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Clinical Flow & Why It Matters For Your Growth
Episode 69 • 29th September 2023 • Clinical Flow with Physiotherapist Andrew Koppejan • Andrew Koppejan, PT
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In this episode, I'll be talking about clinical flow and what it means for your practice. I believe that every clinician should improve their capacity to operate in a flow state. In my view, the ability to operate in a place of clinical flow, maybe the most important aspect of developing as a clinician. And in this podcast, I'll explain why.

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Mentioned in this episode:

Sole

https://yoursole.com/us/health-professionals

Transcripts

Speaker:

Welcome to the unleash, your

best clinical self podcast.

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I'm your host, Andrew Cobian.

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If you're a physiotherapist

or other movement professional,

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who feels like you're stuck in a

rut, then my podcast is for you.

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This podcast is focused on helping

you move from frustration to

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flow in your clinical practice.

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In each episode, I'll share strategies,

approaches, and my latest thinking.

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On how to improve your clinical

performance and keep loving what you do.

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This is episode number 69.

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And in this episode, I'll be

talking about clinical flow and

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what it means for your practice.

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I also wanted to let you know that I

have a newsletter where each month I

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dive into topics relating to improving

your clinical performance, head over

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to 360 clinician.com to sign up today.

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Before we get into today's

episode, I'd like to take a moment

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to introduce our sponsor, Jane.

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Jane is an all-in-one practice

management software with

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features like online booking.

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Scheduling medical charting and

a PCI compliant payment solution.

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The time you spend with your patients

and clients is valuable and filling

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out forms during their appointment can

quickly take away from your time together.

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That's why the team at Jane has designed

online intake forms that your patients can

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complete from the comfort of their homes.

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And to help them remember

to fill out their forms.

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Jane has your back with a

friendly email reminder sent 24

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hours before their appointment.

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This means they arrive ready

to start their appointment and

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you can arrive, ready to help.

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Jane's online intake forms are fully

customizable to ensure you're collecting

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everything you need ahead of time.

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Whether that's a credit card

on file insurance, billing

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details, or assigned consent.

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You can build your intake forms from

scratch or use a template from Jane's

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template library, and customize it

further to meet your practice needs.

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If you're interested in learning

more head over to jane.app forward

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slash guide, or use the code 360 1

M O at signup to receive a one month

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grace period on your new account.

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All right.

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Let's get started with today's show.

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Clinical flow.

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It's a topic infused in everything that

I've written about at 360 clinician.

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And sometimes it can feel a

little fuzzy as to what it means.

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And that's what I want to talk about

today is this concept of clinical flow.

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I believe that every clinician

should improve their capacity

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to operate in a flow state.

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In my view, the ability to operate

in a place of clinical flow,

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maybe the most important aspect

of developing as a clinician.

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And in this podcast, I'll explain why.

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So what does flow actually mean?

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Being in flow is a concept first

articulated by psychologist, Maha chicks.

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Hi.

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It's where a person is highly engaged

and focused while doing an activity.

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Can be associated with activities.

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In sports or artistic endeavors.

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And it can also incur in

different work settings.

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And I think we can also experience

it in clinical work as well.

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at first glance, the concept of

flow seems almost unattainable in

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a clinical setting or at least.

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Unsustainable.

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The constant demands of a clinical

day, moving from patient to patient

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can make the concept of flow.

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Almost seem laughable.

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Maybe it even feels a little bit

nebulous or maybe a bit hokey.

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Anyone since it feels unrealistic

or unattainable, we tell ourselves

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that flow really doesn't matter.

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We shift our focus to skill acquisition.

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We focus on hard skills that feel

more tangible and measurable.

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And at nearly every turn in our career,

the pursuit of hard skills can seem

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to be the only thing that matters to

getting better clinical results and

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improving our professional journey.

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So why am I focusing on pursuing

flow when it seems that hard

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skills are all that matter?

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'cause I think that focusing our attention

on flow and the necessary ingredients

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needed for moving into a place of flow.

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Sets us up as clinicians for a lifetime

of highly engaged work that enables us to

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consistently experience meaning and joy.

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And when we experienced deep meaning

enjoying our work, there's really

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nothing that can stop us from fully

realizing our unique potential as

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healers with the people we serve.

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And I believe that flow and more

specifically clinical flow is what

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we need to draw our attention to.

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If we're serious about

professional growth and enjoyment.

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So let's take a moment

to define clinical flow.

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And I believe that the concept of

flow needs to be refined within

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a clinical setting, as we need to

acknowledge that there are some inherent

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constraints such as limited time that

exists within a clinical context.

