CG CLASSIFIEDS
We are looking for a second fellowship-trained Geriatrician to join our amazing rural Upstate New York community.
Supplements & Special Projects
Getting the Most out of Your CME
Ever attend a meeting and think that there were several ideas that you planned to implement as soon as you returned to the office only to find that nothing was accomplished when you got back on the practice treadmill? Well, that can all change if you have an action plan that you take to each meeting. You enter the few ideas that that you want to use or try and then commit those ideas to paper and give yourself deadlines for accomplishing those actions. A sample of an action plan is shown above. We also suggest that your staff complete the form when they attend a meeting and bring back their to-do list and what they plan to accomplish within the practice.
Bottom line: An idea is like a slippery fish. Unless you stab it with a pencil and put the ideas down on paper, they will slip away. Using a post-meeting action plan is one of the easiest ways to take an idea from the meeting and see that the idea takes root.
First Impressions Count
The telephone is usually the first interaction that your patients will have with your practice. If the telephone isn’t answered properly with an energized and enthusiastic receptionist, you may find patients not keeping appointments, and there will be holes in your schedule like Swiss cheese. There’s a world of difference between “Doctor’s office, please hold” and “This is Dr. Baum’s office. This is Maria speaking. How may I help you?” The first method is likely to discourage patients from becoming a part of your practice, and the latter is likely to make them feel important and appreciated.
A Useful Front Office Checklist for Your Practice
It’s Monday morning and you arrive 15 minutes before you are to see patients. You walk into the reception area (not waiting room!) and see that it is disheveled; you look into the patient restroom and there are no paper towels; and you walk into the exam rooms and find that the rooms are missing paper covers on the exam tables. Clearly, your office is not ready and prepared to see patients in a productive and efficient fashion. What can be done to correct this situation?
Using a Scribe to Increase Practice Efficiency
Today, with decreasing reimbursements and increases in overhead expenses, there is motivation to become more efficient in our practices. One of the easiest methods of increasing volume of patients seen each day is to make use of a “scribe.” It does not make good use of physicians’ time to take a history of the present illness, do the review of systems, and ask about the patients’ past medical history. This can be effectively and accurately done by delegating this important task to someone else in your office and allow you to see more patients while this information is being obtained. I
Improving Patient Safety Using Checklists
Every surgeon is aware of the “time out” surgical safety checklist used in nearly every hospital in the country. We are suggesting that perhaps it is time to use these same checklists in the office for invasive office procedures. Examples would be flexible sigmoidoscopy, biopsy, and removal of skin lesions, vasectomies, prostate biopsies, etc.
A checklist (sample shown above) is created that confirms that the consent is signed, the patient completed the proper pre-procedure preparations, the appropriate medications have been given prior to the procedure, all of the equipment necessary t
Avoid the Doorknob Question
You stand up to terminate the visit with the patient; you ask the patient if there is anything else he/she would like to discuss and the patient says “no.” You close the chart and put your hand on the doorknob to leave the room and the patient says, “Doctor, there is one more thing I'd like to talk to you about.” We have all experienced this doorknob phenomenon, which usually results in having a patient with unanswered questions and the patient having a less than stellar experience with the doctor and the practice. Now here’s a way to reduce the likelihood of this happening to you.
Clinical Geriatrics Blogs
Coming in Future Issues of Clinical Geriatrics
Series: Diabetes in the Elderly
Series: Cancer in Older Adults
First Report® Conference Coverage: American Academy of Neurology, American Diabetes Association, 2010 Digestive Disease Week
Assessment and Classification of Pain in the Elderly Patient
Pharmacologic Management of Pain in Older Patients
Miscellaneous Pain Syndromes in Older Adults
Nonhernia Causes of Inguinal Pain in the Elderly
