Practice Management

Medical practice management concerns physicians and specialists throughout all disciplines in medicine as well as those staff members that support their practice of care. Running a professional medical practice is not an easy task, and there are constant challenges that professionals need to be prepared for and overcome to maintain a great reputation of quality and care for their patients.

Staffing the Healthcare Industry

One of the most important aspects of building a successful medical practice concerns creating a solid staff of qualified medical professionals as well as a team of management and administrative professionals that can help operations run smoothly.
The best medical practice management teams are made of up of a diverse group of professionals that can actively contribute to the success of the organization. In many larger practices, these teams are made up of representatives from all aspects of the practice – from business managers to nurses and medical specialists.
For smaller, private organizations, practice management usually falls into the hands of the head physician or a sole medical manager. These individuals or teams are responsible for providing the caregivers with administrative staff that is able to handle involved procedures such as billing, scheduling and maintaining patient relations.
For growing organizations, an important aspect of practice management is to recognize when there is a need for hiring additional professionals, especially when it comes to medical staff. As with any hiring process, there is a significant amount of time and money invested in this process, so healthcare management professionals should be prepared to make accurate hiring decisions that can positively affect the organization for a considerable amount of time in the future.

Internal and External Practice Communications

In any industry, communication on all fronts is key, and this is especially true in healthcare. To ensure the best practice management, communication should be a top priority not only externally between patients and their doctors, but internally between doctors and their staff as well.
External communications between an organization and its patients is key to successfully managing a medical practice. Strong practice-to-patient relations are important for eliminating errors and missed appointments, establishing positive relations, and also for instilling confidence in patients that their caregivers are providing them with the highest quality of care. Great communication leads to trusting relationships between patients and doctors – something that is vitally important in the maintaining a successful and thriving practice.
While external communication is an integral piece of the puzzle, internal communication is just as important. Physicians, doctors, nurses, and all other medical professionals need to openly communicate with the healthcare administration staff to ensure information is properly and accurately recorded as well as to ensure that all any rules established by the practice or by the state or federal government are made known to all and followed. Building a cohesive staff with the same goals and visions can help build a successful medical practice.

Implementing Medical Technology

Technology has made an incredible impact on every facet of our lives, not only personally, but professionally as well. When it comes to medical practice management, implementing medical technology that can help improve the quality of care and operations of the organization becomes a top priority. Improvements in medical technology have made their way into every aspect of the industry – from research, diagnosis, treatment, and communications – and have made their application vitally important to the advancement of medicine.
A major concern for successful practice management is the training, implementation, and maintenance of medical technologies. Today’s most pressing issues concern the new regulations on the “meaningful use” of technologies like electronic medical records (EMR) and electronic health records (EHR), the integration of mobile technologies like smart phones and tablets, and the updating of costly telehealth equipment to encourage more collaborative treatment options.

Practice Management and Medical Compliance

Compliance with important state and federal health regulations and laws, like the healthcare reform bill and HIPAA, is vital to the operations of a medical practice. There are several regulations that concern those in the medical industry, from the direct care of patients to avoid malpractice suits, the insurance coverage of patients through the healthcare bill, and the regulations covering the use of medical technologies.
Noncompliance with many of these regulations can have extreme consequences for medical professionals. From expensive fines, jail time, and even the revoking of a medical license can result from failure to comply with the standards and regulations established to provide the best care for patients.
A big part of medical practice management is ensuring that all staff members, from head doctors to nurses and medical billing staff, are aware of all medical regulations and laws, are trained to implement and adhere to them properly, and are notified when any changes need to be made to eliminate the risk for any interruptions in practice.
Quality medical practice management is equally as important as quality patient care, and they go hand-in-hand in creating healthcare organizations that can be relied upon to deliver quality patient care.