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Typically within the definition of

flow, there's this loss of time.

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time sort of stands still.

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We really can't operate in that

place within a clinical setting.

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And so I think there are some,

considerations that we need

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to take when we think of flow

within a clinical setting.

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I define clinical flow as a state of

persistent psychological engagement.

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Really an energized focus that is

embodied with the values of curiosity.

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Collaboration, creativity and courage.

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It's where our attention can be

leveraged to be fully present

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in our patient interactions.

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In delivering high quality

care within the bounds of our

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knowledge, skills, and abilities.

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And I believe it is in this place that we

experienced meaning and joy in our work.

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It's a place where our ego protective

defenses are held at bay so that we are

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fully engaged in the patient interaction.

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It's in the place where we

operate best as healers.

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And I don't think that this experience is

something that is fleeting or haphazard.

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I think it's actually something

that can be sustained by having the

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right work environment, an optimized

state of self in terms of who we

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are, what's going on inside of us

and flexible learning processes that

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support our growth and development.

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And I believe that there are really four

pillars, four key values, four elements,

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whatever we want to call that are

foundational to the clinical flow state.

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And they are courage, curiosity,

collaboration, and creativity.

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So let's talk first about the

foundation, which I believe is courage.

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Now.

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It seems that courage, maybe isn't

something that's necessary for

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clinical flow, but the more that I've

reflected and written on this topic.

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I've realized that courage is

needed to advance all the other

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elements of clinical flow.

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We need courage within ourselves

when we're feeling discomfort.

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Because of an interaction that went off

or we're feeling overwhelmed and we need

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to explore what's going on inside of

us, but we also need courage with our

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patients in terms of being able to have

meaningful conversations and be able to.

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Interact and navigate things

that can be challenging.

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The next element needed to

support a flow state is curiosity.

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And after courage, I think

that curiosity really is that

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next level of the foundation.

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Why?

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Because curiosity

fosters engaged openness.

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It helps us to move beyond our perceptual.

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Blinders.

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It helps us to explore beyond

what our current understanding is.

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It fuels our own growth

and development as well.

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It helps us to actually really interact

with our patients in a deeper way.

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And really helps to understand

the why of what's going on.

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Collaboration is at the core of

the patient therapist relationship.

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It's really an open-handed interaction

that focuses on working together.

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And I believe that collaboration

has an understanding of humility.

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It's not this top-down power hierarchy.

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But instead it's one of joint

decision-making and journey making.

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It really is such an key element.

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And, and you know, that you're in a

place of flow when there's a very strong,

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collaborative interaction taking place.

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Finally, we have creativity.

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Now, when we're dealing with

complex problems and situations.

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When we're dealing with

challenging patient situations,

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we need to be creative.

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The exercise that we gave for

another person may not work for this

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individual that's in front of us at

the moment, and we need to be able to

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be creative and come up with something

that's going to work for that patient.

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And I think that creativity allows

us to be more agile clinically.

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, and it helps us to bring novel

solutions to complex situations.

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So, how does this focus on

clinical flow actually helping

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you to be a better clinician?

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When we are consistently entering

a place of clinical flow with

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our patient interactions.

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We're going to be in the best

position to maximize our skills,

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our thinking personality experience.

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For those unique patient interactions.

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And then what that does is it creates

an opportunity to bring our best selves

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forward in those interactions and really

deliver the best clinical experience.

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Which is going to end up resulting in

enjoying your work more and actually

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getting better patient results.

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So this week, think about

your clinical experiences.

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Do you find yourself engaged in your work?

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Are you energized with

your patient interactions?

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Do you find yourself being curious

about the patients you see.

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Do you find yourself collaborating with

your patients and exploring creative

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solutions to complex situations?

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Are you finding the courage to explore and

reflect on your own emotional reactions

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that come up over the course of the week?

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These are all great questions to think

and stew about a little bit, as you

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go through your day and as you reflect

on, your workweek, and if you've been

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focused on only development of hard

skills, then think about whether you

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could begin exploring ways to develop

and improve your ability to operate

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more consistently in a place of flow.

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A great starting point is

checking out articles that I've

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written at 360, clinician.com.

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Where I write about topics relating

to and impacting clinical flow.

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Thank you for hanging out with

me today and hearing about how to

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improve your clinical performance.

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Make sure to subscribe on

iTunes or Spotify to stay up

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to date on future episodes.

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And if you enjoyed this

podcast, I truly appreciate.

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You're leaving a five-star

review on iTunes.

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Here's to less frustration, more flow and

better clinical results till next time.

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