Steven D. LaRowe, Ph.D.Assistant Professor

Department of Psychiatry and Behavioral Sciences

Medical University of South Carolina

Health Behavior CoordinatorRalph H. Johnson VAMC

Motivating your Patients for Behavior Change

Conflicts

No conflicts to reportViews expressed here are those of Dr.

LaRowe and do not necessarily reflect those of MUSC or the VA

The nature of the problem…

Your patient arrives for his (or her) appointment

During the last visit, the patient was advised to follow a treatment plan

Upon his return, you find that that patient has not implemented the plan

What do you do?

The nature of the problem (continued)…

Of course, you again recommend the patient follow the plan

You provide logical reasons why the patient should do so

Perhaps you remind the patient of the health consequences if the plan is not followed

Does the patient argue or does he agree?The patient leaves……and still no changes are made

What’s going on?

Why do patients keep coming to appointments but make no change?

Because the patients wants good health, but also wants to continue to do the things they are doing that cause bad health

“Ambivalence is a state of having simultaneous, conflicting feelings toward a person or thing” – Thanks Wikipedia!

Or, feeling the same way about two different conflicting things

Ambivalence:

I love my cigarettes!

Smoking helps me

relax!

If I don’t quit I’ll have breathing

problems!

Smoking leads to disease or

death!

Patient wants to avoid this…

…but also wants to continue this.

How NOT address ambivalence

Our first instinct is often to provide information to “make it right,” to persuade or convince the patient to change their habits using logic

We should strive to avoid this because it is often ineffective…(but why?)

Hypothesis: If someone is AMBIVALENT and we argue for one side of an issue, their reflex will be to argue the OPPOSITE side of that issue.

In other words, when people feel criticized they tend to defend their behavior.

Arguing with the ambivalence…

I love my ciagrettes

!

Smoking helps me

relax!

If I don’t quit smoking, I can’t get surgery!

Smokingcan lead to

disease or death!

If you don’t quit smoking you can’t get

surgery!

Smokingcan lead to

disease or death!

(Provider)

Provider (logically) argues for change The ambivalent patient will argue for the side of ambivalence that is being attacked!

Provider argues more Patient argues more, and is now less ambivalent towards change than before

What can we do? Motivational Interviewing!

Motivational Interviewing (MI) is• …a conversation, not an argument, about behavior change • …explores ambivalence• …through use of reflective (person centered)

communication skills• …to emphasize the person’s own reasons for change.• It is a strategic conversation method to help a person move

toward a particular change goal• …that uses specific communication techniques to elicit,

strengthen and reinforce change talk• …and provides a way to responds to resistance (non-

change talk) in a non confrontational way

Motivational Interviewing

Is an Evidence-Based Practice associated with better health outcomes: Led to reduced saturated fats (Brug et al. 2007)

Reduced weight, BP, cholesterol (Hardcastle et al. 2008, Armstrong et al. 2011,)

More fruit intake in African Americans (Resincow et al. 2001)

Can be used in brief encountersNOTE: Not a panacea…appropriate for patients

who are ambivalent, but may not be effective for people completely ready to change or people determined to make no changes

Review of MI: Spirit and Basic Skills

While we talk to patients, we want to emphasize their AUTONOMY, talk in a COLLOBORATIVE manner and EVOKE their values and abilities

In this context we use these basic skills… Open-ended questions Affirmations (reflecting a patient’s sense of

his/her own accomplishment) Reflections (MOST IMPORTANT SKILL!) Summaries

OARS: Basic MI Skills…

Open-ended question: Can’t be answered with a simple YES or NO. Examples: “What brings you here today? Tell about…Tell me more about that…”

Affirmation: NOT praise, but a reflection of the patient’s sense of accomplishment. Ex.: “You’re really glad you’ve been able to cut down on sweets.”

Reflection: Paraphrasing, mirroring what patient says, labeling emotions. Ex.: “You have been cutting down on sweets…You seem worried about your diabetes…”

Summarizing: Bring all the above together in a summarizing statement

Goal of MI in Session

Providers often hope that Motivational Interviewing will motivate patients to immediately engage in desired behaviors

But MI Involves engaging in a conversation in the spirit of Autonomy, Collaboration, and Evocati0n, using OARS…

…To elicit and strengthen Change Talk…The theory of MI: Increased Change Talk ->

eventual change

What is Change Talk?

