EQ in Healthcare
IQ (Intelligence quotient) is something which all of us aspire for and strive to improve upon it. People with high IQ work intelligently and the output for such individuals comes from the brain. EQ (Emotional quotient) comes from the heart and those with high EQ function differently from those with high IQ. While employees with high IQ are required for success, it is often insufficient in isolation. Healthcare institutions would benefit tremendously from employees who have an optimal mix of IQ and EQ.
While IQ helps in doing the right thing smartly, EQ makes one do it with a heart. It adds an emotion to doing the right thing and it is this emotion which makes a huge difference in healthcare. A patient could go home cured of the illness or the patient can go home with a cure and an experience that he or she would remember for life. People come to hospitals with a problem and they always have an emotional distress associated with it. IQ helps solve the clinical problem and EQ helps solve the emotional distress. With healthcare becoming commoditized, EQ is gradually losing its importance and managing a patient is becoming more mechanical.
This is leading to a stressed doctor – patient relationship which is the major cause of eroding trust in our healthcare system. One of the immediate challenges is to regain the trust of the community and for this enhancing EQ in the healthcare environment is critical. There could be other factors like transparency in care, a payment mechanism which creates the perception of delivering ‘value’ for the amount charged and living up to the expectations of the patients, but the most important factor is the EQ. However, EQ is often not recognized as an important ingredient for deliver results in healthcare and healthcare professionals are not incentivized for doing their job with the their heart.
I am not sure whether I have been able to convince the readers about the importance of EQ with what I have articulated so far. I will attempt to bring some clarity with an example. Let us take the case of an 80 year old man who had a knee replacement surgery. The surgery has gone well, he has recovered well post-operatively and is ready for discharge. The doctor in his discharge advise has recommended physiotherapy at home after discharge. The patient asks the doctor if there is a facility for home physiotherapy. The concerned hospital does not have this facility so the doctor tells the patient “no there is no home physiotherapy facility, find someone close to you house and get it done”. This doctor has done his job perfectly in doing the joint replacement, but the parting statement of fend for yourself at home creates stress in the mind of the patient and the patient is going home with this new found emotional stress. On the other hand if the doctor had said “we do not offer home physiotherapy, but I will connect you to a physiotherapist and will make sure he will take care of you at home”, the patient is going home with a completely different mindset. If the doctor goes a little further and makes a call to the patient on the 2nd day of discharge to enquire about the status of the patient and how the physiotherapist is doing, it would take the patient experience to the next level and with it the trust between the patient and doctor goes up manifold. This is the difference EQ could make in healthcare.
Healthcare organizations must create an environment where EQ becomes part of the DNA of every employee. This starts from employing the right people who have the clinical skill sets amd experience but also adequate EQ to incentivizing and recognizing employees who exhibit the highest EQ in the organization at regular intervals. The organization must empower the employees to go beyond the call of their duty and do everything possible to appreciate patient needs (beyond clinical needs) and address them. This is an investment that organizations must make and return on investments into EQ are far higher than any other component in healthcare.
I strongly advocate a ‘patient experience officer’ in every healthcare organization and the simple task of this person is to create an environment where employees work with their heart and patients perceive this service and carry the fragrance of it long after they have left the hospital.