Author: Developer

Investing in staff training or other learning opportunities has the obvious benefit of advancing skills and knowledge. What isn’t so obvious is all the other results and opportunities that come through staff investment. Let’s explore the benefits of creating learning opportunities for your staff as well as some ideas of how to go about providing that added training.

WHY you should invest in your staff:

1. Improved Patient Experience: A well-trained and skilled staff can supply better patient experiences and superior care. This often will lead to higher patient loyalty and patient satisfaction. Patients are much more likely to return to a clinic they trust and where they feel comfortable and well-cared for.
2. Increased Efficiency & Productivity: Investing in staff training can improve the efficiency of your clinic. Staff who are professionally trained in patient management and administrative tasks can help streamline your operations and reduce the time it takes to complete certain tasks. More time allows for more to get done.
3. Increased Revenue: When patients are satisfied with their care, they are more likely to refer all their family and friends to you and your clinic. The new customer base is sure to add to your bottom line.
4. Staff Retention & Satisfaction: Investing in your staff can help improve staff retention rates. Employees who feel valued and appreciated are more likely to stay with a company long-term, reducing the cost and time associated with recruiting and training new staff. Investing in staff creates job satisfaction and empowers your entire team to become recruiters. Happy employees tell happy stories and attract other employees.
5. Competitive advantage: Investing in additional training can give you or your staff a competitive advantage in the job market or within the industry. It can help you stay up-to-date with the latest industry trends and best practices, and demonstrate your commitment to ongoing professional development.
6. Enhanced innovation: Additional training can help employees develop new ideas and innovative solutions to problems, leading to improved processes and products. Be sure to empower your staff to share ideas.
7. Improved teamwork: Additional training in communication and teamwork can help employees work more effectively together, resulting in improved collaboration and productivity.

HOW to invest in your staff:

1. Training and Development: Investing in staff training and development helps them to grow professionally and improve their skills, which will in turn benefit the organization.
2. Mentorship: Assigning a mentor to a staff member can help them to learn from an experienced professional within the organization. Encourage additional professional mentors outside of your clinic to gain experience and perspective.
3. Communication and Feedback: Regular feedback sessions can help to identify areas for improvement and encourage staff to strive for excellence. Invite and encourage open dialogue which can build trust and assure everyone is working towards a common goal.
4. Career Progression: Creating opportunities for staff to advance within the organization can help with retention and create a culture of growth and advancement.
5. Work-Life Balance: Ensuring a healthy work-life balance can improve staff morale, increase productivity, and help with stress reduction.
6. Recognition and Rewards: Recognizing and rewarding staff for their hard work and achievements can boost morale and create a positive work environment. Genuine appreciation matters.

Investing in your staff is exactly what it sounds like, it takes the investment of time and/or money. While that type of investment can be a little scary, the return on investment will pay for itself and in most cases, it ultimately results in much remarkable success both for the clinic as well as the staff. While making your staff investment plans don’t forget to include yourself in the growth journey!

Money Tree Billing is a chiropractic billing company who removes the distraction of billing from your office so you can focus on changing lives through chiropractic care. Money Tree Billing offers complete billing cycle management through a dedicated and seamless billing process. We empower you and your team with support beyond just billing. Focus on your practice and your passion and we’ll focus on getting you paid. We GUARANTEE our work. Money Tree Billing guarantees if your insurance claim goes unpaid due to our error, that we will credit you the amount you would have been paid on that claim. You won’t find another guarantee like it in the industry. To learn more about Money Tree Billing, and our one-of-a-kind guarantee, visit www.moneytreebilling.com,

When many chiropractors are asked about telehealth, they often can throw up their hands; chiropractic care is hands-on, so telehealth is not for me or our clinic. While telehealth can mean different things depending on who you talk to, the Mayo Clinic puts it nicely, “Telehealth is the use of digital information and communication technologies to access health care services remotely and manage your health care.” And while there are actual remote direct patient care services that a chiropractor can do remotely, patients and chiropractors alike will always prefer and demand direct contact with the patient. With that, telehealth is so much more than virtual visits, and if your clinic is not utilizing some form of telehealth, you are already falling behind.

