Helping Your Medical Practice to Thrive

Many medical practices are struggling to thrive in this post-pandemic world. This can be caused by a variety of reasons: staff burnout, staff shortages, failure to adapt to new telehealth demands, lack of efficiency, not meeting the increasing demands of their patients, or a combination of several of these. Genesis Medical Management provides a few tips for medical practices to adapt and thrive during these trying times.

Ever since the pandemic began the medical field has been on overdrive trying to deal with a variety of issues. It isn’t just the number of people getting COVID-19, but all the ramifications of the pandemic, from mental health issues to delayed elective surgeries creating health problems to patients avoiding wellness appointments and more. This increased level of work has created significant burnout and driven many medical staff away from the healthcare field, causing crisis level shortages in qualified healthcare staff.

Medical practices need to adapt and change to address staff burnout and shortages. The priority is to retain your current staff by helping to prevent burnout, so implement strategies such as allowing flexible scheduling, working from home when possible, and improving efficiency to lighten their workload.

Adapting your procedures to increase efficiency will also allow your practice to thrive with a smaller staff that can focus on patient care. Simple procedures, such as allowing patients to check-in for appointments online and updating their medical needs and current medications list, can save crucial staff time. Encouraging applicable appointments to occur through telehealth is also a significant resource saver. Streamlined and standardized communication processes between staff and patients will improve quality of care, efficiency, and patient satisfaction. Another way to create efficiency within the office is to identify ways of grouping similar appointment types.

Include all staff in developing and implementing new procedures to improve efficiency and reduce workload. Hold regular staff get-togethers to discuss strategies and solutions. A weekly huddle for 30 minutes can save significant time and resources by getting everyone on the same page and allowing new ideas to flourish. One of the biggest mistakes a practice can make is to think they are too busy for staff to meet and strategize, it is actually a proven time saver overall, and becomes an important morale booster as staff realize their thoughts and ideas are important to the rest of the team.

Patients are demanding more from their medical practices, including online access to their medical records and electronic communication with their doctor and medical staff. Medical practices must ensure they are offering their patients an online portal. This not only provides patient satisfaction, but it also saves time and resources and ensures transparency in treatment.

Genesis Medical Management recommends that medical practices implement these time saving resources to help their staff to succeed. Some of these simple procedures can reduce staff burnout and help your practice to grow and thrive.