All about appointments: Streamline busy office operations with patient-scheduling software

If your practice is anything like the other chiropractic practices operating throughout the United States, your office team schedules thousands of patient appointments every month. It’s no secret that managing these appointments – scheduling and rescheduling them as well as reminding patients of appointments to reduce no-shows – requires a significant amount of time and effort from your front-office personnel.

How can you streamline this process to reduce the number of staff hours required to manage appointments as well as decrease the number of errors made during patient scheduling? One excellent way to gain more control over your scheduling processes is to implement patient-scheduling software into your existing computerized operations.

Simply put, chiropractic patient-scheduling software can standardize the appointment-scheduling process for any variety of visits, including x-rays, spinal and postural screenings, massages and more. Some patient-scheduling software programs even allow your patients to schedule their appointments themselves via a secure, web-based portal that enables them to view available appointment times, schedule appointments at their convenience, and reschedule appointments if needed. Automated appointment reminders can be sent to patients before the date of their visit, reducing no-shows by as much as 50 percent, according to some patient-scheduling software companies.

From your office staff’s perspective, patient-scheduling software can alleviate many of the routine tasks associated with manual scheduling. This can even include the routine tasks associated with assigning patients to exam rooms, as many patient-scheduling software programs include automated room-assignment capabilities. What’s more, some software programs enable you and your team to manage patient data via advanced mobile apps. This means you don’t need to be in front of your practice’s main computer terminal to retrieve and review critical patient-scheduling information.

An additional benefit that can result from implementing patient-scheduling software into your chiropractic practice may not be so apparent. Many systems contain detailed cross-referencing capabilities, enabling you to generate various reports that analyze new patient volume and patient retention. You can also track patient referrals by both referral source and patient ZIP code, which can serve as a powerful tool to measure marketing impact as you pinpoint the best opportunities for growth in your practice area.