Patient no-shows create a domino effect. Patients might think it’s not such a bad idea because the doctor can spread the time across the day and spend more time with them. But, a doctor alone does not a medical practice make.

Staff supporting a doctor go underutilized. Exam rooms go unused. There’s a direct impact on revenue. It why there’s always a priority placed on calling scheduled patients to remind them of upcoming appointments. Consider the salary of your support staff involved in making these calls. You’ll realize that it’s a cost of thousands of dollars a year—and it might not even pay for itself. Turn that expense into an investment with the right automated appointment reminder system. Here’s what to look for:

Plays Well with Others

Doctors are already aware of the multitude of software systems they have running things throughout the office. One of the biggest frustrations an office can experience is the inability for these systems to communicate with each other. In the end, a system that’s supposed to save time and money ends up actually costing more of both.

Yes, you want to make sure you’re satisfied with the way a system can be used to call patients to remind them of upcoming appointments. Many of these systems may not be capable of interfacing with other systems you have in place—such as your daily patient schedule from your practice management software.

Make sure the appointment reminder system you choose can read patient schedules. Otherwise, you’ll have to manually enter whom the reminder system must call, and you’ll double the amount of work. It can also increase unnecessary data errors.

We’ve Got Enough Hardware and Phone Lines Already

Say, “No, thank you,” to any appointment reminder system that’ll require you to purchase or lease more hardware or phone lines. This is a capital expense that’ll go right to your bottom line. Maintenance and support only adds to the financial burden.

Look instead at Internet-based appointment reminder systems. Yes, the cloud is coming to your office—or maybe it’s your office that’s migrating to the cloud. No matter which direction, an Internet-based appointment reminder system requires no additional hardware or phone line costs. This makes it an operating expense.

The Right Message to the Right Patients

Your staff isn’t just calling patients to remind them of an upcoming appointment. The message often changes based on the type of visit, and there also can be important additional information a patient needs to know. For example, maybe the billing department needs a patient to bring along their new health insurance card, as there’s been a change in coverage.

We also live in a diverse world where the ability to deliver multilingual messages helps to ensure that patients will show up for the appointments they’ve made.

Look for an appointment reminder system that allows you to create customized messages that can be stored and delivered automatically to patients based on the appropriate situation for them. The same use of technology can be put in place to select the most appropriate language for the reminders themselves.
 
You’re not making the best use of your staff, and you’re also likely losing a lot of money if you still make manual phone calls to remind patients of upcoming appointments. You can make an easy and inexpensive switch if you keep these tips in mind when you let technology make those calls for you.

Technology that makes things easier for medical professionals and their staffs is the guiding principle behind the products Vitacon distributes. The vein finding technology used by the IV-eye portable, handheld vein finder is a proud example. Use this link to have a distributor contact you.

You’ve got a wide variety of personalities you need to understand to manage a staff. Often, we tell ourselves that the only way to be a good manager is to “put ourselves in their shoes.” So, we attempt to sympathize with the people we manage. The dictionary tells us that “sympathize” is the action of agreeing with a sentiment or action.

How can you sympathize with a sentiment or action that you know is incorrect—especially if it puts a patient in jeopardy or causes financial damage? As a manager, you need to practice empathy, not sympathy. It’s similar, but there’s a different outcome. Empathy is the ability to understand—yet still disagree. Successful managers use empathy to lead through understanding. Here are ways you can use empathy:

Ask for Opinions                                                                           

Empathetic managers know that they don’t always have all the information to act on a situation. Rather than ask someone what they know about a situation, ask them how they would handle it, instead. You’ll accomplish two things:

1. You’ll demonstrate that you want to understand things from their point of view.
2. You’ll also discover what they know about a situation because it becomes the basis of how they explain their point of view.

You often will find this approach helps you to uncover peoples’ areas of expertise, too. Use that to your advantage when it happens. Give them an opportunity to shine. Successful managers practice empathy as a way to gain a deeper understanding of how to motivate people.

Express Authority for the Right Reasons

There’s the obligatory “why”—which is not always voiced—when a manager assigns tasks and responsibilities. Successful leaders find they spend less time explaining the reasons driving management decisions when they demonstrate empathy.

In this case, they use empathy to understand why people want to know the reason for their selection. It becomes an easy explanation based on a simple equation. “I understand that you’re good at X, which is the reason why I’ve asked you to do Y.” It’s a motivational strategy, as well. You’re communicating that you want people to succeed by managing their ability focus on what they do well.

Laugh

You’re already aware of humor’s health benefits. There’s no official decree stating that managers must be forever serious. You cannot practice empathy without showing your lighter side. A smile is the universal sign of openness and receptivity. Make it your guiding principle. A sense of humor, along with openness and demonstrating fairness make a strong statement. It says, “I care.”

