Communicating Choices: Supporting Confident Decisions in Veterinary Care

This episode is sponsored by Nationwide.

Happy Client Service Representative Week. Client service representatives (CSRs) are such a crucial part of the clinic, and we are excited to celebrate and recognize them for the true heroes they are.

In recognition of CSR Week, check out this episode of The Vet Blast Podcast presented by dvm360 with special guest Emily M. Tincher, DVM. Throughout the episode, Tincher and our host, Adam Christman, DVM, MBA, discuss the importance of a team approach when it comes to veterinary medicine, especially the role of CSRs when it comes to financial conversations and overall pet care plans. The duo highlights recent data regarding veterinary visits, the need for nonjudgmental communication when talking to clients, and more.

Below is a partial transcript, edited lightly for clarity.

Adam Christman, DVM, MBA: We know finances can be such a barrier that we're trying to overcome. It's difficult out there, and I wonder, you know, and we don't want them to feel guilty, that's a big thing that we talk about when we talk about spectrum care in general. There's a lot of different areas that we're in chat about with this, but when you're offering a range of care options from basic to advanced, how do you explain those trade-offs, such as outcomes, risk, costs that we just talked about, and next steps in a way that doesn't make them feel so pressured or feeling that guilt?

Emily M. Tincher, DVM: I love that question. There are so many pieces to that. What we do in the exam room is challenging, pulling together so many skills. One of the most important things we can do is make sure that the pet families we're serving—whether they would choose the level of care that we would or whether they opt for a different plan and work on us with that—don't feel judged. We want them to come back and feel like they can tell us when they're uncomfortable, or they can tell us when they have financial constraints. And so I think about what is the published definition of a spectrum of care? How do we meet pet families where they are and contextualize the pet in front of us and the person in front of us? There are 3 pieces to that.

First, we have to work at saying, how do we understand what pet family goals, values, and resources are, and we've done some research at Nationwide [pet insurance] to help understand not everyone is looking for the same level of care. We experience that when we talk to pet families, but it's a good reminder for the entire team to say, OK, help me understand what some of your goals are, and very early on, help me understand what the finances are. Even in pretriage, preappointment forms, when we know that pets are coming in a little bit harder, sometimes with emergency situations, but asking, does your pet have pet insurance? Do you potentially need financial assistance for anything that might come up in a particular appointment setting, especially when things get more expensive, when they start talking about surgery, chronic care, or emergency care?

And then, how do we take those goals, those values that we've gained from our expanded medical and family history? How do we look at the evidence-based medicine in front of us and say, OK, I can come up with a couple of treatment plans depending on what's going on, we'll talk about an example in just a moment, and then how do I communicate back to your question, nonjudgmentally, about what those options are, while we make sure that we give informed consent. There are always trade-offs—everything from advanced-level care to basic level of care. The trade-offs in time, cost, and convenience will always be there, and the medical outcomes pieces are so important, and so I know near and dear to your heart are dachshunds, that I know you've had a few intervertebral disc problems recently.

Christman: I feel like one of them's back is made out of taffy. But yes, it's a very common thing that we see. And I was chatting with other pet owners, other dachshund owners, in the waiting room, about this issue. And you'll appreciate this. You don't know this. Actually, I'm going to tell you right now that the 4 of us that were waiting, we all had pet insurance because we knew about intervertebral disease, and obviously, I'm a veterinarian, but the other 3 weren't. And I asked them, how did you know about pet insurance? And [one of them] said, well, we researched, and my veterinarian recommended it at the time of the puppy visit.

Tincher: Oh, that's great.

Christman: So I feel like we’re getting there.