Re: Symantics!
Stan LaCount
Description
Collection
Title:
Re: Symantics!
Creator:
Stan LaCount
Date:
10/13/2000
Text:
Joe; to you it's just semantics. To some amputees, being called a PATIENT
is demeaning. Your clinical experience in the medical environment led you
to call your customers patients, but if you look the word up in enough
sources you will see that your customers are really clients, not patients.
Too many O&P practitioners use the word patient incorrectly and a lot of
them act and dress like little Doctor wannabes too. This does not endear
them to the medical profession nor to some clients. Unless you are a nurse
or a doctor you have no patients and the average O&P client is not sick or
coming to you for medical treatment. You write no prescriptions, dispense
no medicine (I hope), and perform no surgery.
People come to a hardware store for help and expect services to be performed
in a caring
professional manner too. A beautician doesn't call her clients patients and
neither do shoe salesmen or custom carpenters and boatbuilders. Why must
you? I would hope that 33 years would have taught you that things do indeed
change. Political correctness has been foisted on us all so just get used
to it and lets get on with the business of building legs. That patients
rights plaque hanging in your waiting room is going to your head Joe. Wake
up and smell the coffee.
Whether to sell them what they want or what they need is a better question
and has no easy answer but with all your experience I'm sure you'll figure
it out. As far as letting the work go out the door before it has been paid
for, I'm sure most of it has been paid for long before it is truly finished
if you know what I mean, wink, wink, nudge, nudge.
Stan LaCount PRE
----- Original Message -----
From: Joe Carideo < <Email Address Redacted> >
To: < <Email Address Redacted> >
Sent: Friday, October 13, 2000 9:37 AM
Subject: Paralympic Coverage and Symantics!
> Not sure this went through the first time so here it is again.
>
> Even when trying to inform folks and do something nice, people have an
> overwhelming tendancy to find things wrong! Thank you so much for the
lesson
> in symantics.
>
> From this day forward, shall I treat all who walk through my doors as
> customers purchasing an item? Shall I demand payment in full for services
> rendered prior to them leaving my office or impose a mechanic's lien?
Should
> I expect them to come in with prescription in hand or can I sell them
> whatever they want? If I did, I imagine I would be hearing from the law
firm
> of Dewey, Screwem, and Howe real fast!
>
> This is not a soda shoppe or a hardware store, this is an office where
> . I absolutely consider all who come in my office as
> people first, NOT CUSTOMERS! As a healthcare provider, I administer the
care
> and concern my PATIENTS deserve and expect. I have done so for over 33
years
> and I imagine will continue for hopefully a long time.
>
> I'm spelling things wrong - so it's time to stop writing!
>
> Nufsed,
>
> Joseph F. Carideo, CP, LP, FAAOP
>
> -----Original Message-----
> From: Kimberley Barreda
> To: Joe Carideo
> Sent: 10/9/00 6:04 PM
> Subject: Re: Paralympic Coverage
>
> Hello
>
> FYI
>
> Amputees are never patients of prosthetists.
>
> We are your customers
>
> Have a great day.
>
>
is demeaning. Your clinical experience in the medical environment led you
to call your customers patients, but if you look the word up in enough
sources you will see that your customers are really clients, not patients.
Too many O&P practitioners use the word patient incorrectly and a lot of
them act and dress like little Doctor wannabes too. This does not endear
them to the medical profession nor to some clients. Unless you are a nurse
or a doctor you have no patients and the average O&P client is not sick or
coming to you for medical treatment. You write no prescriptions, dispense
no medicine (I hope), and perform no surgery.
People come to a hardware store for help and expect services to be performed
in a caring
professional manner too. A beautician doesn't call her clients patients and
neither do shoe salesmen or custom carpenters and boatbuilders. Why must
you? I would hope that 33 years would have taught you that things do indeed
change. Political correctness has been foisted on us all so just get used
to it and lets get on with the business of building legs. That patients
rights plaque hanging in your waiting room is going to your head Joe. Wake
up and smell the coffee.
Whether to sell them what they want or what they need is a better question
and has no easy answer but with all your experience I'm sure you'll figure
it out. As far as letting the work go out the door before it has been paid
for, I'm sure most of it has been paid for long before it is truly finished
if you know what I mean, wink, wink, nudge, nudge.
Stan LaCount PRE
----- Original Message -----
From: Joe Carideo < <Email Address Redacted> >
To: < <Email Address Redacted> >
Sent: Friday, October 13, 2000 9:37 AM
Subject: Paralympic Coverage and Symantics!
> Not sure this went through the first time so here it is again.
>
> Even when trying to inform folks and do something nice, people have an
> overwhelming tendancy to find things wrong! Thank you so much for the
lesson
> in symantics.
>
> From this day forward, shall I treat all who walk through my doors as
> customers purchasing an item? Shall I demand payment in full for services
> rendered prior to them leaving my office or impose a mechanic's lien?
Should
> I expect them to come in with prescription in hand or can I sell them
> whatever they want? If I did, I imagine I would be hearing from the law
firm
> of Dewey, Screwem, and Howe real fast!
>
> This is not a soda shoppe or a hardware store, this is an office where
> . I absolutely consider all who come in my office as
> people first, NOT CUSTOMERS! As a healthcare provider, I administer the
care
> and concern my PATIENTS deserve and expect. I have done so for over 33
years
> and I imagine will continue for hopefully a long time.
>
> I'm spelling things wrong - so it's time to stop writing!
>
> Nufsed,
>
> Joseph F. Carideo, CP, LP, FAAOP
>
> -----Original Message-----
> From: Kimberley Barreda
> To: Joe Carideo
> Sent: 10/9/00 6:04 PM
> Subject: Re: Paralympic Coverage
>
> Hello
>
> FYI
>
> Amputees are never patients of prosthetists.
>
> We are your customers
>
> Have a great day.
>
>
Citation
Stan LaCount, “Re: Symantics!,” Digital Resource Foundation for Orthotics and Prosthetics, accessed November 5, 2024, https://library.drfop.org/items/show/215206.
