Episode 81:

[30:00] Reducing Task Switching With Better Veterinary Team Workflows

So that, you know, and, and our poor support team, right? My client service representative, she's just trying to ask a question.

On her mind, her goal is to get an answer, tell the client, and be off the phone. That's her focus. Her focus isn't like, "Oh, Dr. Parks has undiagnosed ADHD," and it's gonna be a lot of task-switching for her, right? Like, that's ... I don't expect her to have known that, right? Or, like, this could be a lot for her.

I'm, I have this thing in front of me and I have to get it done. So don't assume that they're gonna know this. This is having, like, a sit-down conversation of like, "Hey, this is the flow. This is how we're gonna do this in this hospital from now on." And it, you know, start with maybe management of like, how can we roll this out?

And having a designated time for those questions, because what's really cool is when they're like, "All right, 15 minutes, you got those questions?" They come to you bam, bam, they get all their questions answered, clients get calls back, life is good, right? It's kind of like think of it of, and I know some people do this, this would, uh, drive me crazy, but say you're gonna, like, see an appointment and then go do a surgery, see another appointment, then go do a dental, see two appointments and do a cat spay, right?

Like, you're just going back and forth. That is not efficient. Even if, again, can you do it? Yeah. No shit, I did it for a decade and a half. But should you do it? Is it efficient? Like, this is what we need to know about our brain to work with it instead of against it.

[31:30] Scenario 3: How Unclear Questions Create Mental Overload

Okay, scenario number three. I, th- I feel like, um, I joke that I'm getting more autistic the older I get because now I'm so aware of it, but the nuances in simple questions.

So going back to my poor receptionist, th- this example just came to me. I, honestly, this happened so much I don't even have an example, but this is what came to my mind. So they would come, ask me a question. Now keep in mind they're still, this was still done, like, in between appointments, right?

So not only are we task-switching, now they're gonna say, "Hey," um, and this is the example I came up with.

"Hey, um, Mr. Smith's on the phone. They've got Fluffy, the Addisonian. He vomited once. They're going out of town, and they didn't have to increase the meds before, the prednisone. And so they're gonna go out of town now, but he vomited." That's what I get, and I'm like So first things first, and I've said this, I still say this, communication maybe is like it irritates me if something isn't clear, which is hilarious 'cause I'm sure at times I'm very much not clear.

But I have said, "Okay, so they're telling me that, like, you're giving me this information." I'm like, "Is that a question or a statement? Are you asking me a question or is that a statement?" And they're like, "A question." I'm like, "Okay." So they wanna know if they should give the meds this time even though last time they went out of town, didn't increase the pred, and the dog was fine.

Yeah. Okay. So number one, clarity, right? In their mind, they're skipping a couple steps and it's making sense. In my mind, being neurodivergent, I'm seeing all the fucking nuance to that. And I, I don't think this is, you know, all these examples are not super specific necessarily to neurodivergent, but I do see all these a lot in neurodivergent individuals.

But what goes through my mind with this is, like internally, there's like a, a battle of like, "Okay, when did we last check electrolytes? But then he vomited, so maybe the potassium is actually lower, but normally it's higher. But then they're gonna go out of town, he's gonna be stressed, so his cortisol... he doesn't have any fucking cortisol.

Okay, so the pred, but they didn't increase it last time, so now..." Like, all of that is going through my mind before I can give an answer. And then, "Okay, when's the last time they had blood work done? And then what were the electrolytes? When's the last time we gave a Percorten injection?" Right? Like, all of those scenarios are what goes through my head, so I am like a deer in headlights sometimes because number one, I don't even know if you asked me a question or you're telling me something.

Number two, I'm not really sure how to answer because that whole train of thought just went through my brain. So then I'm like paralyzed because all of that's going on, and then maybe the phone's ringing. My technician's like, "Hello, Dr. Parks, we gotta finish up this other room." My other tech's like, "Uh, Dr.

Parks, I have another room here for you." And you're like, "Fuck!" And you wanna yell and scream and run out the door.

[34:30] Training Your Veterinary Team to Communicate Clearly

So again, this is why having those set times for callback questions to the doctor are, I think, hugely important. The other thing that, uh, the practice that I worked at was really good at was we got very good at, and this is a training thing, but training your support team members to ask specific questions or come to you with specific information.

I cannot stress to you enough how amazing this is. So for example, it's a little bit different than what I just said for that scenario, but my boss, best thing we could've ever done, we got really good at the training, and obviously there's a transition period. But when a technician would come to us with like, "Oh, I have Sammy here for, check teeth I'm like, again, all the nuance goes to my brain.

Check teeth, like he has bad breath, he's chewing weird. Is he two years old? Is he 12? Does he have a heart murmur, right? So we trained our staff to, like if you're coming to us with a... I mean, technically you could say this for your front desk staff too, although I think this is a, it's a lot. But having your technicians, they, we train them to come to us like, "Hey, I have Sammy, a two-year-old Brussels neutered male, Brussels Griffin, Brussels Griffon, neutered male, ch- for check teeth.

