Effective Communication In The Medical Office

[Noelle]

By Dreama Sloan-Kelly MD, CCS

Hey All,

I hear the statement “My doctor does not listen to me” from various billers, coders, practice managers, and office managers from around the country. I hear it so much that it has become permanently implanted into my brain.

Now, you know that I am a doctor, but that does not meant I do not sympathize with your feelings, because in all truthfulness you are RIGHT! But being right is not the whole story. What you, as the support staff, needs to understand is that it is not that your doctor does not want to hear you, but it is all in the approach in which you try to provide the information.

As clinicians, your doctors are trained to listen to patients, treat them, heal them and move onto the next case. No one ever told us that we would have to run a business and deal with all of the drama that is associated with a subject that we know very little about.

At the end of the day, you come to me, the doctor, tell me all of these things that I am not documenting, and how I am coding wrong (or not coding at all), and then to top it off you are showing me how my reimbursements are going down. So now, instead of you being my right hand, you have become just like my demanding spouse – who I shut out on a daily basis

WOW! You would shut down too. Do not worry, I would never give this depressing peak into some (not all) of your doctor’s minds and not tell you how to communicate effectively with your doctors – making your life easier, and theirs too.
Stay tuned next week for the first step in the “Getting My Doctor to Listen to Me” series.

Until Next Time……

P.S. Join me for a special webinar that we have created about communication in the medical office. Effective communication with your physician is essential to the success and financial health of your practice. However, learning how to communicate with your physician is a skill that is not easy to come by. This webinar will give you the skills you need to get your doctor, and other practitioners, to listen to you. To find out more about this webinar, visit the MedicalCodingShop.com.