Patient Retention for PT Clinics & How Patients Are the Key to Success

What are the two most important management tasks for those running a physical therapy (PT) clinic? First, attracting new patients, and second, retaining them. Patient retention is actually even more important than bringing in new ones, because it costs less to retain a patient than to find a new one! It is up to five times more cost-effective to retain a patient than to secure a new patient. In fact, increasing retention rates by just 5% can increase profits by 25%-95%.

Missed appointments can be a major pain point for the profitability of clinics. In the United States, health clinics report anywhere between 5% and 55% no-show rates. These missed appointments can negatively impact the long-term prognosis of patients, impair the development of the important relationship between patient and therapist, and decrease potential billing time for providers.

Patient retention should be a focus for clinics to improve profitability, create more positive outcomes for patients, and build trust among the community and other providers. The following are focus areas for retaining patients in physical therapy clinics.  Figuring out where your clinic has room for improvement in any of these areas can have a positive impact on staff and patients.

Patient Retention Means Focusing on Strong Relationships

Providing a positive experience at every visit is essential, and building a strong relationship with your patients is key in that process. 70% of patients do not complete their recommended plan of care and 20% discontinue services within the first three visits. A major factor for this immediate churn is the failure to form trusting relationships between providers and patients. Patients who report high satisfaction with their physical therapy provider have 25-30% higher retention rates than those who report lower satisfaction.

While many types of interactions can affect how a patient feels about their provider, the clinic, or their treatment, these are some areas you may want to focus on or provide additional training in order to improve patient satisfaction. Most of these will incur no additional costs and provide great return on your investment of time.

• Empathy: Active listening when patients discuss symptoms or challenges, asking motivational questions, and offering supportive suggestions all help patients feel understood by their therapist and other staff members.
• Cultural competency: This can include offering written materials in a variety of languages, a variety of appointment times, adapting home exercise regimens to match a patient’s living situation, or making an effort to understand how cultural norms affect treatment and healing opportunities.
• Offer educational materials: Ensuring that patients understand their injury and treatment plan will create more motivation and buy-in for progress and commitment to treatment.
• Address expectations: Set clear expectations for both provider and patient so there is no confusion about roles and responsibilities.
• Accessibility: Ensure your clinic is easy to access for patients who are using public transportation, mobility assistance, or care givers for attending appointments.
• Communication availability: Give patients a variety of ways to get in touch with the clinic. This should include phone numbers, in-person visits, telehealth visits, and after-hours email addresses or messaging systems. Apps are great for some patients but others are uncomfortable with technology or reside in rural areas without access to broadband service.

Offer Personalized Care, Planning, and Review Services

Designing tailored treatment plans to each patient’s specific needs and challenges is a major contributor to both satisfaction and patient retention. Generic plans that are the same for each stroke, joint replacement, or injured patient leaves individuals feeling that they are just a number instead of a unique person with factors that influence their progress specifically.

When physical therapists take the time to understand a patient’s situation and tailor goals, treatment plans, and at home therapies to the specific person, they are much more likely to follow through and report satisfaction with services.

Additional ways you can apply personalized care include:

• Always using a patient’s preferred name
• Understanding a patient’s medical history
• Using an EHR that allows all providers to communicate seamlessly and remain abreast of changes in medical status
• Using a patient’s preferred method of communication including phone calls, texts, medical portals, or email
• Offer appropriate educational materials for the condition and education level of the patient

Frequently reviewing progress and setbacks with patients also improves the relationship as the provider considers the factors that influence this patient’s progress or challenges. Setting goals in collaboration with patients helps them to feel in control of their treatment and gives them a sense of autonomy and set themselves up for success.

Improve the Patient Experience to Improve Retention

The patient experience starts as soon as someone gets a referral to your clinic. Everything from this moment on can influence how they feel about your services, if they continue treatment, how they will talk to others about your clinic, and thus your overall patient retention. Think about all the people, technology, and environments patients interact with that will help determine if they provide a positive experience.

Some common areas of friction that you can improve are:

1. Scheduling. Do you have multiple ways available for patients to schedule and update appointments? Try to allow them to call the office or schedule through an online portal or website that is available outside of standard working hours.
2. The physical environment. Do you have enough parking spaces for everyone who is coming and going? Is the office easily accessible? Is the waiting area comfortable? Keeping all areas tidy and clean will improve the perception of the clinic. Also consider the noise level, potential for crowding, signage, and lighting to make the environment friendly and easier to navigate
3. