It is already February! My, My, how time flies! By this time many practices should have set their production goals to help their offices have a healthy bottom line and see a better year than last. Once that goal is set do you know how to monitor it to make sure you stay on track? Unfortunately, most doctors will ask their staff to pull reports, but those reports usually end up in a binder never to be seen again until you’re getting audited. I would like to ask you a question. If your patient comes in for an exam and you notice a problem or condition starting to develop, you would either perform treatment or at least recommend a recheck, right? Think of your reports as an exam for your practice. When was the last time you looked at your aging report? If I were to ask you right now what is the total on that report, would you be able to tell me? Would you be able to give me a close estimate? Most doctors and office managers don’t have a clue. I can validate this claim because I have at least three phone calls a week from different offices around the country that ask about how to pull an AR report and gasp when they see the total at the bottom. It’s not just the aging report that is critical to your practice’s “health”. Do you know the ratio of completed appointments to canceled or missed appointments? Do you know your deferred production, outstanding treatment plans to treatment plan appointments scheduled? If you don’t, Practice-Web has a tool that can help. The Practice-Web Analyzer can give you all of the critical information you need to see at a quick glance so you can “examine the health” of your practice on a regular basis and perform the necessary “treatment” to give you a healthier bottom line.
When you look at your reports and the numbers are not where you want them to be then you should “perform treatment”. The “treatment” can be anything from better managing your collections to being more diligent about working your unscheduled appointments list.