Just Be Honest

Three of my doctors are leaving the practice because they are moving out of the area. We have to assign their patients to new doctors but since we are so short staffed we have no open slots. We hired a new doctor to start on June 1st and she will need at least a week to see how we work. Patients have been calling and the doctors are afraid to call back and say that for the next few weeks there will be no therapy sessions. Considering that they are doctors, they should have the skills to explain this to the people that are calling. Yesterday an irate patient called and I happened to pick up the phone. She was yelling that no one has called her back. Instead of making up excuses or glossing over the problem, I just told her the truth. We are short staffed and have no idea who will be her new doctor, but by the second week of June she will have one. I told her that we are upset that this has happened but we are in a mess and have to dig out of it. I told the plain truth. After I told her, she said that she understood and would be glad to wait. She did not know why she was not told this two weeks ago as she would have been fine with it. What she was not fine with was having her calls ignored. I agreed with her and told her that I would have been angry too. We ended the conversation laughing. Things are simpler when you tell the truth.