Well I hope everyone is enjoying their spring. It’s nice when we finally hit a spot in our practice when we aren’t incredibly busy. Over the last few weeks, we have had some days where we actually had 5-10 spots open at the end of the day. After the winter we’ve had, those kinds of days are a pleasant treat for everyone.
But, when you have 2 weeks of days where every provider has 5-10 spots open at the end of the day, that does not continue to be pleasant as a practice owner. How many of you are in the same situation I am in? As we’ve gone through our busy winter, we’ve hired another Physician Assistant and 2 more full-time nurses. Now that we have that extra financial commitment, what things can you do to ‘buff up’ the times when you are not seeing patients?
The way I look at it is there are 2 things you can do. You can get more patients in the doors, or you can put your people to work doing non-patient care activities. But you can’t let them ‘work’ and do nothing. What does that mean?
First, we can do things to get more patients in the door. Here’s what we are doing: Anytime one of the nurses or receptionists have free time, we go down the list of patients coming in tomorrow. We call the patient and try to confirm their appointment personally. Then we indicate it on the schedule so that someone else doesn’t do the same thing.
Next, if someone is 30 minutes past their appointment, we call them and ask if everything is all right. If possible, we then offer to set them up an appointment in the next 1-2 days to replace the missed visit.
Third, we have a list of patients that are due for health maintenance visits. This is based on their age and the last time they were seen for a ‘well’ visit. This list is kept up front with the receptionist. Whenever a patient checks out, our policy is to always schedule them a follow-up appointment. If they are due for a well checkup, we try to schedule that just 1-2 weeks in advance and explain why they need to have it done.
Fourth, the receptionist checks the list of patients that need Well Visits. When a patient checks in or out (depending on how much time we have), we look to see if any family members are due for check-ups. If so, go ahead and get them scheduled for the next couple of weeks.
And fifth, we take the list of patients that need checkups and send out a letter by mail. It simply explains that they are due for the visit, and that most insurance companies encourage their clients to make sure they get all their routine visits in a timely fashion.
Once a month we will update this list and continue with all the above things. Typically we do this every month until we are busy enough that we don’t need the extra business.
Next week, I’ll go over part two of my plan. How can we put our office staff to work doing non-patient care things?