Tips to Improve Patient Experience and Profitability at your Practice

Patient satisfaction plays an important role in enhancing physician reimbursement. Sadly, majority of practices have not yet acknowledged the significance of this aspect. They fail to realize that patients want more than just accurate diagnosis and appropriate prescribing. In order to increase revenue and profitability, physicians need to provide a positive experience and establish a good relationship with the patients.

Industry Facts :

According to the Medical Group Management Association (MGMA), approximately 80% of “better performing” practices make use of patient satisfaction surveys

As per the Cleveland Clinic survey, around 85% patients said that there was at least one factor about their doctor’s clinic that affected them

Common Problems Faced by Patients

• Appointment scheduling issues
• Long waiting hours at the clinic
• Doctors give less time per patient
• No scope of establishing a rapport with the doctor
• Untrained, rude front-desk staff
• Unclear follow-up plans

How can Practices Improve Patient Satisfaction?

The profitability of a medical practice is directly related to patient experience. Growing numbers of practices across the US have started surveying their patients on a frequent basis. They are conducting these surveys to come up with effective solutions to improve patient satisfaction levels. These surveys have helped physicians improve communication with their patients. It has also helped them bring significant changes in the practice workflow, enhance overall performance and prepare for any changes in future patient satisfaction requirements.

• Practices also need to improve access to care, quality of care and co-ordination of care in order to improve patient experience
• Well-trained front-desk staffs need to be hired to ensure that the first-hand experience of patients is satisfactory and appointment scheduling doesn’t get affected
• Physicians should devote more time to patients rather than spending hours on documentation or monitoring the progress of the billing department
• Physicians need to examine the processes and structure of their practice to bring in more improvements

How can you Devote Time towards Improving Patient Experience?

These solutions can be implemented only when physicians strike a right balance between clinical and admin tasks. Considering the current scenario of the US healthcare industry, practices are finding it difficult to devote time towards improvement of patient experience. Annual payment cuts and stringent billing and coding reforms are forcing them to work hard in order to make ends meet.

Are you facing similar challenges? If yes, outsourcing your billing needs to a billing partner like MedicalBillersandCoders.com can help you achieve the desired results. Companies like MBC have a strong team of highly-trained coders and billers who will strengthen your revenue cycle while you focus on attending patients. The company also offers effective patient scheduling solutions so that physicians can streamline office tasks and heavy patient inflow with ease.

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Published By - Medical Billers and Coders
Published Date - Oct-09-2014 Back