Why Do Small Healthcare Practices Struggle with Efficiency?

Efficiency is the building block of hospitals. It affects the overall quality of patient care. If healthcare practices neglect to invest in it, it will have serious consequences for both the practice and patient care.

What does efficiency mean, particularly within the context of healthcare? In simple words, efficiency is providing quality services using the right resources while reducing extra costs.

The concept of efficiency is gaining popularity among healthcare practices. They are swiftly implementing strategic changes to reduce claim denials, which affect an organization’s cash flow and operating costs, without compromising quality. Equifax estimates that manual processing and other subpar billing procedures cost U.S. physicians $125 billion annually.

However, maintaining a seamless operation presents various challenges for medical professionals and small practice owners. This blog will explore those challenges and how healthcare practices can be efficient in their work.

Why is Efficiency Important?

In healthcare, efficiency is crucial for various reasons. The most evident benefit of efficiency is fast patient service. It allows you to serve more patients, and everybody will be served in their turn and at the appropriate time, which ensures that every patient receives the necessary medical care at the appropriate time. Since efficiency increases patient inflow, it further calls for more rapid claim filing for reimbursements of the service they are giving.

Healthcare professionals must constantly consider how evolving procedures may affect care because they deal with actual life-or-death situations. Efficient healthcare practices can better allocate resources to meet changing patient expectations, handle changing disease trends, and handle patient demands.

What Factors Contribute to Inefficiency in Healthcare Practices?

Excessive Paperwork

Paperwork is the most essential task of any healthcare practice because it provides a detailed record of the patient’s medical history, diagnoses, and treatments. Documentation is necessary for payment from insurance companies, Medicare, and Medicaid. However, most healthcare practices are integrating Electronic Health Records (EHRs) to alleviate this load.

EHR is a digital copy of patients’ medical records containing detailed information about their health and medical history.

Work-Life Balance

Indeed, a study suggests that providers practicing in small practices are less burned out, with a reported rate of 13.5%. This is because it brings a sense of independence and autonomy that prevents them from burning out.

Every advantage has a drawback, too, and this autonomy may add to their administrative load and ultimately disrupt their ability to strike a balance between work and personal life.

Dealing with patients and providing them with the necessary care is already difficult for healthcare practitioners. It becomes worse when they have to run an inefficient solo healthcare practice.

Lack Of Expertise

Assuming your office employs staff who are not knowledgeable about their jobs and are not updated on the latest regulations or technological developments. This will cause a discrepancy between the performance of your practices and what your patients expect.

However, training and development are the two most important components of raising employee productivity. Streamlining daily tasks can be achieved by giving your staff the skills to perform their work as effectively and efficiently as feasible.

Cash Flow Constraints

Effective cash management is vital for healthcare practices to stay in operation. Healthcare providers must have enough money to upgrade their facilities, compensate employees and suppliers, and maintain their competitiveness in the market.

Healthcare practices rely on insurance companies to cover their costs. However, many practitioners find it difficult to obtain timely reimbursements because insurance companies keep revising their policies and rejecting claims.

What is the Impact?

Small clinics and independent practitioners cannot afford to be inefficient with the intricacies of medical billing and revenue cycle management in the fast-paced healthcare sector, where every minor detail matters. But what are the underlying causes that affect the efficiency of healthcare practice?

The most common issue practices face is billing errors, which can cause late payments and eventual financial loss. It can cause confusion and frustration for patients who receive inaccurate or excessive bills and disrupt the entire billing process of the practice. This damages both the practice and its reputation among patients.

These errors not only damage the reputation but also have significant financial repercussions, such as the cost of resubmission. The cost of denial rework to providers is about $118 per claim. Furthermore, once the claim is denied, practices have to rework it to get it approved, and there is no guarantee that it will be approved on the second attempt.

To avoid these problems, medical billing services for small practices are available in the field. These services continuously assess and optimize billing and revenue cycle management systems, enabling small practices to seize opportunities for improvement and growth.

Is there Any Solution?

Of course, there is a solution to every problem. Organizations can increase healthcare efficiency by integrating technology, providing employee training, and forming strategic partnerships that streamline corporate procedures.

Implement Technology

Automating tasks with the latest technology is the best way to operate your practice more efficiently.  For instance, implementing EHRs can automate the process of documenting patient data instead of manual recording, which takes extra time and attention. Hence, doctors and nurses can devote more time to more crucial duties.

Provide Employee Training

Healthcare practices must develop both technical and soft skills among their staff through regular training. Everything from special office policies to industry best practices should be included in training. It must provide information about changes in technology, laws, and policies, as well as to fit the hectic schedules of clinical staff.

Employees should be trained beyond their typical responsibilities whenever possible so they may fill in for missing coworkers without negatively impacting operations.

Collaborate with Experts

Organizations can accelerate their path to operational excellence by collaborating with any medical billing services provider. These medical billing companies focus on providing customized solutions to challenges occurring in practice, with the smooth integration of the latest software for data management and security assurance.

Conclusion

Overall, various factors can impact the effectiveness of any healthcare practice. However, there are solutions to these challenges, such as using the latest software for data management and documentation or training the staff according to changing regulations.

Lastly, the best way to cope with these challenges is to outsource your practice’s medical billing tasks to a third-party provider experienced in this field.