'Doctor Shoppers' and the Membership-Based Model

At Origins Incubator, we love working through ideas and discoveries together. Our recent discussion demonstrates how we really cover all the aspects of patient care, business management, and legal management, all wrapped in one program. Not only did we just cover, for example, clinical management of migraines, but we also dealt with how we all deal with this personality type that you might call “Doctor Shoppers.” 

Doctor Shoppers

“Doctor Shoppers” are the ones who have seen seven to eight functional providers right there in your own backyard. We often see these patients come in over and over because they are just taking to heart a small portion of the guidance they have received. They want a little of this, and they don't want to do everything. They take bits and pieces, and they come back for their next appointment. They say, “Oh, I did some of that, but not all of that might work for me, and my friend tried this other thing, and I also read online that….” So, we're left with this person who ultimately is really thinking very hard on their health, but struggling to figure out how to stay on track and really dig into a singular approach. 

Membership Model

Again, this is one of the things that is so useful about the membership model. People don't just kind of float and waver when they know that they have five appointments and they have set touch points with you. It means that it gives us a much better opportunity than the way appointments are traditionally set up or established to really make sure we're pulling them back in, really anchoring them, and getting them to that endpoint. 

Dealing With the Patient

When I deal with a patient like this, I try to think, just like with any condition, “What's at the root cause of why they're out there, shopping around and not really digging into a singular approach, and overall really wanting to get better, but somehow scattering themselves through so many choices that they can't really get serious?” 

Chaos Theory

One of the things that we talked about was something known as Chaos Theory. It is the idea that some people in their past have used chaos as a coping mechanism. One idea might be, from the patient's history, to figure out if that's appropriate to them, even asking them, “Do you think that you use chaos as a strategy for dealing with things?” 

Simpler the Better

Another piece is just being highly directive with a patient like this and as simple as possible. Usually, in a functional medicine approach, we're asking people to do a lot of things, and the endpoints can sometimes be vague. So, we need to make sure we're really clear about that, telling them, “We are going to focus on the intensity of your headache, your sleep schedule, and decreasing carbohydrates from your diet. Here are the ways we're going to measure each of those things.” Whether it's a specific questionnaire that you then have them fill out or having them chart every day what they're doing with their diet, they will really get engaged in their health care like they want to be, but in a way that's productive rather than potentially self-sabotaging.

Education, Education, Education

We talked about how in this situation, I first like to remind patients that we are doing treatments, at least for a couple of reasons, and feeling better is only one of those reasons. That's true. That's the primary reason. But in addition to improving what's going on, the second reason that we want to diagnose, that we want to do various treatments, is because it will tell us what's going on in the patient. Even if they don't have improvement from it, it allows us to rule out that line of thinking as a reason why they're feeling worse or not doing well.

I remind them that unless they're very specific with what we're trying to do, we won't be able to evaluate as well, in terms of not only how they're doing, but also, “Was this the correct diagnostic approach?” And so ultimately, education, education, education is always our best tool to deal with what's going on, really telling somebody multiple reasons why we're asking them to be engaged in this way. 

Migraines, Areas of Focus, & Supplements

Then, in our group discussion, we went on to talk about things like migraines, and we shared various areas of focus, as well as supportive supplements that we've all utilized and seem to be helpful. 

Conclusion

At Origins Incubator, we work to get to all of the pieces of the puzzle that we deal as practitioners. Not only are we addressing the actual clinical manifestation of what somebody is experiencing, but also their motivation, their style of being, and how they're interacting with the outside world. All of these can be obstacles on their way to becoming healthy, and ultimately, really seeing the value of something like a membership-based practice in terms of getting people to where they are is key to the functional medicine approach.