Practice Management
Urgent message: Increase in the proportion of value-add time during an encounter was associated with an increased rate of positive perceptions of timeliness and overall patient experience in pediatric urgent care centers. Aimy Patel, MD; Brian R. Lee, MPH, PhD; Amanda Montalbano, MD, MPH; and Amanda Nedved, MD Citation: Patel A, Lee BR, Montalbano A, Nedved A. Retrospective study on the impact of increased value-add time on patient experience in pediatric urgent care centers. J …
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Urgent message: Shorter urgent care visits are correlated with higher experience scores. The presence of learners does not negatively impact patient experience scores. David Skoglund, MD, MS; Brian Lee, PhD, MPH; and Amanda Montalbano, MD, MPH Citation: Skoglund D, Lee B, Montalbano A. Learner presence does not negatively impact patient experience in pediatric urgent care. J Urgent Care Med. 2021;16(2):30-36. ABSTRACT Objective The number of trainees seeking pediatric educational opportunities in community outpatient settings is …
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Urgent Message: As “influencers in chief” charged with assuring the types of patient experiences that create patient loyalty and word-of-mouth, urgent care providers must understand the relationship between patient experience metrics, financial and clinical outcomes, care team coordination, and time spent with the patient. As value-based reimbursement becomes more prevalent in healthcare, providers are increasingly tasked with not only ensuring a great clinical outcome, but a superior patient experience, as well. Industry research supports this …
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Healthcare payment reform may be giving urgent care a leg up on the local emergency room, according to a new white paper from Press Ganey. While positive “patient experience” scores enable hospitals to collect greater reimbursement, tight margins require sharper focus on clinical care than ever before. In addition, pressure to keep household expenses down is pushing many patients (ie, customers) to consider their options more carefully, especially for lower-acuity complaints like those tailor-made for …
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Urgent message: Attracting and retaining urgent care patients entails more than reducing the total duration of patient waits. It also requires understanding and managing patient expectations and perceptions of waiting. MICHAEL BURKE, MBA, and GARRETT BOMBA, MD People often respond irrationally in waiting situations. How else can we explain the fact that people are routinely more satisfied with a clearly explained 30-minute wait than with an uncertain 20-minute wait? It is not rational, but it …
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Urgent message: Successful urgent care centers depend on repeat visits from loyal patients, but if patients do not like the experience provided, do not value it, or do not think it meets their needs, they will not come back. Cultivating a loyal following entails understanding and building a service offering around the factors that attract patients and keep them coming back. ALAN A. AYERS, MBA, MAcc, Experity Urgent care is differentiated from other medical practices …
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Urgent message: Just because you build it, patients won’t necessarily come. As entrepreneurs, successful urgent care center owners must market their services to the community, innovate with new services to fill excess capacity, and create positive patient experiences that spur repeat visits and positive word-of-mouth. ALAN A. AYERS, MBA, MAcc Practice Velocity One needn’t look further than the 20,000+ physicians already practicing in urgent care centers nationwide to grasp just how attractive this business model …
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Urgent message: The costs of and barriers to adding WiFi to an urgent care center are low and the benefits include a better patient experience and improved perception of wait times. ALAN A. AYERS, MBA, MAcc, Experity WiFi is now ubiquitous. Step into most any coffee house, theme restaurant, library, shopping mall or other service establishment and you’ll find that Internet access is readily available and usually free of charge. Many hospitals have also introduced …
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Urgent message: Companies like Apple and Nordstrom have raised the quality of customer experience to an art form, one that urgent cares would do well to emulate. ALAN A. AYERS, MBA, MACC, Experity Introduction Urgent care is positioned as a consumer-focused delivery channel for low-acuity medical services differentiated from hospital emergency departments and primary care practices by retail-facing locations, extended evening and weekend hours, and walk-in convenience. As with airlines, restaurants, and other service businesses, …
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