Why should treatment presentations be scheduled in the morning, and what does decision fatigue have to do with it?
Because human decision-making quality degrades through the day as the brain’s executive-function reserves get spent on every choice, large and small. By late afternoon, even highly capable people default to the safest-sounding option, which usually means choosing not to commit to anything significant. A treatment presentation scheduled for four in the afternoon walks into a patient whose decision energy is mostly used up. They listen, they may agree the recommendation makes sense, and they defer the actual commitment. The same patient in the same conversation at nine in the morning has a fresh mind, ample executive function, and a much higher probability of committing decisively. The ethical implication matters. The doctor schedules morning treatment presentations not to manipulate but to give the patient the best possible conditions for making a sound decision about their own health. Pressuring a tired patient into a yes backfires anyway, since fatigued minds default to no. The morning slot serves the patient’s interests.
If the answers you are finding here resonate with you, my team and I work with a small group of clients each year. The next step is a complimentary Discovery Consultation and Practice Review with Dr. McAnally.