Telehealth and the Patient Portal

One of the most popular uses of technology to communicate with your patients is an online Patient Portal. Patient Portals have been shown to increase patient engagement, and dedication, to their clinic and their overall treatment plan. While patient portals offer countless possibilities, some of the most popular uses of the portal are:

• Ability to communicate directly with your care provider – Patients now expect to be able to get messages directly to their providers. This ability gives the patient the comfort and confidence that they are important and heard.
• Appointment management – Giving your patients the ability to create or cancel appointments online is a fantastic way to engage the patient as well as alleviate some of the incoming phone calls. This feature also allows the patient to view their appointment times, reducing the risk of missed appointments.
  • Check-In online – Some patient portal options allow patients to do a pre-check-in online. This is a helpful tool for staff, but also to prompt the patient to be sure they have all the necessary information you will need.
  • Text options – Text messages are the hottest trend in reaching your patients for appointment reminders and confirmations. This will absolutely reduce missed appointments.
• Refill prescriptions – Your patients can send in refill requests for any prescriptions with ease.
• Bill paying – Many software options offer a “soft” reminder on their portal software for unpaid balances, oftentimes this reminder is the first thing the patient sees when they login. Online payment is necessary for your clinic’s success in collections.
• Receiving test results – Patients can quickly and easily review test results, and doctors and/or staff can add valuable information to those results, so they are not misunderstood.
• Complete forms – Keep patient information up to date by allowing them to fill out forms directly in your portal for health information, medications, etc.
• Referral requests – If you work at all with referrals, the patient can request a referral without calling in.

Telehealth and the Virtual Visit

It is hard to imagine virtual visits with chiropractic care since it is a hands-on type of treatment. Virtual visits are now a permanent part of the healthcare model and a viable way to provide treatment to your patients.

A few virtual visit ideas:

• Check-Ins
• Nutrition coaching
• Stress management
• Sleep coaching
• Ergonomic best practices
• Exercise – physical therapy exercises
• Yoga
• Life or sleep coaching
• Organic pain relief

Telehealth is truly something all chiropractors and clinics should look at to stay in touch with their patients and stay in step with their peers. You can implement all the suggestions here, or cherry pick what would work best for your clinic. Staying in touch with your patients through telehealth is a terrific way to create a well curated journey for your patients.

Don’t navigate telehealth billing alone! Money Tree Billing is a chiropractic billing company who removes the distraction of billing from your office so you can focus on changing lives through chiropractic care. Money Tree Billing offers complete billing cycle management through a dedicated and seamless billing process. We empower you and your team with support beyond just billing. Focus on your practice and your passion and we’ll focus on getting you paid. We GUARANTEE our work. Money Tree Billing guarantees if your insurance claim goes unpaid due to our error, that we will credit you the amount you would have been paid on that claim. You won’t find another guarantee like it in the industry. To learn more about Money Tree Billing, and our one-of-a-kind guarantee, visit www.moneytreebilling.com.

Surprisingly, it is not unusual for many chiropractors to lose a substantial amount of income due to medical billing mistakes. Some mistakes are easy to fix, and admittedly, others are much more complex. The reality is that clinics generally consider medical billing one department of their business with no real understanding of what goes into it. Let’s investigate some of the common mistakes that are made as well as a few solutions to get your billing back on track. Some of the most common medical billing mistakes made at chiropractic clinics are:

1. Not following up on unpaid claims. Unfortunately, many of the billing mistakes boil down to lack of systematic follow-up and lack of staff who are dedicated to this specific task. With no follow-up those unpaid claims can really hit your bottom line.
2. Not resubmitting rejected claims. Rejected claims can be difficult to navigate through, and it isn’t uncommon for a chiropractic clinic to give up rather than fix the issues and resubmit.
3. They do not learn the software. If this is true for you or your clinic, you should know that not learning the software is common in all businesses. First, the time and effort to fully learn all features of the software are rarely dedicated in the front end. After the expense of the initial software, clinics often don’t invest in the full training and believe they or their staff will learn as they go. This can then lead to a lack of updates, and lack of using strong tools and protections the software may offer. The result is when you don’t know how to use your software you will mess up your account balances. When you mess up your account balances you don’t know what to follow up on and you cannot properly follow up or bill your patients.
4. They don’t watch the bottom line. Most of us are familiar with the phrase, keep your eye on the ball, when it comes to the health of your business someone needs to always have an eye on your fiscal ball. Even with the absolute best intentions, many chiropractors lose focus of their bottom line. (We get it, you’re busy healing people!) But when you drop focus little and big billing errors start to substantially add up. The truth is, by the time many clinics realize that they have dropped the fiscal ball, it is too late.
5. Lack of well-trained and dedicated staff. Even if the staff hired to handle chiropractic billing was well-trained, the reality is that unless the clinic is dedicated to on-going education and equally dedicated to staying on top of never-ending insurance changes, the staff is no longer trained. It is also common that not enough staff are hired to really handle all the billing. One or two office staff are often tasked with more than they could possibly keep up with and the complexity of those tasks is often underrated.
6. Clerical Errors. While true misspellings or number mix ups are an actual huge issue in holding up insurance claims, it runs deeper than just a typo.  Clerical errors can include typos, not updating patient records, not submitting the claim on time, coding errors, or a myriad of other issues.
7. Failure to verify insurance coverage. Before providing care to a patient, it’s critical to verify insurance coverage and benefits to avoid denials or delays of payment.

