Adrienne Boissy, MD, a practicing neurologist and Cleveland Clinic's former chief experience officer, has been in healthcare for 20 years, but as is the case with so many professionals in the field, COVID-19 reshaped how she viewed the patient experience and her role as a provider.
Recognizing that as she has experienced many changes and overcome challenges since the onset of the pandemic both professionally and personally, Dr. Boissy detailed some of her takeaways from the last few years to help guide other patient experience professionals in a Qualtrics blog post.
- Be brave — Dr. Boissy writes that for healthcare professionals, this can simply emulate reflective listening and compassion.
- Chase your joy — This can look different for everyone, of course, but specifically, she explains that it is important to understand "when we find ourselves in environments that ask us to compromise our values — like choosing scores over people — that moral distress gets created and, over time, burnout. We have to find the joy or move on."
- Lift — Rather than physically lifting heavy things, Dr. Boissy stresses the importance of lifting one another up in the healthcare profession and finding ways to incorporate gratitude for yourself and your colleagues day to day.
- Define everything — By defining your own metrics of patient experience, Dr. Boissy explains that metrics like teamwork, empathy, safety, and ease with billing or telehealth services all matter to track because they are "holistic metrics that matter to actual humans," she writes.
- Be weird — Likely not a traditional guideline you may expect from a seasoned patient experience professional, but Dr. Boissy details that being human and watching experiences patients go through does affect every professional in some way, and it's okay to allow it to. "If we as empathy amplifiers don’t lead the way by modeling compassion to our colleagues and selves, we contribute to the sharp pain of suffering that is invisible, unknown, and carried alone. So, harness your weird. Your creativity. People need us," Dr. Boissy concludes.