PENSACOLA, FL – In an effort to bolster patient satisfaction scores, doctors at Sacred Heart Health System have been mandated to rub patients’ bellies, say “Good patient, good patient!!” and give them a treat, according to sources.

“This past year’s HCAHPS scores were below expectation, so we had no choice,” explained Sacred Heart CEO Jonathan Sacred-Heart, adding that he developed the mandate after rubbing his golden retriever’s belly and watching him revel in it led to the epiphany.  “Whatever is good enough for my dog, Kudos, must be good for our patients.”

It is Sacred-Heart’s belief that gently rubbing tummies should bring back happy childhood memories for patients.  “I’d bet patients would wag their tails if patients had tails to wag,” said Sacred-Heart.  Saying “Good patient, good patient” should acknowledge that the patient is well-behaved and on the road to recovery.  Finally, by giving the patient a treat it reinforces patient behavior as Pavlov did with his dogs.

“What the treat is, we’ll leave that up to our health care professionals,” added Sacred-Heart, but did imagine that graham crackers and turkey sandwiches might be some good initial options.  Or maybe even a Trendelenburger.

“You know what treat I’m not going to give them?  Dilaudid,” insisted hospitalist Rodrigo Villanueva, telling Gomerblog that he could get on board with rubbing bellies, barking orders, and teaching patients new tricks.  “But the treats?  No Dilaudid.  I gotta have some degree of self-respect, right?”

Villanueva ended by rubbing our bellies, our fat Gomerblog reporter bellies, much to our delight, saying “Good Gomerblog, good Gomerblog!”