---

Founder, Vance Thompson Vision, Professor of Ophthalmology, University of South Dakota Sanford School of Medicine, USA

Do you have a controversial opinion? 

The patient comes second. At first blush, this sounds blasphemous, but understanding that we took an oath and – yes – we are going to do the right thing for the patient’s medical or surgical issue, but if we truly want to touch our patient deeply with how our clinical experience makes them feel, we need to understand that culturally our team needs to come first, and the patient comes second. 

If your “work family” feels like they are the number one priority and they truly feel loved and cared for, they will love working together for a long, long time and the patient who comes into this atmosphere will say, “I love how they treat each other. I love how they treat me. I trust them to do my surgery and I am going to tell all my friends about this center.” A “team first, patient second” mentality is key to creating a great team and patient experience.