It is critical to the success of any chiropractor or chiropractic clinic to get a full grasp on their billing, and billing errors. Errors in billing cause payment delays and payment denials. They can also cause recoupments, fines, and audits. Most importantly, they can frustrate your client base. Here are a few suggestions on how to navigate through some of these common errors.

1. Invest in education. Invest in your staff by offering on-going learning opportunities to keep them up to date with current billing trends, policies and procedures. Learn software by working with the provider online or other training venues to make full use of all the software has to offer.
2. Take time to fully understand your financials. It is perfectly understandable that you might not have a firm grasp on your financials, or honestly, even the slightest clue on how to read them. Make sure that you either learn how to understand basic fiscal management of your clinic or hire someone who can (and will) keep their eye on the ball.
3. Look for the weak spots. If you watch your financials, you’ll likely start to see weak spots. Focus on those weak spots first. If you notice a lot of unpaid claims, focus on why and then put systems in place to prevent further claim issues. If you notice your staff is struggling to keep up, consider added staff or training. Take the time to do a deep dive into understanding where your weak spots are.
4. Outsource your medical billing. Outsourcing your medical billing will improve accuracy and compliance, increase your revenue, supply access to technology and resources, reduce administrative burdens and enhance customer satisfaction.

Money Tree Billing is a chiropractic billing company who removes the distraction of billing from your office so you can focus on changing lives through chiropractic care. Money Tree Billing offers complete billing cycle management through a dedicated and seamless billing process. We empower you and your team with support beyond just billing. Focus on your practice and your passion and we’ll focus on getting you paid. We GUARANTEE our work. Money Tree Billing guarantees if your insurance claim goes unpaid due to our error, that we will credit you the amount you would have been paid on that claim. You won’t find another guarantee like it in the industry. To learn more about Money Tree Billing, and our one-of-a-kind guarantee, visit www.moneytreebilling.com,

“I am ready to face any challenges that might be foolish enough to face me.” -Dwight from The Office.

Just like personal goals, don’t let the ringing of the new year be the only time you think about your business goals. Any time is the perfect time to review your Chiropractic Clinic goals for the coming weeks, months or year. Unlike your strategic plan, goal setting outlines the specific goals that should inspire you and/or your team to work efficiently, and perhaps towards the broader strategies that you may have in place for your clinic. Goal setting is an important part to running any successful business, they give you clarity, a target to reach for, and they can motivate you and/or your employees. Goal setting can be a challenge, so we’ve compiled some advice to help you through the process.

Goal Setting Prompts:

• Are you happy with the size of the clinic?
• Do you need to increase, decrease, or stay steady with the number of employees you have? 
• Do you have the right employees? 
• Do you continue to stay on top of current best practices and laws medically, as well as human resources, staff training and growth, etc.? 
• Do you like your physical space, equipment, etc.? 
• Do you partner with, or consider partnering with third party vendors to help you focus on what you and/or your team does best? 
• Do you have a coach or mentor that you can rely on to bounce ideas around?
• Are there proficiencies that you can create through better technology or better understanding of technologies available? 
• Are you marketing your clinic, and if you are, is it working for you? 
• Are you profitable? 

You don’t necessarily need to answer all these questions, and there are certainly many more to consider. This is a nice baseline to use to brainstorm. Innovative ideas and concepts will likely grow from there.  

Creating the goal and sticking to it:

• Make sure that your goals are obtainable, even if they are aggressive. 
• Make sure you have measurable goals. 
• Make sure your goals are specific and succinct. 
• If you have a team, invite their input for added buy-in. 
• Make a commitment to the goals you set. 
• Hold yourself and/or your team accountable by implementing deadlines. 
• Schedule regular check-ins and progress reports, even if it is just you.
• Don’t forget to acknowledge and celebrate each goal you meet. 
• Add new goals as you check old ones off. 

Many successful businesses of all types know that goal setting and goal achievement is necessary to succeed. They’ll also tell you that it’s important for you to focus on what you know, and then hire experts to do the rest. In the chiropractic clinic setting the most popular areas of outsourcing for day-to-day operations are medical billing, human resources, and virtual receptionist/appointment setters. Outsourcing also can include business coaches, outside training for you or your staff, business strategists, etc. 

