Using Group Meetings To Further Support Bariatric Patients
Face-to-face group support meetings are an incredibly valuable tool with which support your patients...
Bariatric Patients Need Support
Life after bariatric surgery can be lonely and secretive for some patients, where there may not be much or any understanding or empathy around the new post-surgical lifestyle. Face-to-face connection with, and support from other people going through the same challenges is therefore very beneficial for your patients.
Providing group support opportunities at your clinic is a simple step that you can take that will greatly impact upon the experience of your patients, so that you stand out in your field in terms of your patient support.
The Benefits Of Group Support Meetings
From our experience of running many, many face-to-face workshops over several years, one of the highlights of our group sessions for many patients is simply the opportunity to interact and connect with others in a structured and facilitated format. Face-to-face workshops allow you to delve much deeper into the common challenges that patients face, to share tools for overcoming these challenges and to get perspectives from patients who have found solutions that work for them. This all takes place in a space that is away from the patient’s usual environment, so they can simply focus on themselves and the experience of the session. Providing these support opportunities is a great way for a clinic to show that it truly cares about the patient, add massive value, and to enhance the whole post-surgical experience.
Face-to-face group sessions can also be longer and more in-depth than a patient's usual one-on-one consultations and are an incredibly valuable and cost-effective tool to use to support your patients. They allow you to:
- delve much deeper into common challenges that patients face;
- facilitate longer patient interactions in a secure, positive environment;
- enable patients to share their perspectives and experiences with fellow patients, with guidance and moderation from an expert; and
- coach, support and educate multiple patients in one session.
This all means that your clinic stands out in terms of your patient support, and allows your team to function in a very economical and efficient manner.
When To Schedule Meetings
From our experience, Saturday and Sunday morning sessions of around 3 hours in duration, starting at 9am or 9.30am seem to suit the largest number of patients. If weekday sessions are to be offered then these would ideally be shorter (approximately 2 hours) and they should not start before 5.30pm, to allow people the opportunity to get to the venue in time after their work/family commitments.
What To Focus On In Meetings
As part of our support program, we have comprehensively tracked the major challenges identified by bariatric patients in their 1:1 private coaching sessions. This has given us a clear picture of what patients want support with. The most frequent challenges identified by participants are:
- Emotional eating (23.7%)
- Lack of motivation / goals (18.6%)
- Stress / busyness (15.4%)
- Lack of time to exercise (10.9%)
- Poor self image (8.7%)
It is therefore recommended that support meetings prioritise dealing with these challenges.
Making Your Support Accessible
Although face-to-face group support sessions are probably one of the most beneficial and effective ways to support patients, the biggest challenge is convenience and accessibility. Trying to find 3 hours at the weekend or 2 hours during the week (plus travel time) is a challenge for some people. This is why it’s highly recommended that you complement your face-to-face sessions with shorter, more-frequent telephone/webinar group sessions. You can see our tips on running group support webinars here. It is also advisable that you record the content of the face-to-face group support sessions, either at the time, or afterwards via a video format, so that those that are keen to attend, but unable to, can still benefit from the tools and reflection activities shared.
Lead The Way In The Bariatric Surgery Field
Providing regular, structured group support meetings will greatly enhance your support from a patient's perspective and is a cost-effective tool to assist many patients. In an increasingly competitive field, using this strategy as part of your patient support offering will help you to stand out and lead the way in your field.
Complimentary Assistance
Would you like a Free Support Blueprint and Patient Workshop for your clinic?
We're offering this because we know that a certain number of clinics that we do this for will want us to build and run their support programs for them.
We only however offer this to qualifying clinics and you can see all the details here:
