Slower schedule than you'd like?

October 8, 2011

Hi all,

I just wanted to pass along what we have done to fill our schedule,

just when we thought Steve might have to close the practice, as we

cannot survive with 5 patients/day, 4 days/week. October is

historically our slowest month (flu shots are the only thing that gets

patients walking thru the door), followed closely by June, so we

needed to act quickly.

Anyways, now that most health plans are covering preventives with no

copay/deductible, we have started sending out letters to all of our

patients that have not been in for at least 18 months. We have never

done this before, mainly because we have a young practice (6 years

into it now) and we were still trying to get our ducks in a row. We

are getting about a 20% response so far, and our schedule is filling

up nicely (not too busy, not too slow). The past 2 weeks (we started

sending out letters about 3 weeks ago), we have gone from 5

follow-ups/day to yesterday being our busiest Friday ever with 12

patients plus 6 flu shots! I know this is busier than some of you

want to be, but we need to fill our schedule most of the 4 days we are

in the office in order to fulfill our financial responsibilities

(mostly rent and house payment!). We offer 20 minute follow-ups, and

our physicals are 40-60 minutes, depending on the age and complexity

of the patient. On a busy day we can see 14 patients (although our

schedule has a max of 18 slots per day, we use multiple slots for

PE's).

For a small investment of time, envelopes, and stamps, we are seeing a

nice ROI, as 20 preventive exams pays about $2500 in our area

(depending on age). We have yet to see if there is an improvement in

the health of our patients. No huge surprises or " saves " on any labs

yet, but we are getting patients in for their mammos, colonoscopies,

etc. much better than we were previously.

We have only gotten letters out to people on our list that popped up

in our HMO's P4P reports plus everyone else A-J. This has been a nice

surprise for us to increase contact with our patients and make sure

they are staying healthy.

Just wanted to share, hope you all have a great weekend!

Pratt

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