High unemployment, loss of insurance coverage, higher deductibles, other priorities, the recession: all factors that have led to patients spending less on their healthcare, according to a recent report in the journal Health Affairs.

What does this mean for your practice? If you’re like thousands of other private practices, you have felt the financial impact of patients spending less or delaying services. “An ounce of prevention is worth a pound of cure,” you tell them!

Meanwhile, your practice has more compliance regulations to follow and more claims to reprocess. The first instinct is for physician-owned practices to neglect customer service, control costs, ask employees to do more with less, and reflect on “the golden days of medicine.”

But the most successful practices aren’t wondering if the good ol’ days will return. They believe, like influential management thinker Peter Drucker, the best way to predict the future is to create it.

Now, more than ever, medical practices should be focusing (and spending money) on providing value. When is the last time you asked one of your patients “are you getting a good value when you come to our practice?”

Here are 5 simple things your practice can do to provide better value that will both make a difference to your patients, and differentiate you from the competition:

1.) Call every patient the following day and ask them “were you satisfied with the service we provided?” – if they answer “no,” listen to what they have to say and fix it.
2.) Greet every patient who walks through the door like a VIP — get your phones out of the check-in area, look patients in the eye, and tell them you are thankful they came in today.
3.) Make sure you’ve provided a clear road map — patients won’t know how to get there if they don’t know where they are going; print out an “future services” itinerary for them on every visit. (Mayo Clinic does this.)
4.) Educate your patients on “what’s in it for them” — do they have all the information they need to make a good decision? Don’t assume they will fill in the gaps, or they will with whatever is online.
5.) Don’t make your patients wait inexplicably on anyone in your practice — no one likes to waste time waiting on other people, including your patients; impart of sense or urgency with your staff that it’s not okay to run late and that it is paramount to return calls in a timely manner.

The success of your practice is your responsibility. Be proactive, leverage technology and don’t accept that good is good enough. Your patients are taking notes.

If you have questions or need advice on how to thrive in a complex environment, call us!

It’s the elephant in the room. No doctor wants to speak publicly about the economics of medicine. Yet, with half the physicians in the US operating a private practice, you should be.

For too long, physicians have sat idly by and watched reimbursement drop, seen insurance companies become more restrictive with treatment, and been bombarded with increased regulation and compliance standards — all to the detriment of patient care and to your business.

Now is the time for action. Your patients do not want to be 65 years old – or in need of care today — and find every smart doctor is no longer in practice because the “system” squeezed them out.

As with any successful endeavor you need a plan. Here’s an outline:

1. Understand the economics of your practice
   • What percent overhead are you running?
   • How much revenue do you produce?
   • What are the main drivers of that revenue?
   • How will that revenue be influenced by changes to reimbursement?
   • How many patients do you need to see to cover your overhead?
   • How much cash do you need on hand?
   • What drives your costs?
   • Do you know how to create a P&L or income statement?
2. Understand how reimbursement works
   • How many days does it take to collect dollars generated today?
   • What is your clean claims rate?
   • What is your denial rate?
   • Does your documentation meet medical necessity?
   • What is your billing workflow?
   • Are you collecting your contracted rate?
3. Be a master of efficiency
   • Read Six Sigma principles
   • Analyze your workflow
   • Analyze your schedule
   • Are you leveraging mid-level providers?
   • Are you performing the tasks only you can perform?
4. Market yourself
   • What is your unique selling proposition?
   • Do you have a web presence?
   • Do you a cohesive brand strategy?
   • What does your logo say about your practice?
   • How are you developing your network?
   • Do you know the law on what you can and can’t do (Stark & Anti-kickback in particular)
5. Leverage Technology
   • Do you track where your referrals are coming from?
   •  Do you have custom software applications that help you make decisions about purchasing, payments, or insurance verification?
   • Have you chosen an EMR? If so, are your utilizing its capability?
   • How do you confirm appointments?
6. Find good help
   • Find a solid healthcare attorney that can advise on Stark, Anti-kickback, OIG regulations, etc
   • Determine where you are helping and hurting when it comes to running the business
   • Find a trustworthy accountant
   • Fight the urge to maintain control over every aspect of the practice and hire smart, honest people to help

At the end of the day, a physician is the only one with the training to take care of a suffering patient. Until recently this skill was all you needed to be successful in the business. But increased regulation, decreased reimbursement and lack of industry leadership mean physicians need to raise their level of competence when it comes to running a successful practice. Graduating from medical school and doing a prestigious residency and fellowship simply isn’t sufficient anymore. It is worth remembering Einstein now more than ever when he said “problems cannot be solved with the same level of thinking that created them.” I’m no Einstein, but I know physicians need to be smarter than they have been if they hope to continue providing care to the many patients who need it.