Medical Practice Management Challenges

Good practice management is a prerequisite to good patient care and is in the best interests of patients and the office. However, every medical office comes with its own set of challenges, and when they occur, they must be overcome and resolved by virtue of training, guidance, special knowlege, and experience. Some of the possible challenges might be:

• The uninsured patient
• Coordination of benefits
• Specialty care referrals
• Managed care
• State and Federal laws
• Attorneys and lawsuits
• Third party liability issues
• Insurance companies
• State and federal regulatory agencies
• Compliance (OIG, OSHA, HIPAA)
• ERISA and CLIA
• State Health Department
• Debt collection agencies
• Debt collection laws
• State insurance laws
• Medicare/Medicaid
• Tricare rules
• Auto accident cases
• Workers compensation cases
• Court procedures
• Medico-legal examinations
• Consent and informed decision making
• Patient dissatisfaction
• Ineffective appointment systems
• Misplaced patient records
• Unproven and alternate therapies

and

• Efficiency of written communications
• Security of office and computer systems
• Adequacy and security of patient records
• Quality of the equipment
• Safety of the practice
• Filing patents for new treatments

For larger medical groups, practice managers may be employed to undertake some of this work, such as solve a problem, or resolve pressing issues. In other cases the task may be allocated to a specialist of the group who has the necessary skills and background. Sometimes an outside consultant, or lawyer may be hired, while the doctor and his medical assistants continue their daily medical office routine.