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Melissa: Making a medical practice
youth-friendly is not just about the doctor being
a really youth-friendly doctor who can give that young person time.
It’s very much about the
practice as well because a young person isn’t going to know
in fact that that doctor is a cool doctor
until they walk through their door.
They first have to ring up and make an appointment.
Talk to the receptionist, come in and possibly register,
sit in the waiting room.
So there’s lots of really practical things
that can happen before they walk through the doctor’s door.
So we often encourage GPs to
offer their receptionists some training as well
in how to be youth-friendly. To talk about
payment options,
to talk about things like confidentiality
or explain that the doctor might-
would like to see them by themselves. This sort of thing.
Once they come into the waiting area
it’s really nice for a young person to feel
that there’s material in the waiting room that is relevant to them.
I hear a lot of young people say that there were no
youth magazines or reading material
or posters on the wall made them feel like
it wasn’t a welcoming place for young people.
So they’re a couple of things that can be done
I think to make the practice seem youth-friendly.
There’s lots of other really important things that we know from
research that’s looked at barriers. So
things like cost and medicare cards.
How easy it is to get to the practice.
What the opening hours are.
How quickly they can get an appointment.
What the waiting time is like. These things are important to all-
all people.
But particularly so for a young person.
Especially if they’re starting to do this on their own
and you’re wanting to encourage them to
take those steps towards independence.
It’s important that they feel quite welcome in that practice
and not feel like it’s just a place for
older people.
Rebecca: For GPs to be adolescence friendly-
it's not
talking down to them would be the start.
Because when you’re in that time space
a lot of people can feel you’re being condescending
if you’re talking to them like they’re a little kid.
But equally they want that support
because you need to be asking them
you know, about their life. Because
you know, teenagers are very involved in their own life.
And you want your GP to be asking
you that sort of thing about what are you doing?
How are you going?
Melissa: So I think it’s very much about being genuine.
And being empathic.
Being non-judgemental. And
what I mean by that is not jump in and impose your
moral opinion on what’s going on
but actually to listen to what a young person is telling you.
To get to know a young person does take time. It takes
probably more time than it takes with an adult or a younger child.
So it is about spending that time
getting to know who they are.
What I’ve always said to
GPs and nurses when I’m doing some training with them is,
for example
don’t make your goal in this consultation
diagnosing what the problem is. Make your goal
engaging this young person to trust you.
That should- that is the best goal of all.
Because a young person will vote with their feet
and they won’t come back.
And if they don’t come back to you it’s
quite likely that they also will
think all doctors are going to be the same
and treat them the same.
And we’re then really doing them a great disservice.
So just take your time and
make it the priority to really engage this young person.
As a person. Make them feel like they count.
Introduce yourselves.
You know. Tell them your name.
Ask them what they would like to be called by.
If they’re there with a parent make sure you
focus on the young person.
Involve the parent but
try to spend time with that young person alone and
certainly address them as the main patient.
A few little tips like that can, I think help
young people feel much more like
they’re not just being treated like a number.
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