Coronis Health Blog

A federal grant will be issued to University of Alabama to study if telehealth can be used to increase diagnosis and treatments of eye diseases in rural and under-served populations. 

Did you know, on average patient no shows can cost the healthcare industry up to $150 billion annually? That is an immense waste of money that could contribute to more beneficial areas for the healthcare industry. Each missed appointment for a practice is lost money, which means there needs to be a solution for missing income. Some practices find it beneficial to have a fee charged to those who miss appointments to recoup some of the lost income. However, if there is a way to minimize the amount of missed appointments, then there is a better chance for increasing income. Starting with the beginning of the process, if scheduling is done well and pre-registration is completed, and the staff follow up with appointment reminders there is a higher probability that somewhere in those parts of the process the patient will cancel is needed. One of the top reasons for no shows is due to fear of payment. If prior to the appointment the patient knows exactly what they will owe after insurance, then they will more likely be willing to attend the appointment or reschedule for another time. Unfortunately, the number one reason for no shows is forgetfulness. Therefore, the appointment reminder phone call is important.  The patient is more likely to cancel or remember to arrive for the appointment. Lastly, your practice should allow for cancellations, but there needs to be a cancellation policy in place. Patients should have ease of access to cancel through a patient portal, or the ability to call to cancel and know their call will be answered. Patients should be given a certain time frame in which they can cancel without penalty or reschedule. Take the time to review how your practice handles no shows, and from there find the areas for improvement, your cash-flow may depend on it.

With the ubiquity of social media and the ease of global connected-ness, it’s easy to think that long wait times are not a nuisance to patients. After all, the vast majority of people these days seem content spending time with their smartphones, tablets, and other devices.

Let’s face it—today’s patients are flighty. They’re significantly more likely to switch practices than patients of just a few decades ago. In fact, experts estimate that one in three medical patients will leave their current provider within the next couple of years. A surprisingly large number of these are not switching due to insurance change or a household move, but because of unmet expectations. Driven by the experiences they’ve had in other industries, patients are looking for innovations and advances in their patient experience. Unfortunately, many providers are failing to meet these expectations.

Now that hospitals are required to post chargemaster data online for patients to access, the Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services is exploring the most effective ways to make sure providers comply with the rules.

Patients pay equal attention to online ratings that measure a physician’s clinical ability as well as those that measure the patient experience, according to a new study.

Patients walking in the front door of the University of Minnesota Health Clinics and Surgery Center in Minneapolis may do a double take, thinking instead that they’ve entered an Apple store.

Price transparency tools have been gaining in popularity among providers, the idea being that they can reduce medical spending by allowing consumers access to pricing data — which in turn lets them shop around for less expensive services. A new study published in Sage Journals, however, found that few consumers actually use these tools.

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