Low Overhead combined with a Standard Patient Workload

[Guest guest]

On February 1st, 2006, I left a Hospital owned family practice and

opened a smaller, digital practice in Canandaigua, NY. My staff

consists of 2 FTE front end personnel, 1 FTE LPN, a part-time FNP,

and myself. We have begun with Amazing Charts on a wireless system

with Dell laptops on mobile laptop stands that are wheeled into each

exam room. It has worked phenomenal thus far. 850 new patients

since we opened our doors 6 weeks ago! Charges for the 1st month

alone for myself were $37,000, covering expenses easily.

The main component to our information workflow is using Apractis

Collaboration Partners at www. apractis.com. Apractis has packaged

Onebox.com as well as Webexone.com, formerly intranets.com, for

information workflow. Through a single account, I recieve all faxes

(including lab results and imaging reports from the hospital),

emails, and voicemails, as onebox works as our answering service as

well. Apractis has enabled me to become completely digital and

mobile with my information needs outside of our EMR. I can send and

recieve emails, faxes, lab requests, referrals, prescriptions, all

with Apractis' workflow assistance at a very low cost. Most

answering services will cost 70-80 dollars per month for nothing

more than a phone call telling you who called and what number they

are calling from. I have eliminated this issue by having onebox

automatically route calls during evenings and weekends to whomever

in my call group is on call, or to my Treo 650, where I answer the

phonecall directly after onebox screens the patient name and number

for me. Incredible functionality for less than $10 dollars monthly!

My practice website is based upon the webexone " WebOffice "

framework. I am offerring online newpatient registration,

appointment requests, medication refills, and virtual visits, using

the secure survey tools that are offerred through Apractis.com. It

has been phenomenal to watch my practice grow in leaps and bounds by

leveraging internet communications. Over half of all my

registrations have come from the internet forms we offer, and

patients are literally banging our doors down because they value

this service and guess what, there is no other standard office

practice in canandaigua, NY that is offerring these enhanced

communication services.

My main mision was to re-create a standard family medicine office

with visits remaining in the 20-30 range for a single provider,

while increasing efficiency and decreasing overhead at the same

time. While not a true overhead practice as Dr. 's model has

proven, I am able to care for thousands of patient this way, offer

full scope family medicine, offer medical home services such as

minor procedures, EKGs, Spirometry, cryotherapy, virtual visits, etc.

I welcome correspondence to learn more of how a young family

physician broke free from the chains of a salaried hospital position

to practice medicine the way it was meant to be, on our terms and

with using technology to enhance communication and efficiency with

daily workflows.

Sincerely,

L. , MD

Finger Lakes Family Care

241 Parrish Street, Suite B

Canandaigua, NY 14424

rlsmithmd@...