Accepting the walk of shame...

​Accepting the walk of shame... admitting you were wrong

Truth be told. We are all wrong at some point. Even those with a photographic memory or those described by patients to possess hands that have been “touched by an angel,”  occasionally fall short. The impact of these errors come with the actions taken afterwards, not the error itself. As a new therapist, the hardest pill to swallow may be finding a way to tactfully admit fault.  It happens on a daily basis. You have a patient you may have progressed too quickly, and they’ve been waiting all weekend to let you know that on Tuesday, they are still sore from their therapy session the previous Wednesday.  Better yet, you’re working on balance exercises with a patient in the clinic and they fall after you turn your head for a second, ending up with a compression fracture in their thoracic spine. 

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Accountability is more than just a 14-letter word

How do we handle these situations? These errors can change the course of your career if not handled properly. The reason organizations implement drills is to diminish and hopefully eliminate these close calls or occurrences. After the fact, we have to hold ourselves accountable. This could be admitting to a patient that you may have advanced their program too quickly, and this response is good information for moving forward on how their body responds to exercise. Or with the patient who suffered a fall, you could let them know you may have underestimated the magnitude of their balance deficits and you should have been more attentive in the moment. 


What are we afraid of?

Will be there consequences? Absolutely, but when you hold yourself accountable, you’ll never have to keep justifying why the finger is pointed in the direction away from you. The blame game becomes lame (caught that?). It’s a tough topic, but if we start our journey with a pledge of being accountable for our actions in all situations, it will create a level of clinical maturity that just can’t be taught. 
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How do we change it?
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We take the time to become more prepared and avoid risky shortcuts. You never want to be that guy or girl that is driving a car 75 mph on a curvy road with bad brakes because you were being too lazy to get them fixed. Confront bad habits now and use those occurrences to make your story even better to read. Our peers and patients respect us more when we are consistently honest and genuine. Staying true to these principles, regardless of how much “book smarts” we possess, will keep them fans of us for life.