Choosing Membership Services

Once you decide to become a membership practice, the next step is choosing membership services for your patients. We know the benefits for providers: A smaller patient load, reduced overhead, and less record-keeping. But what services will you offer your patients?

Ask Your Patients What Membership Services They Want

When some people think of a membership practice, they think of fluffy robes and private waiting rooms. Those things are nice extras, but they don’t do much to make a patient’s experience better. Ask your patients what would improve their experience.  The most common things patients are looking for all relate to time: Faster access to appointments, longer appointments, and a practitioner who listens (which takes time!).

How Available Do You Want to Be?

From a patients’ perspective, one of the most attractive things about a membership practice is the increased access they have to their provider. What used to be handled with an in-office visit can now be handled on the phone or over email. Simple follow up questions that used to take days to get answered can now be answered in hours or even minutes.

But this kind of access means that the provider no longer leaves work when he or she leaves the office. You’ll be tethered to your practice in a way that traditional providers are not. And while most patients won’t take advantage of this 24/7 access, there are bound to be a few who do pick up the phone for every little thing. So consider if you can handle providing that level of availability.

For patients used to the old model, simply being able to schedule same or next day appointments, and not having to wait once they arrive for that appointment, will be an incredible improvement. So if you’re unsure about 24/7 access, you can still provide much greater access than what your patients have been used to.

Consider Your Demographics

If your practice is in a very affluent area, then luxuries like fluffy robes and private waiting rooms may indeed be something you want to offer your patients. If your patients are seniors, they may want help navigating the healthcare maze, things like coordinating specialist referrals and appointments and medical records. For patients with limited mobility, house calls would be an attractive feature and something well worth paying a membership fee for.

If your patients are focused on wellness and preventative care, they desire services that cater to their healthy lifestyle.  You might consider hiring alternative therapists like an acupuncturist, naturopath, or nutritionist and adding an on-site lab to provide simple blood tests for things like vitamin deficiencies and lipid levels.

Tech-savvy patients will appreciate patient portals, so they can do things like make appointments, access medical records and get lab results on-line. Even better if you have a patient portal app so they can do all of that right on their phone!

A Perfect Match

Choosing membership services to include in your  practice is a matter of finding the right balance between what is best for your patients and for you. This shouldn’t be too difficult because providers and patients often share many of the same frustrations with traditional practice models. Therefore,  what makes your patients happy can make you happy too.

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