Anchor Your Patients by Focusing on the Gut
FEATURE
NUTRITION
Todd Singleton
DC
If you’ve ever gotten hooked on visiting and making purchases at a favorite business — restaurant, tanning salon, local market — you’ve experienced what experts call an “anchoring effect.” Basically, anchoring is the effect that someone experiences when they have a positive experience in a certain setting, and the brain triggers a release of endorphins associated with that place.1,2 A lot of the time, people experience anchoring effects when they visit the beach, make a trip to Disneyland, or go home to visit family. The same principle applies to running a successful clinic. If you want to retain patients for life, you’ll need to make sure that everyone is having positive, anchoring experiences that tie them to your office.
To get started, make sure that your clinic is an enjoyable place for your patients to visit. When patients first walk into your office, they should feel calm, relaxed, and at ease. You can facilitate this by making sure that your waiting area is a pleasant place that looks and smells nice, and even includes interesting educational materials available to peruse. If you want to kick things up a notch, you can offer patients a free sample of a nutritional food or beverage while they wait (this is especially helpful if you have that product available for sale). At every visit, you should make sure that the person working at your front desk is saying each patient’s name about three times. Research shows that this can help patients feel “at home” and welcome in your office.3
Beyond the work that you do to make your clinic a pleasant place, it’s important to provide treatments that work so well that your patient makes a positive association with your clinic. In my experience, the way to do this is by focusing on the gut. Though this might seem counterintuitive, research shows that the gut-brain connection influences everything about each individual’s daily experience. If you can correct imbalances or dysbiosis in the gut, this will make an enormous difference to your patients’ health and happiness. Then, once patients have experienced a health transformation and feel positive about your office, they’ll be much more willing to consider other treatments and services.
Here’s why healing the gut can make such a big difference. The gut’s enteric nervous system contains about
100 million neurons that govern everything from hunger to mood.4 There are so many neurons in the gut that some experts refer to it as the body’s “second brain.” Though most doctors are used to thinking about the brain as the command center for the body, it really works the other way around. The nerves in the gut send powerful signals to the brain, communicating important information about the state of the gut and the overall health of the body. The brain uses this information to make decisions about what to prioritize. If the gut isn’t healthy, the brain will recognize that the body’s basic needs are not being met, and will siphon energy off other bodily systems in order to focus on healing and repair. This can leave a patient feeling tired, bloated, irritable, and in desperate need of your help. If you can fix the problem with the gut, chances are that you will fix the entire problem.
A brief cleanse ives the body a chance to rest from this constant assault and instead devote its energy to healing and repairing the gut.
To get started, I recommend that you use a combination of supplements and nutritional strategies to bring your patients into a state of balance. When prescribing supplements, remember that quality matters.5 Choose a supplement company that produces organic, whole-food herbal supplements that are minimally processed and have a history of effective clinical use. Once you’ve identified a brand that you trust, I recommend prescribing a combination of probiotics, omega-3 fatty acids, fiber, vitamins, minerals, and digestive enzymes. If a patient has more severe symptoms, you may want to add additional supplements designed to meet their specific needs. You can start here, and then add additional products as you deem necessary.
For the best results, I recommend that you prescribe a brief three-to-five day lemonade cleanse at the start of this process. For patients who have been eating a heavily processed diet, this can help “reset” the system and encourage healing. Remember that the body is designed to heal itself. If your patients are struggling with chronic pain, fatigue, or other health ailments, the body wants to get back to a state of equilibrium, but when patients eat the same inflammatory foods day in and day out, they never have a chance to heal. A brief cleanse gives the body a chance to rest from this constant assault and instead devote its energy to healing and repairing the gut.
The final step in this process is to guide your patients through nutritional protocols designed to change the way they eat. This is the hard part. Some patients will find this challenging, but the results will absolutely be worth it. If a patient isn’t willing to commit to a balanced diet, start where they are because if you can get them to make even small improvements, those changes will make a difference. On this type of program, you should encourage your patients to reduce their intake of processed, inflammatory foods (anything that comes out of a box, bag, or can) and replace those foods with plenty of fresh fruits and vegetables.6 The better a patient adheres to this style of eating, the better their results will be.
If you introduce effective, nutrition-based gut health solutions in your clinic, your patients will be happier, healthier, and more “well adjusted” (pun intended). They’ll keep their appointments and will love coming to see you. Happy patients make referrals too. If your patients have a positive experience in your office, they’ll tell friends and family members about it. If your patients have a bad experience, they’ll warn people away from your clinic and may even leave scathing reviews online. Ultimately, satisfied patients are the foundation of any successful chiropractic practice.
As you get started, one thing to remember is that most of your “new” patients are only new to you. Many of your patients have probably seen another chiropractor before, and they chose not to go back. So why the switch? In most cases, they probably weren’t getting the results they wanted. This means that you have the chance to be the change that your patients are seeking. If your patients get great results in your office, they’ll feel anchored to you and will keep coming back.
Dr. Todd Singleton is an author, speaker, and consultant who has been a chiropraetor for more than 25 years. He ran the largest MD/DC/PT clinics in Utah before switching to an all-cash, nutrition-based model in 2006. Dr. Singleton now spends his time speaking, consulting, and helping chiropractic offices across the country. For more information, call 801-903-7141 or visit www.ArticlesbyDrSingleton.com.
References
1. Grisaffe, D.B., & Nguyen, H. P. (2011). Antecedents of emotional attachment to brands. Journal of Business Research, 64(10), 1052-1059.
2. Schmitt, B. (1999). Experiential Marketing. Journal of Marketing Management, 15(1-3), 53-67.
3. Howard, D. J., Gengler, C., & Jain, A. (1995). What's in a name? A complimentary means of persuasion. Journal of Consumer Research, 22(2), 200-211.
4. Costa, M., Brookes, S. J. H., & Hennig, G. W. (2000). Anatomy and physiology of the enteric nervous system. Gut, 47(suppl 4), ivl5.
5. Office of Dietary Supplements. (2011). Dietary supplements: What you need to know. National Institutes of Health. Retrieved from: https://ods. od. nih. gov Healthlnformation DS WhcitYouNeedToKnow. aspx.
6. Guenther P. M., Dodd K. W., Reedy J., & KrebsSmith S. M. (2006). Most Americans eat much less than recommended amounts of fruits and vegetables. Journal of the American Dietetic Association 106(9), 1371-9.