The owner's noticing an odor, says he's eating dr..." Right? Like that tells me so much more. So that, again, efficiency, streamlining, better workflow. It helps me not have to bend my brain all in different directions, because my brain just went in 87 different directions trying to... Sorry, that was my dog shaking.

Wrap my mind around what I was going to be encountering, right? So that makes it, this is just communication, b- and it makes it a lot easier. But you can also, in my scenario I gave, have your support team members, like just say, "Hey, you know, you can tell me whatever story it is, but then you just have to tell me, 'Their question is...'

Or, "The owner's question is..." Or, "My question is..." My, personally, my business coach, she, and this is a great thing, we do voice and text messaging in addition to like our sessions, and her thing that she tells everyone is like, you can vent if you're frustrated or share a win, something exciting."

She's like, "But if you have a question you just have to tell me. 'Hey, my question is this.'" Because she's like, "I would get messages that are five minutes long about this thing, and then I'm like, 'Wait a minute. Do you have a question, or are you just trying to tell me this thing?'" I'm like, "Oh, so good."

So it's something simple like that, right? And you don't have to be in management and recreate the wheel, but you wanna pick the environment that you have that conversation in, because if it's chaotic, the phone's ringing, they've gotta go grab the phone, you've got three appointments there, and you being like, "Hey, you know what? You, next time you need to tell me if there's a specific question." Like, "Okay, no, we need to do this a, a different way."

So just know your, your surroundings, right? Read the room.

[37:45] Scenario 4: Why Last-Minute Schedule Changes Trigger Frustration

Okay. Two more scenarios. Uh, number four, schedule changes. OMFG, this used to drive me bonkers. I would look at the schedule, like I said, if I got to my desk in the morning, I'm having a good morning, I'm writing down all my notes for my appointments, and then I know my callbacks, and I'm like, "All right.

Great." You know, those cases that are on the schedule, either maybe the owner's a little high maintenance, or the patient is difficult to deal with, or the case is a fucking clusterfuck, and you're just, like, dreading it. So I would have, like, this mental capacity of what I was gonna deal with that day.

Maybe then I would see an appoint... That, that really tough one that I was dreading canceled. Oh my God, I could do a fucking cartwheel. I'd be like, "Oh," internally so excited, right? And then, and maybe that was, like, a check eye, but the owner is a lot or something. And then I look, and that canceled, but then they put a 12-year-old new patient vomiting dog in.

I'm like, "Motherfucker, give me that check eye," right? So when there's changes to the schedule, it's because... And why that affects us is because our cognitive flexibility, it's the transitions, right? And I think, too, for myself, I only had so much bandwidth in being burnt out that, like, I subconsciously had planned out, "All right, that...

This looks doable," right? It might be a little tough at 2:00 PM with that crazy client or that crazy dog, but then I'll be good. And now, that 2:00 canceled and something else that's probably gonna take the rest of the afternoon got put in there. It would send me over the edge. So it's a lot of to... a lot of times to the f- the unknown, right?

We don't know how much energy this is gonna be. 12-year-old vomiting dog, maybe they came in, they're new to the area. They're like, "Oh, we always give it some Sucralfate and he's fine, and he's eating, drinking. He's had blood work last month," right? That's gonna be different than the 12-year-old lab that hasn't been to the vet in three years, and he's not eating great, and he's lost 10 pounds.

Those are gonna take different bandwidths and your mental energy. And so that, that would, like, send me over the edge.

[39:55] Managing Schedule Changes and Reducing Worst-Case Thinking

So what's a solution for that? That's a tough one. Um, I'll be honest. So number one is i- scheduling in general, right? So making sure that there is enough holes, if you will, in your day that there can't just be people like, "Oh, I have a full schedule," and then we're just tacking on walk-ins and everything else that comes in, right?

I know that's not always feasible for everyone. Or, and there's ways to go about changing that, which I think is so fucking obvious. It drives me crazy that people don't do that. But the other thing is, you know, just, um, having some parameters around the scheduling. So if there's maybe two doctors, and they're always booking shit on your side, and the other doctor has it's just they've got three openings, and you're double booked, like, why is that happening, right?

Having that conversation is... needs to happen, for sure. But also, give yourself permission that what can start... Like, when we start to get that anxiety like, "Oh my God, 12 years old, new client, what the fuck?" Give yourself permission to be like it may not be that bad. It could be, but it also may not be.

So if we're going to worst-case scenario, we also have to tell ourselves the opposite. So it could be a fucking clusterfuck, or... Sorry, I'm dropping the F-bomb a lot today, but I'm very heated about this, this whole neurodivergence. But yes, it could be crazy, but it also could be very straightforward.

