In this last section of this article, the author asks: Is Your Practice Clinically Healthy? She urges practitioners to go beyond tracking solely financial metrics; the first benchmark of this section is tracking avoidable emergency room visits and hospital admissions. Track a one-month sample and then assess monthly against that benchmark. Patient outreach activities and perhaps a critical eye on the office telephones (Are they always busy? Can patients schedule urgent appointments?) could minimize this issue.
Everyone believes they provide top-notch customer service, but would your patients recommend your practice to others? Don’t assume they would. Ask. And then listen. The author gives 90% affirmative answers as a reasonable target.
The end of the article provides a handy chart to help you in your benchmarking. This article is a quick, must-read for every practitioner.