You must ensure that that your patients are provided with relevant and timely access to essential health care services through the use of an efficient appointment scheduling. You have to be on top of everything and ensure that timely access to essential health care service and facilities is given due course. This is a critical element in maintaining a high level of satisfaction of those who seek and need your medical services.
Your core concerns will include efficient use and allocation of existing resources and facilities. This means that you must be able to have the capability to determine the types of physical assets and facilities that you need in delivering relevant health services and allocate them where they are needed, when they are needed. This is the main reason why you need to have an efficient appointment scheduling system in place. You must manage your services to ensure that you are able to meet both anticipated and emergency health service needs of your patients.
The medical and health care sector is a major pillar of the US economy. It accounts for about 15% of the country’s gross domestic product. Government expenditure for public health care service, which is now pegged at 45% of total health care expenditures, continues to grow at an increasing rate and will double this amount by 2050. And if you consider other variables such as rising demand for chronic health care, aging population and limited private and public health care budgets, you shall see the urgency for a more efficient management of services to your patients.
Pre-arranged patient encounters refer to primary as well as specialty care visits and planned surgeries. Each of these services will have their own process of appointment scheduling. Included in your range of responsibilities is the ability to respond and provide service during unscheduled encounters. These include walk-in cases as well as medical situations requiring your immediate response. Emergency cases normally happen in primary care clinics. In the event that you are not able to accommodate the urgent case, you must direct the same to another facility.
However, there are instances where you are required to attend to unscheduled encounters regardless of your current load. This is the other reason why you need to have an efficient appointment scheduling software. Your primary responsibility is to provide your patients timely and easy access to essential health services. With an efficient appointment scheduling software, you will be able to respond to emergency cases, manage the work flow and respond to provider and patient preferences.
You have to understand the unique features and requirements of hospital and specialty care services. This means that you will have to adopt a completely different approach in managing the appointments for hospital and specialty care services. In most cases, most primary care patients will require services that can be done within a fixed time frame. The usual approach by primary health care clinics is to allocate the provider time in equal slots, so that each patient is assigned the same time as the other patients. For patient encounters that will require more time, the patient will be allocated with additional appointment slots.
An appointment scheduling system is an essential tool for health care service providers. You must at all times be able to efficiently and effectively match your resources and capabilities with the requirements and preferences of your patients. With an efficient appointment scheduling software in place, you will also be able to respond to emergency medical situations regardless of your current work load.
