For any business with high fixed costs (like a health care practice), the main way to grow margins is by increasing volume. Too often, provider organizations try to grow margins through incremental projects, such as contract negotiations and billing automation. These are important features for a practice; however, they can be cumbersome, if a practice has gaping holes in its schedules, their effect can be limited.
High-performing practices prioritize patient acquisition and treat other projects as ancillary. They know that the way to grow their margins and thrive is by focusing on volume: getting more new patients in the door. One major way to do this is providing ample availability. These successful practices deploy a range of tactics to achieve this aim and stand out to patients.
Fast Access
The typical Zocdoc booking is for an appointment that takes place within 24 to 72 hours, which tells us that near-term availability is a crucial component to serving patient needs and building trust. This approach responds to observed patient behavior, where preferences for fast bookings overwhelmingly win out.
That’s a tight window for a practice to acquire a patient, but it’s one in which high-performing practices are giving themselves more opportunities. Our data shows that large provider groups offer more same-day, next-day and three-day appointments than sprawling health systems. Viewed in conjunction with our data on shifting patient preferences, the implications in favor of near-term availability are clear.
More Availability, More Bookings
Increasing near-term availability is a huge boost for any practice, but to many, staffing and resource limitations may seem insurmountable.
They don’t have to be. Large provider groups deploy a job-creating and cost-effective solution: Nearly half staff with advanced practice providers (APPs) — nurse practitioners and physician assistants, “as well as other licensed non-physician providers, including certified nurse midwives, clinical nurse specialists and certified registered nurse anesthetists,” per the American Journal of Managed Care — compared to just 1 in 3 health systems.
Offering care through APPs increases overall provider availability, and high-performing practices know that APPs allow more patients to receive treatment without compromising quality of service. Over a 90-day period, our data showed that practices with APPs had more than double the provider availability of their counterparts. Not surprisingly, practices with APPs secured 72 percent more bookings during those three months.
New patient inflow is critical for any provider organization to grow and thrive, and this can be maximized by responding to patient preferences and behaviors. High-performing practices have prioritized patient preferences for availability and seen their profitability grow by leaps and bounds.
After taking a deep dive into Zocdoc’s top-performing practices, we’ve identified lessons from their success that any provider organization can adopt. Get more of these insights in our white paper, “These Provider Organizations Get All The Bookings – Here’s Why.”