Technology that makes things easier for medical professionals and their staffs is the guiding principle behind the products Vitacon distributes. The vein finding technology used by the IV-eye portable, handheld vein finder is a proud example. Use this link to have a distributor contact you.

​Providing quality care at a long-term care facility is already stressful enough without adding in the concerns of what an upcoming state audit might uncover. The solution is to have a successful monitoring program in place to watch for and rectify anything these audits might catch.

Long-term care facilities have a wide range of obligations that audits will track, ranging from privacy regulations to quality of treatment. You know what they’re looking for, so that shouldn’t be causing the stress. It’s making sure you’re actually doing what’s necessary to pass the audit that’s likely keeping you up at night. Here are ways to reduce that stress.

Take a Risk-Based Approach

Assess your facility as if you didn’t work there. Most long-term care facilities take a robust approach to audit financial return on investment. That’s obviously important for the continuing operation of your facility—but healthy profit margins won’t overcome risks identified by an audit. Those might shut you down.

You already know what the auditors are looking for. Which areas open you to the most possible risk? Quality of care is relatively easy to self-monitor. You see that daily as you make your way through the facility. The same could be said for care planning and medication management.

But how about billing and cost reporting? Do your patient record creation and retention practices meet state and federal compliance laws?

Determine which areas expose your facility to the greatest risk of failing an audit. You obviously won’t take your eye off areas where you’re doing well—but stress is often caused more by what you don’t know. You may not like what your self-auditing efforts currently tell you. It’s better for you to uncover this bad news than discover it during an audit.  

Create an Effective Monitoring Program

Your car stays on the road because your hands are constantly on the steering wheel. Your long-term care facilities efforts to remain in compliance with state and federal policies in order to pass audits need that same firm grip.

Perhaps the most crucial and effective way to implement a deeper level of monitoring is to step up your educational processes. Your staff is already highly trained in their respective fields. However, are they also aware of what auditors will look for?

The careful blending of your facility’s internal best practices with audit criteria results in a roadmap that generates quality care, professional standards, and a passing score for your next audit. It’s not easy to stay compliant, but it’s easy to—and far less stressful—to identify your obstacles and get them out of the way than to be surprised by them during an audit.          

Technology that makes things easier for medical professionals and their staffs is the guiding principle behind the products Vitacon distributes. The vein finding technology used by the IV-eye portable handheld vein finder is a proud example. Use this link to have a distributor contact you.

​The world is pretty much familiar with intravenous therapy, thanks to the profusion of medical TV shows and the Internet. Even if they’ve never personally experienced it, they’re also likely to be afraid of any type of procedure involving a PIV.

They’ve felt the pain of a failed needlestick. Or, they’ve seen it on the face of someone else. The irony is that many people today are less afraid of many kinds of medical trauma or procedures than they are of a nurse or medical technician’s attempt to place a PIV.

Statistics Speak                                                                             

• Approximately 90% of patients admitted to hospitals receive intravenous therapy. Successful placement of a PIV is surprisingly only 57% successful after two attempts.
• These statistics change dramatically if the PIV placement is done by a vascular access nurse who has undergone specific training to assess these devices’ placement, maintenance, and removal.
• PIV placement is one of the top three skills that graduate nurses say they are uncomfortable performing.

More Education and Technology Assistance is Needed
Nurses and medical technicians are the main healthcare professionals who provide and monitor PIV therapy. Programs to help them improve knowledge and skills is certainly the answer; however, technology is also getting into the act.

Devices such as the IV-eye® portable vein finder can assist in the identification, assessment and preservation of peripheral blood vessels. The IV-eye provides a real-time, clear image of a patient’s vascular structure.

The benefit is multifold. When you reduce the number of failed needlesticks, you also reduce the related costs. You save time, as well as delays in treatment. Equally as important, you reduce your patients’ fear and discomfort. This is crucial when you consider that their willing participation helps in just about all procedures.

The IV-eye uses near infrared (NIR) LEDs to trans-illuminate the patient’s limb from both sides of the target area. The NIR light penetrates deep into the patient’s skin and subcutaneous tissue, where it’s captured by the device’s camera. It’s processed to display a real-time image of the patient’s vascular structure.

The device shows a red line on the display, allowing you to align with the vein. This red line continues as a red light projected onto the patient’s skin to help identify the needle insertion point. It’s about the size of a smartphone. The IV-eye can reduce the inflated fear of failed needlesticks for both medical professionals and patients.

​Technology that makes things easier for medical professionals and their staffs is the guiding principle behind the products Vitacon distributes. The vein finding technology used by the IV-eye portable handheld vein finder is a proud example. Use this link to have a distributor contact you.