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    Categories: Healthcare IssuesHealthcare MarketingPatient Outreach

How to Help Your Patients Now

How to Help Your Patients Now

The long deep recession has American healthcare consumers reeling as they continue to face declining home prices and increasing unemployment.  Most experts predict a long slow recovery. Given that, how can you best help your patients now?

Many physicians have experienced record appointment cancellations and declining numbers of patients as more consumers put off both elective procedures and medically necessary care to focus on other necessities. To help combat these economic realities, some physicians are finding ways to help their patients continue to receive medically necessary care.

The first step is to educate your patients about the potentially costly consequences of them putting off or avoiding needed care. Now is a great time to explain, in plain language, how a minor medical problem, which can be corrected relatively inexpensively, can become a major medical problem, which can only be corrected at high, potentially devastating cost to the patient or patient’s family.

According to CNNhealth.com, well over 60% of all American bankruptcies occur due to medical bills. This year alone, more than 1.5 million Americans will go bankrupt, with nearly one million of those caused by medical bills. Further, the study says, 78% of those bankrupted by medical bills were covered by health insurance. But coverage gaps and uncovered health expenses capsized consumer finances, anyway.

The second step physicians are taking is more drastic. They are finding ways to cut healthcare costs to their patients through reduced fees and low-cost or no-cost services. By doing so, they are building good will and loyalty, plus sending a powerful message about their patients’ health being more important to them than money.

To learn more about helping your patients through these difficult and challenging times, talk to one of the marketing experts at Practice Builders. Call us at 855-898-2710.