How to Organize a Small Medical Office

Time constraints force office managers to juggle an enormous number of duties. A proper medical office setup will lead to a more streamlined and successful practice down the road. Without a scheduled strategy to organize and prioritize your office tasks, it’s easy to forget about important meetings and assignments. With the right strategies and tools, your practice can lower the stress of a disorganized office and optimize productivity for the long term.

9 Tips for Organizing Your Small Medical Office

Organize your medical practice effectively and efficiently with these nine tips.

1. Determine Your Goals

Your organization overhaul will focus on areas like file and document organization methods, schedule management, interdepartmental communication, inventory and supply management, and any other area you determine. Assess your administrative and medical teams to determine inefficiencies. Audit your current policies, your staff’s adherence to them, and their opinions on how you stay organized. Use what you uncover to determine your goals.

2. Prioritize Tasks and Responsibilities 

Planning and setting priorities allow you to more efficiently utilize the office manager’s most limited resource in the practice — time. When managing daily tasks, remember to prioritize tasks that are the most impactful to patient care, and consider the office staff’s current workload. The better you manage important tasks, the more time you’ll have to dedicate to staying organized.

Plus, staying organized will make it easier for staff to accomplish their high-priority tasks. Reduce the chance of forgetting about important tasks, paperwork or meetings by making these objectives clear and accessible. Handwritten or electronic to-do lists are an excellent way to do this day-to-day. Your to-do list can give you a head start at the beginning of each shift.

3. Maintain Calendars for Appointments and Administrative Tasks

Diligent calendar management is important when improving a small medical office’s organization. Practitioners need to know who is coming and when, as well as where they need to be and at what time. This way, every patient receives the care they need and your office doesn’t become disorganized in the shuffle. 

Carefully controlling your administrative calendar is also critical. Every month brings deadlines for training requirements, 401(k) and profit-sharing filings, financial reports and internal project milestones. It’s important to take note of each deadline every month, and document them in your calendar as soon as you learn of them. Also, add in board meetings, reminders for upcoming important deadlines, staff recognition gatherings and physicians’ grand rounds. A solid company calendar is a cornerstone for a proper medical office setup.

4. Reconsider Management’s Open Door Policy 

Many office managers brag about their open-door policies for staff members, but the reality is that continuous interruptions can keep you from getting your work done. Limiting your availability can keep everyone on track and maximize the value of meetings when you have them. Dedicate one hour daily for questions and comments from the staff and set criteria for the interaction.

Reducing the amount of questions that employees have for management can also help, so provide the training and tools that every staff member needs to solve problems on their end.

You can also require job candidates to possess certain education or experience so they can hit the ground running when they start with your practice.

5. Order Office Supplies Online as Needed

Set up a system of keeping an inventory of office supplies to prevent unexpected and unnecessary trips to the stationery store. Ordering these products and supplies online is easy. Your vendors usually keep records of your orders to help both of you better remember the type of pens, paper, models, item numbers and brands for your office supplies. Vendors can also generate utilization reports. 

Consider incorporating office purchases into your calendar management routine. By analyzing your average supply usage for each business quarter, you can anticipate and plan orders so your staff always has the resources they need.

6. Process Mail Once

Only open mail, physical and/or electronic, you feel prepared and able to personally handle. Then, handle it on the spot. This process relies on a helpful principle — only handle it once. Opening mail now and dealing with it later can cause you to spend an unnecessary amount of time on the task. 

Sorting mail as it arrives and opening it during a dedicated time will keep you from going through emails and bills more than once. You can establish a two-part office mail filing system that includes a dedicated location and time for storing and opening each type of mail: 

• Do now: Mail that you or someone in the office can or must process at the current moment. Examples include test results, medical record requests, prescription renewals and other time-sensitive documents. 
• Do later: Mail that you can process at a later, scheduled time. Examples include tax documents, inquiries from vendors, insurance updates and non-urgent administrative documents.

7. Predetermine Emergency Procedures

Organized office managers should always prepare and plan for possible emergencies. 

• Prevent lost records and documents: Set up a system for creating and storing duplicate financial and personnel records. 
• Respond to threats on time: Assemble a file containing significant emergency-related and staff phone numbers in case of security breaches, fires or hazardous spills. 
• Understand patients’ rights: Review any relevant HIPAA training and documentation that you have available to you to understand the best practices when dealing with the security of sensitive patient information. 

8. Implement Office Management Technology

Technology plays a huge part in the modern medical office space. There are various digital tools you can use to manage the practice’s schedule, connect with patients, store sensitive data and otherwise optimize your daily tasks. For example, a strong electronic health record (EHR) is valuable for tracking patient information seamlessly.

9. Find Support Where You Need It

Small medical offices tend to have a few people juggling multiple responsibilities. When your team members have too many tasks to manage, it’s easy to fall behind and let responsibilities compound. One of the more overwhelming tasks for small offices is managing phone calls. If you don’t have a person acting exclusively as a receptionist, calls can go unanswered. 

A call answering service can be an excellent way to support your staff and reduce the many responsibilities they handle in the office.

Organize Your Office With AnswerHero™ Call Answering Services

When your office takes calls all day, it can feel challenging to catch up. Take the next step for organizing your office — partner with AnswerHero™ for call answering services. Our team of bilingual agents is available 24/7 to support your medical office in the way you need most. Whether you want a virtual receptionist, after hours support or overflow answering, our contract-free services provide the coverage you’re looking for. 

Explore our pricing plans today and reach out to our team to get started. With our fast onboarding process, we can start answering your phone right away.