Brummitt Group

Amanda Brummitt had so much fun catching up with Sarah Matt MD, MBA on The Clinical Realist podcast about her favorite topic.....Patient Experience. We grateful that Dr. Matt cares enough about patient experience to really dig into it, because this is a topic that too often gets dismissed as a soft metric when it is actually a margin driver, a retention imperative, and the thing many AI rollouts forget.

A few things from the conversation that every healthcare leader needs to know:
-Patients are shopping, and they are usually doing it on their worst days. In any specialty with competition, there are a ton of things that can go wrong before a patient ever reaches the exam room.
-The first phone call matters more than almost anything else. A warm, calm human who answers questions, even for the sixth time, is often the difference between a scheduled appointment and a patient who says they will call back and never does.
-Friction accumulates by accident. No one sets out to make care hard to access. If you want to see it, secret shop your practice. You'll be shocked.
-Technology should be built for patients, not just the organization. If you are going to call it patient experience, test it on patients. If it did not make their life easier, call it what it really is.
-Embrace AI rather than shame it. Patients are using Dr. Google, Dr. Claude, and Dr. ChatGPT either way. Give them trusted prompts and trusted resources so the conversation happens with you instead of around you.
-And the part leaders cannot ignore: it is cheaper to keep the patients you have happy than to throw forty thousand dollars at marketing while they walk out the back door. Watch your no-show rate and your patient attrition. Those numbers tell the truth.

Thank you, Dr. Matt, for the thoughtful questions and for caring about this work the way you do. Worth a listen if you lead a practice or health system.

Why Health Systems Keep Getting Patient Experience Wrong | Amanda Brummitt, FACHE Patient experience gets treated as a soft metric. Amanda Brummitt, ...

Understanding patient experience starts long before the exam room, especially for families dealing with chronic and complex illnesses. It begins on the phone, in voicemail messages, in appointment reminders, and at the front desk.

So, if you want to improve retention and referrals, start by understanding what patients, parents, and caregivers are carrying when they walk through your door. Keeping existing patients and referrers happy is more efficient than constantly finding new patients.

🗒️ Start With Your Front Desk

Front desk roles are some of the hardest jobs in healthcare.

They manage intake, insurance verification, scheduling, phone calls, rescheduling, upset patients and parents, late arrivals, and clinic delays. They are often expected to move quickly while maintaining warmth and accuracy.

If you’ve never worked the front desk, sit with your team for a day and just watch, listen, and observe. How often do the phones ring while a family is checking in? How frequently must staff switch between systems? Do tense conversations escalate when schedules run behind? What could make their job simpler and the patient’s experience better?

Ask your team:

What is most stressful about interacting with patients and parents?

What makes intake hard?

What questions do you wish you had answers to?

What do parents say that you do not know how to respond to?

Common answers often include:

“I don’t know how to explain insurance rules.”

“Parents get frustrated when I can’t give exact wait times.”

“I don’t know what to say when a child is having a meltdown.”

These conversations reveal friction points that leadership may not see.

Support staff with:

Scripts for difficult conversations

Quick-reference insurance guides

Escalation pathways

Permission to pause and reset

🗒️ The Actual Front Desk or Window

Whether it is a literal check-in window or the first human interaction, ask:

Do families feel seen and acknowledged?

Not processed, rushed, or dismiss. Rather, seen.

If there is a literal check-in window, keep it open. Always. Creating a physical barrier between patients and staff closes communication.

Professional presentation reinforces trust:

Visible name tags

Clean uniforms

Neutral scents

Organized spaces

End with sincere farewells: “We’re glad you came in today. Travel safely.” or “We look forward to seeing you next week. Can’t wait to hear how that school project went.”

Parent and patient experience is not a single initiative.

It is a series of small, consistent behaviors.

Empathy.

Clarity.

Warmth.

Preparation.

Follow-through.

If you need help mapping your patient journey, scripting challenging conversations, or training your team, we are glad to support you. Because families do not remember your policies. They remember how you made them feel.