Streamline your Practice
The doctor-patient relationship always comes first and always should, but that does not mean you cannot streamline your practice processes to improve your time efficiency as a whole. After all, the smoother the process, the more patients you will be able to see, the more time you will be able to spend focusing on clinical management, and the happier your patients will be. The by-product of improved practice finances is an added incentive, even if it is not the driving factor.
Below are some points or processes you might consider to streamline your practice efficiency.
1. Patient flow
Make sure you have a smooth, time-efficient patient booking system. Also, it might seem obvious but know your pace. If you need at least 20 minutes to adequately see patients, then avoid booking patients every 15 minutes to prevent bottle-necks in your waiting rooms.
Tip
There are various booking, billing, and/or practice management software solutions specifically designed to streamline patient flow in medical practices. Many have the added benefit of sending booking confirmations to patients to make sure they remember, which is especially helpful with specialist or follow-up consultations booked far in advance.
2. Information leaflets
Information leaflets or patient brochures can be particularly helpful for topics that typically require longer counselling or education sessions. Providing patients with hard-copy handouts empowers them to educate themselves with evidence-based information. Topics can range from the prevention of common lifestyle conditions coming to your practice, to basic exercises to help with back pain, etc. Taking the time to create these brochures will save you longer consultation times later and streamline patient flow.
3. Know your surroundings
Take the time early on to get to know the specialists, allied healthcare professionals, hospitals, clinics, and other medical facilities and services in your area. Having a list of names and contact details at hand will save you the time of having to search for the information with the patient there. Continually grow your referral base.
4. Consider running campaigns
The kind of campaigns you might want to run will differ from speciality to patient population. For example, if you notice that you see about 5 patients per week for family planning or vitamin B12 injections, consider advertising a day or afternoon specifically for these issues. You might even want to add some other services like flu vaccinations and get a sister to assist with the patients that day, charging them a smaller fee. This will streamline patients and potentially even attract new patients to your practice.
5. Stay on top of your admin
Staying up to date with your admin can be tricky, especially if you do not schedule time into your day for this. Your admin can be anything from calling medical aids for authorisation or registration of new chronic conditions, to calling patients with investigation results. Ideally, you would also include some of your practice admin on a regular basis to make sure you keep up with your financial plan.
6. Take stock
Make sure to keep your finger on the pulse of your practice, so to speak, by scheduling times to monitor its KPIs and progress. Are there any systems or processes that are hindering patient flow? Have any systems or processes become redundant and only add to your expenses? You won’t know unless you take the time to pause and take stock. Doing this regularly will keep your practice running like a well-oiled machine and potentially save you unnecessary effort in the future. Having a good practice management software solution in place will help you even more.
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