Knowing how a practice is performing and how to increase its profitability are most efficiently accomplished through the use of statistics. Some people call them “performance metrics” and others may say “practice metric monitors,” but in any case, they are referring to the numbers which measure the productivity of the various areas of the practice.
Statistics are like car gauges. They tell you whether something is wrong or right, as the case may be. Oil and water pressures in the expected range on the gauges mean things are normal. When an engine light comes on, you know you need to go to a service station to take care of it.
In your practice, statistics in the practice should have the same effect. They are objective measures and if you know how to read them on properly scaled graphs, they will guide you in what actions you need to take for increased expansion and profitability. Sample statistics to keep: Number of New Patients for the week, Weekly and Monthly Billings, Weekly and Monthly Collections, Average Daily Production (Monthly Billings Divided by Number of Days Worked), Weekly Billings by Provider, Overhead (Expenses), and so on.
“Monitoring” or “watching” stats is NOT statistical management – it is being a spectator. An executive takes appropriate actions based on the weekly and monthly statistical results.
The skill in managing by statistics is finding out what changed, up or down and fixing it. Part of this process is having sufficient statistics so you can isolate the exact problem area or, on the positive side, the area that is causing the overall statistics to be up.
So MAKE your survival potential go UP by MANAGING by statistics!
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