Should patients schedule their own appointments?
Many patients prefer electronic communication
It’s 9 p.m. on a Saturday. Your patient, Jane Doe, has just found out that her child’s school play is at the same time she is scheduled to be in your office for her annual physical examination.
She logs onto your Web site, hits a few keys, and in a short period of time, she has rescheduled her appointment and your schedule has been adjusted to reflect the changes. The next afternoon, another patient logs onto your Web site and signs up to fill Jane Doe’s empty time slot.
That scenario may be in your future, thanks to new technology recently introduced to the marketplace.
Compare that to what happens now when appointments have to be rescheduled. The patients have to take time out from their workday to call your office, stay on hold while your receptionist answers three other calls, and then wait for the scheduler to find another slot. Then someone has to make phone calls to patients on the waiting list until the time slot is filled.
The current system is frustrating to everyone: the staff who have to juggle the schedules, the patients who have to wait to be rescheduled, and the clinical staff who may be left with time on their hands.
That’s why savvy physician practices should be exploring the new technology that allows them to communicate with their patients over the Internet.
The patients are already familiar with the technology, and many would prefer more electronic communication with their physicians.
"The successful multispecialty group or large practice of the future will be one that opens up to using new technology and the ability to share information and schedule and reschedule their patients more efficiently," asserts Dustin Crane, president of Atlanta-based Aelera Corp., developer of customer relationship management applications.
In fact, more than a third of respondents (35%) to a consumer poll conducted by LaurusHealth in Irving, TX, reported that they would be "more likely" to choose a doctor who offered electronic communication options than one who did not. The e-health care company polled 1,000 U.S. adults by telephone in July.
Among those surveyed, 49% want electronic access to appointment scheduling and 46% would like to be able to e-mail their doctors.
"Consumers in this survey make it clear how important it is for them to be able to communicate electronically with their doctors. The results of this survey represent an opportunity for physicians that will become a challenge if they don’t take advantage of it," says Peter J. Plantes, MD, medical director of LaurusHealth. The company has been analyzing data on physicians and the Internet since 1997, he says.
Some physician practices are already using e-mail communication to set up appointments with patients, Plantes says.
Aelera Corp. and HealthEappointments, a Bloomfield Hills, MI, developer of Internet-based business products, both recently launched products that allow patients to schedule and change their doctors’ appointments over the Internet.
In some cases, setting up a doctor’s appointment over the telephone may be more time- consuming than the actual visit, points out Barry Shapiro, president and chief executive officer of HealthEappointments.
Then, when a patient gets to the office and has to wait an hour because the physician is overscheduled or the treatment room is tied up, the relationship between doctor and patient starts to deteriorate.
Patients, particularly the baby-boomer population, are no longer willing to tolerate inconvenience, Plantes says. They’re voting with their feet and choosing other doctors who can accommodate their busy schedules.
"I can’t stress enough that we are in a cycle where physicians have to deal every moment with patient satisfaction. There are too many options out there now. The old days of looking successful because the patient has to wait an hour are gone," says Jay Williams, principal of Arista Associates, a health care strategy consulting firm in Northbrook, IL.
Patients who are dissatisfied with the practice’s operational side, such as how appointments are made, tend to be dissatisfied with the quality of care as a whole, Plantes points out. "Care in the medical practice is a combination of the process and interaction with the patient as well as the medical outcome. Patients have very little expertise in judging the medical technical quality of care, but they know how to judge convenience."
Patient satisfaction criteria play an important role in whether a health plan contracts with a physician and whether it renews the contract, Williams adds.
For instance, many plans specify that a patient should not have to wait more than two days to get an appointment.
"Doctor practices aren’t as profitable as they used to be. Customer satisfaction and marketing are playing more important roles in assuring the financial heath of a practice. Ease of appointments is a prime issue in patient satisfaction," Shapiro says.
You have reached your article limit for the month. Subscribe now to access this article plus other member-only content.
- Award-winning Medical Content
- Latest Advances & Development in Medicine
- Unbiased Content