Dealing With Huge Medical Practice Running Costs: How To Bring Them Down

There’s no getting around it – the cost of running a medical practice is high. However, that doesn’t mean you have to accept high bills without hesitation. High running costs slow down your practice and make it difficult to provide quality care to your patients. You’ll be more stressed, and your patients will ultimately be the ones who are affected. Here are some helpful tips to bring down your medical practice’s running costs. 

Hire Virtual Assistants Instead of Full-Time Employees

One way to reduce your running costs is to hire a virtual medical scribe instead of a full-time administration assistant. Virtual assistants work remotely, usually from their home country. They’re experts in a particular area and can help you with various tasks, such as billing, transcription, and marketing.

Hiring a virtual assistant is a great way to reduce your running costs because you only pay for their work hours. You don’t have to worry about paying for benefits, such as health insurance and retirement pensions. A virtual assistant is qualified and experienced in the area you need help with.

Use Technology To Reduce Paperwork

Another way to reduce your running costs is to use technology to reduce the amount of paperwork you produce. For example, you can use electronic health records (EHRs) to store patient information. Doing so reduces the amount of paper you need to print out and file.

You can also use online tools to bill patients and manage appointments -most of them will save you both time and money. They’re also more efficient than traditional methods, which means you can see more patients in a day. Technology also allows you to communicate with patients and other healthcare professionals electronically, creating convenience and saving time.

Reduce Costs That Don’t Contribute to Better Healthcare

Analyze your costs and identify which ones are contributing to better healthcare for your patients, and which ones are not. For example, you may want to reduce your advertising budget, or the amount you spend on office supplies. You can also reduce the amount you spend on rent or lease a smaller office. However, make sure the office you lease is still big enough to accommodate your needs.

Other than this, check whether you’re paying multiple subscriptions for software or services you don’t use. You can also save money by negotiating lower prices for supplies.

Reduce Bureaucracy

Bureaucracy can be a major contributor to high running costs. It creates inefficiencies and wastes valuable time and money. Reduce bureaucracy by streamlining your processes and eliminating unnecessary steps. You can also make sure all your employees are trained the same and follow the same procedures.

Involve the Staff in Reducing Costs

Your staff is a valuable resource when it comes to reducing costs. Ask them for ideas on how to reduce expenses. You may be surprised at the amount of money your staff can save you. They may also have suggestions on how to improve your practice’s efficiency. Together, you can develop ways to reduce your running costs without compromising the quality of care you provide.

Adopt Industry Best Practices

It’s always a good idea to learn from colleagues in other industries. Many of them have already found ways to reduce their running costs. Consider their best practices and see how you can apply them to your medical practice. Some of the things that can help reduce costs are:

• Efficient use of space – can you use less space and still provide the same level of care?
• Error-free processes – can you eliminate or reduce the number of mistakes made?
• Staff training and development – is there a way to improve staff efficiency or train new skills?

Reduce Waste

Waste is a major contributor to high running costs. Reduce waste by eliminating unnecessary steps in your processes, recycling, composting, and using energy-efficient equipment.

Ensure Accurate Patient Identification

Inaccurately identifying patients has several disadvantages – it creates duplicate medical records, overlays, patient mix-ups, denied claims, and more – all of which can become significant losses to any medical practice.  This occurs because patients are misidentified when they have common names or characteristics – leading to the patient being treated using an entirely different EHR! The consequences of patient misidentification are catastrophic as the patient’s life is on the line – they might get treated for a condition they don’t have! 

Fortunately, a touchless biometric patient identification platform like RightPatient helps associate EHRs with the appropriate patients accurately. Patients registered with the platform only need to look at the camera – RightPatient does the rest, making it one of the most ideal ways to tackle mix-ups.   

Continually Analyze the Running Costs To Remain Profitable

Implementing some or all of these tips reduces your medical practice’s running costs. This will allow you to provide better care for your patients while still staying within your budget. Remember to continually analyze your costs and look for new ways to reduce them. Doing so ensures your practice remains profitable and sustainable in the long run.