Improving Patient Care

Need solutions on how to improve your patient no-shows?

In an article published by Family Practice Management, they offered tips on how to improve patient care as well as how to manage the "habitual" no-show patient.

Many practices do not have a policy to address the problem of missed appointments and cancellations. According to the article, only 46% had policies in place to address missed appointments and cancellations.

Some solutions mentioned in the article were as follows:

• Double booking patients
• This is not always the best solution
• "First-come, first-served" models
• Negative about this is the long wait
• Not a good solution for many of the problem patients
• Added a "new doctor" named Virtual Physician ("Dr. VP") 
• If they are a "habitual" no-show patient and schedule an appointment they were added to this doctors queue
• By doing this they do not effect the regularly scheduled patient
• 6-month alternative scheduling probation
• Contacted the patient by letter and phone
• If they made their scheduled appointments, they would return to the normal scheduling (and not Dr. VP)
• They could only see their primary care physician - unless their needs are for acute care
• If they did not make their appointments after 6-months, they could be terminated from the practice

To view the full article, please click the following link: Managing No-Show Patients

For additional billing and coding resources, please click the following link: Medical Reimbursement Resources Page