here from osmosis. And today we're gonna talk about empathetic listening.
It's something that's made a huge difference in my own life as I've taken care of lots of patients. And I want to tell you a few tips and tricks that I think might help you.
Uh as you become a, a clinician or if you're already a clinician, uh things to practice it, certainly things uh that I practice, you know, every day, the goal of lying the point around it or why it matters is that when you're getting a story from someone when they're telling you kind of what happened, uh Those are the facts of the story, you wanna connect intellectually and understand, you know, exactly uh what brought them to you.
But you also want to connect on uh an emotional level. You want to understand what the experience of those facts uh was like for them.
And the reason that that's so important is that you really want to get into their headspace so that when you're giving advice or when you're trying to understand what would be the next best step, you're really locked up with that person with that patient.
Uh And you're thinking about it in the same way, they would be thinking about it. So that emotional piece is really important for that reason.
And so it really is uh helpful to do a, a few things. Uh The first thing I think that can help you with empathetic listening is reading emotions, is understanding what a person is thinking uh and feeling uh by looking at them observing them.
So, for example, you might notice that, you know, as a telling a story, they're sort of, you know, sitting back, maybe they're sort of uh distracted.
Um Maybe there's something else on their mind and that would be a good thing to ask and say, hey, you know what I'm curious, uh Is there something that's on your mind that you want to talk about?
You seem a little bit distracted, they're looking away. And so that's a good segue to ask that question.
You might also observe that they're sort of looking down, maybe they're feeling a little depressed, maybe they're, you know, kind of on edge, sort of like fidgety or, you know, anxious sometimes, uh all those things, you know, you can kind of pick up on them or read them through your own feelings.
So one piece of advice around reading emotions is how do you feel, you know, sometimes before walking into a room, I'll do a quick check in and then I'll sort of go into the room and I'll notice, hey, I feel a little depressed, feels a little down.
And so then you can kind of bring your own energy down a little bit and try to resonate with that person and say, hey, you know, what are you feeling down?
Because, um, because I sense that, uh, you can also do another thing which is, uh, have, if you notice something, have a person leave the room.
I've done that with, uh, you know, young teenage girls. Well, where I'll ask, you know, mom or dad to leave the room.
And so I'll have the parent leave and say, hey, you know what, uh why don't you tell me what happened in your own words?
I wanna hear it from you. And so doing that is actually pretty helpful at really uh understanding what their experience is like.
OK. Number two, I would suggest trying to withhold judgment.
You know, this is something that every human being has a tendency to, to pass judgments in, in various ways. And it's important to try to recognize that reflex that you might have or that, that tendency.
And really when you go into a room and talk to someone try to withhold judgment. So as much as you can, uh start by recognizing it and there are lots of groups out there that, that suffer uh because of the judgments that are passed on them.
You know, I'll just name a few. Uh, probably one that, that jumps out at me right now is women.
So when women, uh, often go and talk about their problems, uh, with physicians, uh, there's, there's often a gender bias and classically it's when a woman, uh, is telling, uh, a male doctor or a man about her, her issue, um, there is this gender bias, it's called, you know, medical misogyny where she's basically trivialized or her concerns are brushed aside, you know, and, uh, and that can be extremely frustrating and angering, uh, you know, being in those shoes, imagine that you're, you're, you're dealing with an issue.
Oftentimes it's something that's subjective. Maybe it's something like pain or fatigue or something like that and you're coming to a physician to try to get it resolved and, and as a woman you're being told that, oh, it's, it's really, you know, maybe not these direct words, but it's in your head.
You're just kind of making it up, you just got to suck it up and, and deal with it. Um, that's, that's really frustrating and a lot of women deal with that.
Unfortunately. So again, that's, that's a type of judgment that's being passed.
Other groups suffer from this as well. So, for example, uh, classically, uh, African Americans that have sickle cell anemia, uh, it's, it's very well documented.
They're not treated, uh, for their pain in the same way that, that other people are treated for their pain. So oftentimes they, they don't get the right pain, pain medications, they have to wait a long time in the emergency department or in the hospital to get their pain dealt with.
And that's another type of, of bias or judgment that's being passed. Um, other groups that deal with this, you know, the homeless population, uh, substance abusers, LGBTQ, I mean, there's so many groups, uh, the incarcerated population that deal with this incredible judgment that gets passed on them as they, as they walk in the door.
And that's really the, the issue. Like when someone walks into your office again, if you're gonna try to practice empath listening, you really can't have this giant barrier of, of judgment that's gonna kind of really inhibit you from getting, getting across and talking to someone, uh, as a human being.
So just recognize that you might have some of these stereotypes in your mind, but when you're in that room, try to put that outside and, and really recognize that there's a person in front of you.
Third II really want to talk about the, the flip side of that is, you know, if you're not gonna be, uh, judge, uh, what are you gonna be?
You're gonna be curious. And so I want you to really, uh, try to focus on getting curious and getting curious is, is important because, you know, it really forces you to be in someone's footsteps and say, you know, for example, if, if a person says, you know, I've been to three physicians for this problem and I've been told, uh Xy and Z and I'm really confused, you know, at that moment, you can kind of step in and say, hey, wait, wait a second.
You know, you've been to three different physicians for this problem. That's frustrating.
You know, I can't even imagine how challenging that that must be to hear that, you know, maybe you're hearing different things or maybe you're hearing the same thing in the sense of like, you know, your problem doesn't matter, but it matters to me and I'm sorry that that experience happened to you.
So part of getting curious is getting into someone's footsteps and trying to feel what they must be feeling. So, really extending yourself and, and truly, truly stepping outside of your own shoes and into someone else's, it's a hard exercise and it's something that I struggle with and, and many people struggle with every day and So that's why it's something that you wanna keep practicing and getting better and better at, as time goes on, all these things, you know, reading, emotions, withholding judgment, getting curious, these things take a lot out of you.
And as a clinician, as time goes on, you might find that you're getting a little irritable or you might be getting a little judgmental even though you don't want to or you might start noticing that you are short with people.
If you're noticing these things, recognize that it's, it's OK uh in the sense that it's, it's normal to feel that way. And I want you to take a step back and give yourself a little bit of time to recuperate, you know, fill your own cup and say, hey, I'm going to uh take a moment for myself.
Maybe you need a weekend off or sometimes people take a week off or take a holiday or whatever it is, but to really fill your cup up and only then can you go, go back and then say, OK, I'm ready to, to be the best physician or clinician I can be.
Um And, and do those things that I know I should be doing. So again, II don't wanna chastise people for doing these things because it's, it's normal to do them from time to time.
But really recognizing it and saying, hey, you know, to be an empathetic listener, I can't be, you know, judging people.
Uh that's not appropriate. So I need to take a moment for myself to, to kind of heal the healer as it were.
So, anyway, I hope that helps. That's um that's something that uh is really near uh and dear to my heart.
And so II um hope that's something that you can uh find value in as well. Take care.
Bye bye. Start your free trial today at osmosis.org.
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