Therapy Practice Essentials: How to Establish Clear Communication with Patients
Communication is key to any thriving business, but especially to a therapy practice. This is because yours is a patient-centric, relationship-centric business. When you have frequent, straightforward methods of talking with the people that are benefitting from your services, they feel valued and seen. Therefore, they keep coming back!
At Clinic Connection, we believe in building quality relationships to support all facets of professional growth, including the credentialing tasks in which we specialize. However, we also want you to be able to achieve this with ease and efficiency. Here are a few easy ways to initiate or improve upon the communication you and your staff have with patients.
Create an Accurate Therapy Appointment Scheduling System
Perhaps the most significant area of clinic-to-patient interaction for a therapy practice is appointment scheduling. It’s helpful to think as the patient would when you set up your preferred system. Imagine asking questions like: Who is my primary contact for scheduling? Should I schedule with my therapist or an admin? Do I need to call the office or can I schedule an appointment online? What if I need to reschedule or cancel an appointment?
You’ll first want to be sure you have a clear answer to each of these. Then, think about how those answers will be communicated to patients. You have many choices about what type of calendar to use, rescheduling procedures, whether to implement text message reminders, etc. For detailed tips about managing appointment booking, check out this post from our partner EMR, TheraPlan.
Notify Patients About Appointments and Schedule Changes
Not only will patients appreciate being notified about any schedule changes, but they will love to see all your other attempts to keep them informed. Something as simple as printed signs in your office can work wonders for creating a feeling of connectedness to your customer base. Use clear, concise signage to inform patients of changes to your policies, remind them to check on insurance renewals, and tell them about upcoming local events or holiday office closures.
If your business has an online presence, duplicate these notices on Facebook and Instagram, or send out an email blast to stay engaged with patients and let them know you’re invested in making therapy a positive component of their lives.
Build Operational Standards for Internal Communication
Especially if you have a large therapy clinic, the line of communication with patients originates from quality internal dialogue. Encourage therapists to stay in touch with your admin staff about specific patients who have unusual schedules or unique needs. Consider establishing protocol with new staff members about the quantity and timing of all communication. You can do this using a document much like the “Credentialing Guidelines” one that we suggested in this post.
Also, we recommend assigning a go-to staff member for each type of communication and making use of an easy digital messaging system for your team. Empower your staff to go above and beyond when it comes to customer service, as this will create a culture that contributes to word-of-mouth marketing and positive feedback.
Positive Communication is a Core Business Principle
No matter which methods you choose to use, spending a few extra minutes and dollars to make sure that patients understand their relationship to your clinic can prevent confusion in the long run. Believe it or not, this can have a direct effect on your revenue and all other aspects of your clinic’s daily operations. You’ll prevent missed appointments, keep therapists providing treatment on an accurate schedule, and create a conversational system that has positive effects on every other element of your business.
We may be the credentialing experts, but we also recognize that things like patient relationships are just as critical to the big picture of your entrepreneurial life. For more personalized advice about running a smooth therapy practice, reach out to us today.
