IAHRS accepted member Paul Rose. MD, JD has the quiet reputation for being one of the most talented and ethical hair transplant surgeons and a true patient advocate in the field. In this segment he discusses his take away from Spencer Kobren’s lecture on "The Patient’s Perspective.”

Paul Rose, MD:  You gave a great talk

Spencer Kobren:  Thank you.

Paul Rose, MD: It was a great lecture and it points to the fact that we often miss how to take care of patients. The fact that you had that survey that talked about what patients perceive and I will tell you, and I'm not blowing smoke here; when I got back from that meeting and I had written down some of the things that you had said, some of the comments that patients had about how they were treated. I immediately got back and said to my staff, and asked them to put into print the questions that patients felt they were not being asked and if we did ask those questions, to make sure that not only the people who consult for me but we as physicians, Dr. Nussbaum and I, speak to that patient particularly about those issues. In particular, I think you had mentioned asking the question, "How is your hair loss affecting you emotionally, in your social situation, in your lifestyle." I think for the most part patients are very welcoming to get that question-

Spencer Kobren: Of course.

Paul Rose, MD: And have an opportunity not so much to vent, but to just say, you know, "This is what's bothering me about my hair." There are some people who really don't want to talk about it, we learned, but there were questions that you brought up that immediately we put into place.

Spencer Kobren:  Well, I appreciate that. My whole thing is about just creating the best possible patient experience. When patients come to me and they say, "You know what, it doesn't even seem like the doctor cared, all the want to do was make that sale, get me in the chair and get me out." And when I hear guys, even from well-known practices who aren't following up, you know, personally. It's so easy, unless you're doing 30 cases a day, and I don't think that's happening in most practices, it's so easy to make a two-minute phone call and just say, "Hey man, how you doing? Just want to make sure everything's okay. I'm gonna have so-n-so from my staff check in on you tomorrow." And all of a sudden, you know, they realize, "you know what, this doctor really cares." And I know you guys do that in your practice, but-

Paul Rose, MD:  We try. Every patient has my cell phone number. We try to be very forthright with patients. If I think they're a good candidate I'll tell them, if I don't think that I'll tell them, "Have you ever looked at yourself with your head shaved? Maybe you look, you know, you might be a Michael Jordan, you might be a Sean Connery, it could work really well for you." There's a lot of stuff out there now about PRP, patients asking us about that, and there's a lot of pseudo-, to me, pseudo-science related to some of these things. I try to be very careful about what I say to patients and what I think is accurate science about some of these things, which we do use. But in any case, I thought that your lecture was very beneficial for all of us at the meeting and I did have some takeaways there that I put into place right away.