The Main Aspects of Patient Management

No matter how good your clinical skills are, it is all for naught if you cannot communicate this value to your patients. As all practitioners are well aware, the doctor-patient relationship is about far more than just the rendering of medical services onto a willing participant. Nowadays, your relationship with a given patient is much more likely to be a partnership of two equals, and using patient management software to facilitate this is easy.

Patient management tools that have been proven to excel at benefitting both your practice and your patients include automated confirmations and reminders sent by SMS and email, as well as more customised automated emails that contain information specific to given patient subgroups or the services they have booked.

Watch our expert's video advice on combining the convenience of automated appointment notifications with the ability to add extra details depending on the type of patient, appointment and/or service booked

When you implement customised automated messaging in your clinic, you can expect to:

• Improve your patients' understanding of their medical care, thus boosting the patient experience
• Help patients understand what to expect when they visit your clinic or even attend a telemedicine video consultation
• Cut down on no-shows and cancellations as patients are reminded of their appointments and the reasons to attend
• Show patients that you have their individual situation in mind every time you communicate with them
• Reduce the admin workload of your receptionists so they can greet patients warmly and manage your waiting room more effectively

Pro Tip: Using medical CRM software you can improve your patient retention rate by sending automated appointment reminders to your patients!

Patient management is not just about fostering a good clinic-patient relationship and developing a rapport with your patients. It's also about managing patients in the sense of recognising their problems, tracking their progress, and providing the best possible treatment plans. In other words, we are talking about the clinical management of an individual as opposed to relationship management.

A good patient management software tool will enable you to fulfill your clinical role effectively by helping you to:

• Track medications and related diagnoses to ensure that your practice complies with regulations and provides the best evidence-based care
• Create lists of patient subgroups and send useful information to them all in bulk, e.g. for diabetes, high blood pressure
• Enter your consultation notes in the EHR in a standardised manner that can be understood even by those unfamiliar with a patient's case