hey
On my community physiotherapy placement at the moment i've had to take a lot of different group exercise classes. This has meant that i have had to use clear communication and instruct people (all above the age 60 years) while still being polite and maintaining my professionalism.
The trickiest thing so far has been able to gain the respect of the clients, so that they will listen, but also having a friendly and happy attitude so they will enjoy the class and continue to listen. This is a similar situation that occurs on all pracs. No matter what placement you always have to gain respect from the patient but also develop rapport. However it is more important to do this in group classes because instead of having only one patient's attention you need to gain 20 patients attention at once. You only have to have one or two patients who don't respect you to disrupt a whole class.
While i was taking a class a few days ago i was instructing the clients in some strengthening exercises. There were a few murmurs coming from one old lady. She was complaining saying the exercise was hurting her knees a little bit. She didn't appear to be in any great trouble. Everyone else was getting on with the exercise without complaints and she was making a bit of a kafuffle.
I explained to the lady nicely how the exercise would help and to continue doing the exercise if she could manage it, i also gave her a slightly easy abridged version of the exercise she could adopt. She responded by saying she had "old knees" and that if i had her knees i wouldn't be able to do the exercise either. I then overheard her say to the person next to her ..."he'd be all of 17!" Referring to the fact that it must be simple for me with my young knees.
I didn't take too much notice of her comment at the time but later on i've started thinking about this. Even though i had tried so hard to gain respect from the class, it was obvious that one of the class members still didn't take me seriously because of the age she thought i was. The main worry about this that i have is i will be 24 years old in 2 months and also as an imminent new grad stepping out into the physiotherapy workforce i want to be able to be able to have my patients respect me and be taken seriously, even with the older generation clients.
Has anyone else experienced anything similar to this situation? Any thoughts on this? Hopefully by continuing to gain rapport with patients and maintaining a positive and professional attitude i will be taken seriously over time.
3 comments:
Hey Kev, there have been a few situations I have been in where patients don’t want to listen to what I have to say because they thought that because I am a student I don’t know what I’m talking about. That’s their problem.
I think all we can do as students and new grads is to be as professional as possible, try to develop rapport and respect. I think if we can communicate well, it gives the impression that be are confident in what we are saying and know what we are talking about (even if you don’t know what you are talking about). I have found that to be a big difference with patients who may question our knowledge or abilities. If we do our best to be professional, and deal with patients to the best of our ability and they still want to be disrespectful to us then that’s their problem not ours.
It is so much different to teach others how to do something than to do it on your own! I experienced this as a step aerobics and fit ball instructor. Describing things in a way for a group of people to understand is tough! Gaining rapport... a whole new ball game!
I have learned through my nursing career that gaining rapport means leaving yourself in the background and putting others on front stage. This means giving them your undivided attention, putting yourself in their shoes and truly listening and responding to everything they are saying, doing and feeling. You will notice that two people who like each other have bodies that almost mimic each other while two people who are fighting have body movements that are opposing without similarities. Gaining rapport uses those same techniques. If you match your body language, voice and emotions to the person you are trying to gain rapport with, there can be a subconscious attraction where like is attracted to like :)
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