Practices are gradually dusting themselves off as they begin to open or ramp up their practice hours as states loosen restrictions. The fall out of the economic downturn hasn’t just been limited to restaurants, event centers, and small businesses. Physicians have had their own share of turmoil and loss of business.
Doctors are going to need problem solvers to help them. Change for doctors has always been hard but COVID means they are being forced to change. These changes mean having to rethink how they did business in the past and how they can better help their patients in the future.
There are 3 key areas that physicians will be looking to help their practices get back to business and care for patients:
- Making their practices safer
- Remote patient services
- Revenue drivers
Making Practices Safer
Talk to your doctor and ask questions including:
How is your access and availability to PPE?
The availability of PPE will continue to be a challenge as global demands will continue for the short term. While some routine supply chains may bring some normality back to this ordering there is a chance that as COVID becomes more prevalent in other countries there will be interruptions to this supply chain. PDMs have the advantage of working with a range of different supply chains to help doctors and other businesses source PPE and testing supplies.
What are you doing to help reduce the time patients are spending in your waiting room?
Risk of contracting COVID increases with the length of time a person is exposed to the virus. Being contained indoors with other people increases the risk. Use of pre arrival patient software and electronic payments are two ways that patients can spend less time in the waiting area. These services reduce the need for sharing air, as well as pens and clipboards that would be used by other patients.
Remote patient services
Talk to your doctor and ask questions including:
What services are you currently offering to patients at home?
Physicians still need to routinely manage their patients but often simply need some data or to ask some questions without the need for a in-person office visit. Remote Patient Monitoring services allow the practice to fill a void inpatient care. Daily recording of data including weight, temperature, blood pressure, and blood glucose can all be used to closely manage patients with RPM services. Medicare aged patients are at the highest risk of complications and therefore keeping them monitored and at home makes sense to proactively address problems as they happen.
What changes would you like to see with your current Telemedicine provider?
Many practices will have very quickly adopted Telemedicine as a service at the onset of COVID. This service exploded in demand at the start of the epidemic as doctors quickly saw a need to keep patients out of their practice. Many of them may have grabbed the first service that came along not knowing what features they would need or want. Areas to consider include security, messaging, ease of access for patient and physician, and potentially EHR integration.
Revenue drivers
Many practices have had to furlough staff and have lost significant revenue. The lead time in receiving insurance reimbursements means that they had money continue to come in for several weeks but many now will be experiencing a hiatus due to reduced provider activity.
Practices may be looking for low or no-cost solutions to drive revenue and products that pay cash.
Talk to your doctor and ask questions including:
How are you planning to recoup some of your lost revenue?
Listen to what they say and then find solutions to match their needs. Get into a conversation – ask questions and find out what the gaps are. Remote services here can help, allergy, equipment or even cash-based products including regenerative medicine or the sale of products such as CBD can bring in some quick cash.
What will you do to proactively address the health of at-risk patients?
COVID has highlighted the accountability that each patient has for their own health. Many patients have expected a prescription for medication to help fix their health care problems. COVID isn’t fixed with a simple tablet. Good health is the best defense. Doctors can better diagnose patient health care and find patients that are at risk proactively with the right solutions. Preventative testing, equipment, and weight loss all offer help for patients to become more aware of their health state and to improve it.
The best thing you can do right now is to talk with your physicians and find out what is keeping them awake at night. Then listen. Become a resource for them to help solve their problems so they can rise out of COVID with a strong practice with healthier patients.