Patient language that moves toward change Opposite from “Sustain Talk” – these are the

reasons that patients give to defend their behavior

Specific to a particular target behavior or set of target behaviors.

Usually initiated by the patient, but also elicited by the clinician.

Expresses patient’s desires, ability, reasons, & need to change

States willingness & intention to change.

Change Talk (DARN C)

Desire for Change: “I think I should probably change my diet; I want, I wish, I would like…”

Ability to Change: “I’ve changed my eating habits before; I can, I could, I am able to…”

Reasons for Change: “Improving my diet will probably help me lose weight.”

Need for Change: “I need to eat less sugar to control my diabetes; I need to, I have to, I must, It’s important that I…”

Commitment to Change: “I will stop eating sugary snacks between meals this week. I will, I intend to, I am going to…”

*** If you are hearing COMMITMENT, I would argue this is the time to starting setting specific goals.***

Gauging expectation for MI Goals

Patient should makes changes (and soon)!!

Use of MI to promote smoking cessation

Providers sometimes expect that MI directly leads to changes and are highly invested in seeing those changes come to light…

…and we might judge the intervention to be unsuccessful if patient does not engage in expected changes right away.

Change Talk

…but the CHANGE TALK is the goal in session.

Evoke Change Talk to Gradually Guide Change

Patient who has expressed change talks starts

incremental movement towards change (e.g.

cutting down, planning)

Use of MI (OARS) to promote change (e.g.

smoking changes)

Using MI skills facilitates change talk within session…

…patient sometimes makes incremental changes on the way to the final change.

Patient expresses desire, ability, reasons, need, commitment to

change.

Change

Made?

NO

YES

Maintenance

Using MI skills to talk about stopping an unhealthy dietary habit…

I love my food!

Yes! (Finally a provider gets me!)

Tell me what you like about

smoking…

You really like to be able to smoke!

(Provider)

Open-Ended Question

What are some of your

concerns about your smoking?

I don’t want smoke

because I could die!

ReflectionOpen-Ended Question

I want to be here for my

children!I know I can

quit, I’ve done it before!

I need to improve my breathing!

Desire

AbilityReason

Need

Let me see if I understand, you don’t want to keep smoking, you’ve quit

before, you want to be here for your children and

improve your breathing

Summary

Where do we go from here?

I think I’ll cut down on my cigarettes,

make an appointment, and start exercising

again next week.

Commitment

Sounds like this is something

you feel confident you

can do!

Affirmation

Motivational Rulers Can Evoke Change Talk

Motivational Ruler: Ask patient to rate importance, readiness, or confidence for change on a scale of 0 (zero) to 10.

Example: “How ready are you to reduce your smoking on a scale of 0 to 10 where 0 is none at all and 10 is extremely important?”

Assuming there is a value other than 0 (zero), ask “Why (their value) and not (a lower value)?” – example, “Why a 5 and not a 2?”

The response to this will usually result in the patient giving you CHANGE TALK…

And this rating reveals much more than a simple yes/no answer

Using Motivational Rulers to evoke change talk…

(Provider)

How important is it

to you to reduce your

smoking?

I would say a 6.

I’d give it an 8.

I’ve done it before!

I need to improve my breathing!

How confident are you that you can make this change on a scale of 0 to

10?

You want to reduce your smoking and

you’ve been able to do it before. Where do we

go fro m here?

I think I will cut down cigarettes,

make an appointment, and start exercising

again next week.

Why a 6 and not a

4?

Why an 8 and not a

4?

Change talk, time to set goals

Barriers to Using MI

Doesn’t it take too much time? It certainly takes time to learn, but can be done in brief

fashion when mastered Sometime reflective listening can diffuse tension and make

patients more receptive

I have to ensure that patients understand a long list of educational information (e.g. in preparation for bariatric surgery, inpatient consults) The use EVOCATIVE spirit of MI to find out what patients

already know, supplement their knowledge Open-ended questions and reflections help us gauge how

well they are learning it

Final Thoughts

MI can be used to help elicit patients’ internal motivation to engage in behaviors necessary to improve dietary practices

MI takes time to learn, but can be used seamlessly within one’s practice once mastered

The motivational ruler is one technique that provides structure to practice these skills in a focused manner

Resources

For training and resources, visit www.motivationalinterviewing.org

Several consultants available via internet search

Steven D. LaRowe, Ph.D. Email: larowe@musc.edu