MANAGEMENT ESSENTIALS

Fulfilling the prophecy of greater patient flow

The Baby Boomer influx won’t keep you in business if you can’t keep patients coming back.

By Farrell “Toby” Tyson, MD, FACS

Farrell C. Tyson, MD, FACS, is a refractive cataract/glaucoma eye surgeon at the Cape Coral Eye Center in Florida. He may be reached at tysonfc@hotmail.com.

Lately, I’ve been hearing optimistic consultants crowing that the best days of ophthalmology are ahead of us. We are told of a coming tsunami of Baby Boomer patients entering Medicare age. What these supposed soothsayers fail to explain is that a stable ophthalmology practice must consist of approximately 29% new patients. If the number of new patients falls to 20% or fewer, the practice is in decline.

POSTCARDS DON’T WORK

Attracting new patients is more costly than retaining current ones. Most practices send out postcard reminders to recall patients. This method doesn’t bring a lot of patients back, and the costs of postage and printing are skyrocketing. A poor rate of success combined with a need to replace a third of your practice annually with new patients means you are counting on most of your patients to make it into your practice on their own. Surely we can do better.

PREVENTING LOSSES

Scheduling pre-appointments is one successful method of preventing patient loss. If the patient isn’t due back for another year, then the practice schedules a tentative appointment for a year out.

Most practices don’t have schedules made out a year in advance, but it’s not so difficult to anticipate a schedule similar to the previous year. Because these future dates are likely to change, the patient needs to be contacted a month in advance to remind him or her of the appointment and to adjust the dates and times as necessary. This way, patients don’t get lost in the recall system. Making sure patients receive reminder calls with enough advance is key to making this method work. Otherwise, you may end up with a lot of no-shows.

RECALL SOFTWARE

Another method of recalling patients involves using a proprietary recall software program that integrates into a practice management system. You can use it to program different filters, based on service provider, diagnosis code, date of last visit, any procedure codes or lack thereof, or other variables of your choice. This allows you to generate a call list of high-value patients who have been lost to follow up.

Besides generating a call list, these systems also track the conversion rates of those calls, calls per-hour, number of appointments made, deceased patients, patients who will not return and their reasons, and dollars collected in association with calls made. These systems are typically associated with a 10% to 20% conversion rate, which more than covers any software fees.

Once your patients are scheduled, it’s best to confirm the day before the appointment. This will help reduce the no-show ratio. In ophthalmology, many of our patients are elderly and require a live person to interact with over the phone. Yet the use of text messaging, e-mail, and phone automation is becoming commonplace for a lot of our patients. Several practice management systems can now incorporate automated appointment confirmation via phone or e-mail.

The use of these systems, combined with the influx of Baby Boomers will help practices achieve the promises consultants have been prophesying. OM