So giving yourself, like, if I'm gonna think worst case, I have to think what also best case could be. And we start to just take lessen the edge a little bit of that. But also recognize that you're not trying to... You're not a bad person, if you're feeling that way. We're just honoring who we are too.

So that's, like, in the short term, but long term, hopefully, there's a, a different way to strategize the scheduling. There's a, there's a lot of nuance to that too, which it could take 10 episodes. I don't even think we would cover.

[41:50] Scenario 5: Perfectionism, Follow-Up Tasks, and Mental Load

Okay, last one. So I said at the beginning of the day, I would write down just some notes about the cases that I was seeing, and then the follow, follow-up calls.

And then we used AvaMark at this one particular hospital, so the way we had it set up is if someone came in for an office appointment, it automatically put in a follow-up the next day that our receptionist would do. But every certain thing would prompt a follow-up, so they could have An exam, a kennel cough vaccine, a pending blood work, like there would be three follow-ups.

So like some of those probably needed to be deleted or moved out, right? Like, "Oh, no, the doctor's gonna call him in a few days with the blood results," or it also had an ear cytology. We don't need to... You know, we're gonna need to not call him in two days. Maybe we need to call him in a few more days. So I had to like change that, and, and my technicians were good about it.

The problem was I was so hyper-focused on making sure that I did that myself that I was like, "Ugh, if I don't do it, no one else is gonna do it. They're not gonna do it right." So at the end of the day, I would go through each appointment and be like, "All right, we need to move the date of this, move it back, you know, make sure everything made sense, make sure everyone's getting a call the next day, et cetera," which is great for business, right?

I'm sure I was a great employee as far as that goes, but it was a lot of mental b- gym- gymnastics essentially that I had to go through. And what happens is like that to me in my brain, there was like an open loop. So it's also with that pattern, right? We wanna like continue the pattern, and it's not closed, and I...

If I just went home and then I got to work the next day and I just started my day, now I feel like all those follow-ups could be all screwed up. They're not on the right day. The owners aren't gonna get called, or they're gonna get called twice in one day. Like those are the things that it sounds little, but it adds up with your mental capacity.

[43:55] Creating Predictable Systems and Delegating Tasks

So a lot of times too, what I didn't realize was that with ADHD, sometimes we feel like we have squirrel brain, and if we had a flow and a pattern, it was a lot easier to just keep doing that. Because if we didn't do that, then there were a lot of variables, and we're less likely to... We're more likely to miss something because the flow was off, right?

Like we didn't... There wasn't that pattern. We weren't doing things as we normally would. So if we do something different, we're more likely to forget or not have it on our radar, right? Which is which is challenging. So the, the solution with... in that particular case is to really get good with your support team members.

And I will say, too, the receptionists were pretty decent. They would see like, "Oh, there's two follow-ups for tomorrow. Obviously, we're not calling twice in one day." They would delete one. But it's also... Like you have to train them that way. You have to have that conversation that way. You have to give them agency to be able to do that, too.

So that's more of your long-term solution in how to do that

[45:00] Understanding Neurodivergence and Working With Your Brain

So, um, all right. That was a lot. That was a juicy episode. So this is gonna be a miniseries. This is episode one. In the next couple of episodes, I do wanna break down, um, some more scenarios and how they showed up, so things like sounds and dealing with clients and emotions and just not feeling like I'm a people person, right?

And, and how to deal with that. So we're gonna break down what that looks like as far as neurodivergent and how to work through that as well. So I hope you guys enjoyed this, and at the very least, if this is getting your wheels turning of, "Whoa, this sounds real familiar," I, honor to you, just get curious.

And again, not everyone needs to be diagnosed. I think it's up to you. It's a personal preference. If you're identifying with a lot of this, you start doing some research, and you start being like, "Oh, 100%, this is me," then great. Welcome. Welcome. I also think that, and I'm gonna talk about this in some of the upcoming episodes, but being neurodivergent is also, like, the secret sauce, I think, for why many of us do so well in veterinary medicine.

We're really good in crisis situations, but maybe it's really hard to send an email or make a follow-up call to an owner, right? So it's little things like that. So just the awareness piece. We just need to be aware and work within how our brain works best instead of trying to fight it.

[46:25] Final Thoughts and What's Coming Next in the Series

So I'm really curious, though.

I wanna know your feedback, what your thoughts were on this, if this is, "Okay, I need to maybe start considering this." I've been doing a lot more posts on social media about being neurodivergent in vet med, so make sure you check that out. Follow me on Instagram at Dr., for doctor, period, Amber Parks, A-M-B-E-R P-A-R-K-S.

And as always, if this episode was helpful to you please share this with your vet med bestie or someone you know who needs it, and as always, if you can hit five stars, follow and subscribe to the podcast, it helps other people discover this podcast as well, so we kinda share the wealth. So it is greatly, greatly appreciated, and I will see you on the next episode.