There is no time like today to get moving towards setting solid goals for your chiropractic clinic. While it is serious business, have fun and don’t forget to throw a few dreams in for long term goals. Most importantly, don’t lose sight of the very reasons you started on your path of healing others and make sure that is always the focus. You got this.

Money Tree Billing is a chiropractic billing company who removes the distraction of billing from your office so you can focus on changing lives through chiropractic care. Money Tree Billing offers complete billing cycle management through a dedicated and seamless billing process. We empower you and your team with support beyond just billing. Focus on your practice and your passion and we’ll focus on getting you paid. We GUARANTEE our work. Money Tree Billing guarantees if your insurance claim goes unpaid due to our error, that we will credit you the amount you would have been paid on that claim. You won’t find another guarantee like it in the industry. To learn more about Money Tree Billing, and our one-of-a-kind guarantee, visit www.moneytreebilling.com.

As the end of the quarter draws near, it is time to RESET! Though our intentions are sincere, and our resolve is strong, statistically only 8% of us will accomplish our goals and sadly, 80% of us will have already failed and abandoned our efforts altogether 30-days later.

Today’s society is all about GO! GO! GO! However, activity does not always equal results. Before you GO, take time to RESET. To get from point A to point B successfully, you must first:    

1. Know where you are currently (Point A)
2. Decide what destination you are trying to reach (Point B)
3. Set your goals
4. Identify your obstacles
5. Adjust & Repeat

Let’s use a simple example. Your goal is to double your practice.

KNOW WHERE YOU ARE CURRENTLY (point A). Common sense tells us that Point A is where you are right now. Where EXACTLY is that? If your goal is to double your practice, how to do you accomplish that without understanding what your current average cash in is, as well as what your current average cash out is? Or if you do not know your current patient visit number and average dollar collection per visit? Your Point A needs to be more specific than “I want to double my practice” or “I want to see twice as many patients.”  Many times, you will be able to better determine your Point A by first deciding your Point B.

DECIDE WHAT DESTINATION YOU ARE TRYING TO REACH (Point B). If point B is doubling your practice, what does doubling your practice look like? How many patient visits per week is that? What does your average dollar collection per visit need to be to for that patient visit number to equal the total revenue you need? Do those numbers support your increased overhead?

For example, if you currently see 50 patients/week and your goal is to see 100 patients/week, is it that simple? Is that REALLY your goal? What if you start seeing 100 patients/week but your collections do not double, they only increase by 20% because of the type of average new patient? However, your overhead has increased by 40% because you have had to add new team members to oversee the additional volume. Congratulations? You are now seeing 100 patients per week AND making less money.

As I mentioned in Point A, sometimes determining your Point B first will help you know what information you need to better determine exactly where/what Point A is.

SET YOUR GOALS. Just like Point A & B, your goals must be specific. No wishy washy, pie-in-the-sky, mumbo jumbo, vague “let’s see what sticks,” half-assed goals. I am sure you have heard this before, and I am going to reinforce it one more time. SMART goals are the key:

• Specific: “Double my practice” is not specific enough. I want to see an average of 100 patients or more per week, at a $75 average collection per visit is.
• Measurable: “Double my practice” gives you nothing you can measure. An average of 100 patients or more per week, at a $75 average collection per visit is measurable.
• Attainable: A goal that is attainable is one that you can actually accomplish. If your goal is an average of 100 patients or more per week, at a $75 average collection per visit do you have the capacity to reach that goal? Is there enough room in your schedule book? Enough hours in your day? Enough space in your office? A team that is all in? A measurable plan to market and attract new patients? And most importantly, do YOU buy in and believe in your goal? Your business will never outgrow you; if it does, you will not maintain it for long.
• Relevant: Does your goal align with your overall vision? If you are at an age where you are starting to plan for retirement, does it make sense for you to try and see twice as many patients per week? Maybe. Or maybe the better goal would be to determine how to bring an associate on board that will eventually buy your shares of the business and to help build their numbers as part of that process. Or to add PT to your practice instead to afford you the ability to bring in an associate. The point is, do not set a goal for the sake of setting a goal. Ask yourself, does it align with my vision? Does this goal help get me to my ultimate destination?
• Time-bound: Your overall goal, and any steps in between, should have specific timelines. Do you want to see 100 patients on average per week by the time you retire or within 12 months? A timeline makes all the difference.