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In whatever way you are involved in healthcare, either as service provider or patient, NLP can have clear benefits for you:
- Doctors and nursing staff - you can use the techniques you learn on our courses to communicate more effectively with patients and colleagues and produce better outcomes all round.
- Patients - by using NLP you can learn to motivate yourself to take care of your own health, for example in areas of weight reduction and smoking cessation.
- Healthcare managers - throughout the world, managers and other healthcare professionals are already using NLP to improve leadership skills, raise morale and maintain positive attitudes. In Britain, managers both inside and outside the NHS are increasing the effectiveness of the teams they organise by applying the techniques they learned on our courses.
NLP for the healthcare professional
If you are a healthcare professional, you will probably already be aware that you face a uniquely diverse set of challenges at work. In the NHS, for example, work stress and burnout is becoming an ever-increasing burden on the system. A recent study of healthcare workers revealed that burnout was closely linked to a loss of a sense of control in their lives. So, with doctors facing more administration, less time to spend with patients and a loss of work / life balance, it is no surprise that the incidence of stress-related illness is far more common among doctors than among the population at large.
Several studies of doctors and stress have investigated why some doctors succumb to stress and others don't. One of the major factors highlighted was whether a doctor had learned to develop effective coping strategies to tackle stress. Other factors included whether a doctor had good clear communication skills and whether he or she had the tendency towards being unproductively self-critical.
If any of this sounds familiar to you, then you can be assured that you are not alone. More and more healthcare professionals are looking for techniques to help them manage both the time they have in their day, and their internal state - so that they can get more done and feel more in control of their lives, while maintaining a focussed, positive attitude.
NLP techniques will provide you with an "inner locus of control" so you can take charge of your life again - and in the process you will learn how to be happier at work and at home, and provide a better experience for all those around you - and of course, a better experience for yourself, too!
Internal state
If you work with the public you will probably already be aware that the ability to get into a resourceful internal state lies at the heart of your work. But how do you achieve it? If you are a GP, or work with one, think: how many times have you heard a colleague complain that by the end of morning surgery they have absorbed the depressed feeling or panic attack of one patient, have been emotionally affected by the anxiety of another, and lived through the abuse of a third? Now, if you imagine that lying behind any one of these examples is a self-critical internal dialogue saying: "I have not done a good enough job, I don't have time, I have to meet the next target...", then you will get a pretty clear picture of the pressures many in the healthcare system experience.
And the fact is: it doesn't need to be that way. By using NLP, you will be able to select from a variety of techniques that will empower you to control your internal state. You will be able to anchor yourself to resourceful states that will stop you from being unduly moved by the emotional current around you. In any given situation, you will be able to choose which particular state is the most useful - and generate it there and then. You will also be free to transform your internal critical voice, break through your limiting or negative beliefs - and choose to replace them with more useful, effective and resourceful ones instead.
NLP for the Patient
Nearly 40% of GP consultations consist of patients presenting with psychologically related issues - very often with one patient presenting repeatedly with the same psychological symptoms. This can lead to a patient feeling a sense of helplessness, as well as tying up the GP's resources and time.
By using NLP techniques such as rapport-building, and then employing the meta model to nudge patients forward into considering possibilities they hadn't thought of before, the doctor can often easily get patients into receptive states of mind in which they can be taught quick NLP techniques to enable them to take control of their lives.
For example, a patient who is suffering from work-related stress and comes to the doctor asking for a sick note and convinced that only tablets will work to "fix" him, can be taught techniques like spinning to remove the anxiety in the moment as well as anchoring to set up a more resourceful state. The doctor and patient can then share a management approach to the patient's problems. The doctor can give the patient tools like timelining to consider future outcomes he can feel good about, and enable the patient to gain a different understanding of his issues through reframing. By judiciously using NLP in practice, a GP can often reduce repeated presenting and give the patient a working model for problem solving in the future.
NLP techniques work very well alongside medication. Symptoms such as depression, anxiety, trauma, obesity and panic attacks are some of the common conditions which can benefit from adding an NLP element to treatment. NLP can enable the patient and doctor to manage these conditions, providing techniques to influence disempowering patterns of thinking and behaviour, such as self-critical internal dialogue and negative beliefs, leading to positive long-term lifestyle changes.
There are numerous NLP techniques for enhancing motivation which can also be taught to the patient to take control of his own health, help him feel more balanced, curtail the need to present time and again - and encourage the patient to live a fuller life.
NLP For The NHS
The NHS is the largest employer in the UK, and managing staff effectively requires leadership skills and confident effective communication. NLP skills are right now being used in a managerial context to motivate NHS staff so that they discover how to enjoy their jobs more while reducing work stress. And that is only one of aspect of NLP's potential in the NHS. Whether you are a chief executive waiting to deliver a motivational speech or deciding how to lead your team more effectively, whether you are a manager negotiating finance structures, or a doctor dealing with cases in the ward or in surgery, NLP techniques can be used to oil the wheels of the great machine of the NHS so that everyone in the system works in unison to provide the best care possible for the patient.
Dr Natheera Indrasenan
To find out how to book on any of the NLP Life Training courses or seminars - or to request any additional information - just CLICK HERE now. We are waiting to help you.
