Readers Write: Creating a Patient-Centric Practice: How to Minimize Wait Times and Increase Patient Satisfaction Scores

Creating a Patient-Centric Practice: How to Minimize Wait Times and Increase Patient Satisfaction Scores
By Sherilyn Giauque

Sherilyn Giauque is principal product manager at AdvancedMD of South Jordan, UT.

By reducing wait times, healthcare providers elevate the patient experience and improve healthcare outcomes, while also driving greater efficiencies across the practice. 

The amount of time a patient spends waiting to see a healthcare provider has a direct impact on the patient’s perception of the practice and level of care they receive. The longer a patient spends waiting — either to schedule an appointment or to see their healthcare provider once they arrive at the practice — the more likely they are to seek out a new physician or simply stop receiving care. 

When scheduling an appointment, the average wait time to get into a medical office is 26 days. That means that many patients are waiting nearly a month just to see their healthcare provider. Research conducted by Duke Health revealed that every 10 minutes that a patient spent waiting to see their healthcare provider led to a 3% decrease in patient satisfaction scores. 

If you’re searching for new ways to build a patient-centric practice that prioritizes patient care and outcomes above all else, here are five tactics that can help you reduce the amount of time your patients spend waiting to see you. 

#1: Take a strategic approach when managing waitlists that minimizes the impact of no-shows while optimizing daily schedules 

Double-booking and triple-booking appointments with high no-show rates can help eliminate unnecessary downtime for both the admin and clinical staff while keeping your practice operating at full capacity. Be sure that waitlists can be easily accessed and updated by your admin team, with automated notifications built in to alert patients when an appointment slot becomes available. 

#2: Give patients access to digital intake forms that can be completed online to streamline patient check-in processes

By taking advantage of digital intake forms, your practice can eliminate the need for patients to fill out paperwork while waiting to be seen. Online forms also help reduce errors and minimize the amount of time your admin team spends entering patient data—all while providing a smooth patient experience. 

#3: Take advantage of a unified medical office software platform that includes integrative EHR, practice management, and patient engagement solutions

Now more than ever, practices need highly integrative technology solutions that seamlessly connect all sides of the business. An effective all-in-one EHR, practice management, and patient engagement platform comes equipped with key features that can help reduce wait times, including: internal wait-list management capabilities, rooming features to move patients through the office as quickly and efficiently as possible, automated appointment reminders, and customizable intake form templates.

#4: Allow patients to schedule visits and manage their healthcare experience via intuitive self-service tools

Patients who have more control over their healthcare experience and more flexibility when it comes to scheduling appointments tend to be more satisfied with their healthcare providers. Providing your patients with self-service tools and access to an online portal where they can access billing records, make payments, schedule appointments, and review lab results not only streamlines patient-centric workflows, it helps reduce workloads and improves the entire patient journey, shrinking wait times and improving patient satisfaction. 

#5: Prioritize onboarding programs for new staff and keep employees well-trained on the practice’s technology stack and workflow best practices

Making sure your staff understands best practices around workflow processes and is up to date on your technology solutions is key to building a thriving, patient-centric practice. Taking the time to properly train both admin and clinical staff enables efficiencies throughout the practice, removing bottlenecks and ensuring smooth transitions as patients move from a waiting room, to an exam room, to the checkout desk. 

The reality is that long wait times are not only detrimental to the patient experience, they can be devastating for anyone who is suffering from a chronic illness who is in need of prescriptions or advanced treatment programs that require accelerated timelines. Improving wait times not only elevates the patient experience and improves healthcare outcomes, it has a positive effect on your entire practice, driving efficiencies throughout the office.