Client and patient scheduling are crucial in running a good healthcare business. When patients can come into your clinic with ease, this helps improve customer satisfaction and boost employee productivity which helps in increasing business revenue. However, there are a handful of challenges that make patient scheduling and practice management troublesome. Some businesses struggle with overbooking, cancellations, or an overall laborious scheduling process. 

Taking this into consideration, it’s important to constantly look for ways to improve your clinic’s patient management process. With that, hiring a virtual assistant to become your medical appointment scheduler can rid you of your patient scheduling woes.

 

Reasons To Hire A Medical Appointment Scheduler

Provide a better customer experience

Patient scheduling is an important part of running a clinic or any patient care-related business. Without a proper scheduling system, it can be difficult for patients to find an available healthcare provider. Physicians can also be overwhelmed by a sudden influx of patients rushing into their clinic all at the same time. Poor patient management can lead to delays where patients can easily feel frustrated and neglected.Hiring a medical appointment scheduler and establishing a good scheduling system can prevent all of this from happening. Scheduling systems come with a variety of features that can help improve patient satisfaction. 

Aside from the ability to choose the time and date of their consultation, the system would also confirm appointments to ensure that a physician is available. Otherwise, patients can reschedule, cancel their appointment, or choose a different doctor for their sessions. In addition to this, scheduling software also sends out appointment reminders, thus, effectively reducing no-shows, delays, and wait times. 

 

Allow physicians to focus on their work

Source: Pexels

Making your physicians or medical personnel handle administrative tasks such as patient scheduling is arguably one of the most effective ways to waste their time. While physicians still have responsibilities that are not exactly or directly related to patient care, keeping tasks such as scheduling patients off of their shoulders allows them to focus on more technical work. 

Aside from this, having a medical appointment scheduler can effectively improve the way physicians manage their time. Since doctors use upcoming appointments as the basis for how to plan their day, avoiding no-shows and cancelations can keep them on track and productive. Having someone handle patient scheduling through a scheduling system can prevent no-shows and improve overall clinic performance and efficiency. 

 

Prevent patient no-shows

Speaking of no-shows, one of the benefits of having a medical appointment scheduling system is that it can prevent patients from forgetting about their scheduled visits. Generally, scheduling software comes with features that automatically remind clients about their appointments by sending out text messages or emails days before. These appointment reminders include the time and date of the scheduled visit in order to prevent patients from being late or simply forgetting the day of their consultation.

 

Helpful Tips To Improve Patient Scheduling Process

Source: Pexels

Hiring a medical appointment scheduler and having a scheduling software at hand can significantly improve your business’s performance. However, there are more ways for you to improve the patient scheduling process. Here are some helpful tips that can help in increasing patient satisfaction with your scheduling system and management strategies.

 

Take advantage of patient self-scheduling software

Gone are the days when clients need to call or message customer service in order to schedule an appointment. One way to improve your patient scheduling process is to utilize systems that allow clients to schedule appointments on their own. 

The system should automatically block dates and schedules that are already booked. Aside from that, it’s important to include a list of physicians available for consultation on specific dates. 

Embedding this feature into your business website or profile makes it easily accessible since anyone can book appointments any time of the day instead of relying on a front-desk staff that is only available during office hours.

 

Include a two-way appointment confirmation system

Most online scheduling software includes a form of appointment confirmation system. Once a consultation is scheduled, the system should send a confirmation email or text message ensuring that the appointment was successfully scheduled and booked on the client’s desired time and date. This feature provides patients with the peace of mind that they have a confirmed slot reserved for their medical consultation. 

However, the confirmation system could also work the other way around. While the clinic ensures that a slot is reserved for a patient, the client should also affirm that they would be proceeding with their appointment on the said time and date. 

Cancellations and no-shows can negatively affect the clinic’s performance and productivity. To prevent this from happening, your medical appointment scheduler can ask for confirmation from clients via text messaging or email on the day of the scheduled consultation. An automated reminder that requires the client to reply can help in reducing no-shows or unexpected cancellations. It also allows the clinic to open the reserved slots to walk-ins or urgent patients if a client fails to secure their appointment on the date itself.

 

Use AI or automated customer support for routine inquiries

A lack of necessary information or details can hinder clients or patients from scheduling an appointment with your clinic. While having a front desk representative answer every patient inquiry that comes by, this system is not particularly the most effective and efficient. 

To help with this, take advantage of AI or automated customer support systems that can provide answers to frequently asked questions. Inquiries such as the clinic’s location, operation hours, services offered, and the physicians available can easily be answered by an automated chat system. Not only that, AI chatbots offer real-time responses, saving you and your patients precious time and resources when booking appointments online.

 

Want to know more about how virtual assistants can help your business? Sidekicks is an on-demand virtual company and we’re eager to help visionaries and entrepreneurs like you. Get a free ebook and learn more about how we can help you by signing up for our newsletter. We also offer a free 30-minute consultation if you prefer something more personal.

Related Posts: