Author Archives Michael Broek

What is empathy?

Empathy is “the ability to understand and share the feelings of another.” It is recognizing someone’s fears, frustrations, and feelings and feeling with them. In other words, it is putting yourself in another’s shoes. Empathy is often confused with sympathy, but the distinction is important. Sympathy is when you have an emotional response to a person’s suffering, but you do not try to understand and feel their pain. With sympathy, you may feel sad for that person, but there is still a kind of detachment that is not present with empathy. Empathy is more of a skill rather than simply an emotional response, one that can be learned and improved upon over time. Those in healthcare can use empathetic understanding to provide the most effective, individualized care for each patient.  

What does empathy look like in healthcare, and how can you ensure it is at the core of your practice?

Empathy in healthcare is identifying how a person really feels, seeing the situation through their eyes, and making an informed decision about the best treatment plan. Taking into account the uniqueness of each patient, and their individual needs and concerns ensures that you are able to provide them with the best possible solution. Understand the patients fears and frustrations in order to understand how best to help them. Keep in mind that how a person is really feeling is displayed just as much in a person’s nonverbal communication, body language, and demeanor as in what they say. Pay attention to more than just what they say to tune into how they are truly feeling. Empathy in healthcare requires attentive listening and being open to criticism and feedback. Have patients take an outpatient survey, and take how you made your patient feel seriously. It is true that people come to the doctor for a solution to the problem, but they also want to feel heard, listened to, and respected. The key, simply put, is to give the patient your whole attention.

Does an empathetic approach really improve patient outcome?

Studies confirm, yes! You can check out a few of them here. The numerous studies that explore how empathy affects healthcare attest to just how many people are recognizing its importance and relativity. How you make your patients feel does matter. Being treated by someone who has really taken the time to understand your situation improves your satisfaction with your care, and in turn can improve your attitude and motivation to commit to your health. Higher patient compliance and satisfaction is not the only upside of an empathetic approach to healthcare. The business side of this approach is just as rewarding. According to a survey conducted by Software Advice, 72% of patients used online reviews as a first step to seeking providers. 91% of patients reported to be “moderately likely” to choose one similarly qualified doctor over another based on positive reviews. Higher patient satisfaction leads to more positive reviews, which has a high potential for more patients. Additionally, research has shown that an increase in empathy shown by healthcare providers leads to a tangible increase in trust. Trust between patient and physician is a critical component of successful treatment. The tendency to detach can come easily for many in a field where you see suffering, and discomfort every day. Showing and feeling empathy day in and day out is not easy, but when the stress of poor health is met with empathy and understanding, the outcome is guaranteed to be better for both the patient and the healthcare provider.

Using Empathy Well

A final aspect of empathy to understand is that it does not look the same in every situation. It is important to recognize that since a large part of empathy is understanding how a person feels, there is no “one size fits all” response. For example, if someone feels vulnerability or shame, they will most likely not respond well to gentle compassion that can be mistaken for pity. In this situation, it may be more conducive to approach the situation with strength, positivity, and a sense of action. While people always need to be understood and listened to, not everyone needs that tenderness that is often associated with empathy. This is what makes empathy such a skill, the need to be so in tune with another person’s inner feelings. It is even more so about what they do not say, as what they say. True empathy utilizes emotional and nonverbal cues to achieve the most accurate understanding of a person’s feelings. While it takes practice, focus, and engagement, empathy is such a worthwhile trait to develop and make a part of every day practice.

The most painful part of your recovery shouldn’t be removing your medical tape. The stickiness and persistent adhesiveness is what makes it so effective when it comes to protecting an injury, but it’s also what makes it kind of a pain in the butt to remove once it’s done its job.

Before trying any of these tricks it is important to understand your injury and what is and isn’t an option for you. If you have an unhealed wound, use extra caution when removing the tape so as to not cause any more pain or damage.

4 Tips for removing medical tape as painlessly as possible:

1. Put baby oil around the edges, and let it soak in. The tape will be easier to peel off without and won’t stick to the skin nearly as much.
2. Rubbing alcohol is another great way to reduce pain when removing medical tape. Unless you have an open wound, then stay away from this one as it will likely burn if it gets into the wound.
3. Take a warm wet washcloth and place it over the tape for 10-15 minutes, and slowly peel the tape back. If it is still to sticky, rewarm to cloth and try again.
4. Take a long bath, effectively soaking the taped area. It should be a bit soggy and less adhesive, making it easier to peel off.

May your wounds heal well, and your bandages come off painlessly!

Use it as a sweatband

When you’re tearing up the court or the course, you may find that your sweaty palms have a hard time gripping the racket/club. Don’t let that affect your game, wrap the handle in cohesive bandage for a sweat resistant grip. Along with the functionality comes the possibility of spicing up your game with fun colors and patterns.

For pet injuries

The bandage won’t stick to skin or fur, but will stay secure for as long as needed. There’s so much room for creativity and innovation, make your pet the coolest at the park with fun colors and cool designs. Ideal for dogs, cats, and horses.

Dog calmer

Believe it or not, cohesive bandage can be used to create a calming harness for your dog. Does your dog get nervous around fireworks, or new people? This wrapping style hits key pressure points that relieve anxiety and calm the nerves. It’s super simple and your pet will likely be thankful for the comforting stress reliever.

Sweatband

As long as you aren’t prone to embarrassment, cohesive bandage work great as a sweatband. They won’t stick to your hair and they’re sweat resistant. As an added bonus, if you’re playing against someone they may be distracted by how stupid you look, giving you the upper hand.

Tattoo care

Cohesive bandage can be used to protect new tattoos. Since it won’t stick to the skin, it won’t irritate or damage the new tattoo, but it will stay secure and keep dirt and sunlight off.

Keep shin-guards up

Have you ever been trying to enjoy your child’s soccer game but the poor kid keeps fiddling with their shin guards? They just won’t stay up! Come to the rescue with cohesive bandage. Wrap the shin-guard against the calf a few times with the bandage. It is helpful to do a few wraps on the top and a few on the bottom for best results. As a seasoned soccer player myself, I can say that this trick came in handy for many, many games.

Artwork for kids

CoEase can be used to create cool designs and pictures. It’s a unique and cost effective way to spark your child’s creativity in a way that isn’t messy or hard to clean up. A little canvas can easily be made, and shapes and objects can be cut out and stuck right to the canvas itself. With the variety of unique colors that Tempo offers, the possibilities are endless!

Brass vs aluminum

The stethoscope is carefully designed to amplify the sounds of the inner body, usually the lungs or the heart in order to detect any irregularities. Due to the functions of the stethoscope, it is clear that optimal clarity is of the utmost importance. The majority of stethoscope chest-pieces are made of either aluminum, stainless steel, or chrome plated brass, but today, we’re here to talk about brass specifically.

What makes brass so special?

Well, think about it, what are the majority of orchestra instruments made of? Brass. There has to be a reason for this, but why? Brass is the product of mixing together zinc and copper, which produces the most genuine sound, rich tones, and generates an acoustically superior sound to other materials. Brass picks up low frequencies, since brass instruments sound comes from differing vibrations of the player’s lips. Centuries of using brass sections for instruments has proven to deliver the most reliable and vibrant sounds of any other medium. Orchestras are revered for their brilliant, vivid music played by their brass instruments. So, the question really shouldn’t be “why brass?” But “why not brass?”

Experience the superior acoustic quality of brass for yourself:

 Dual Head Stethoscopes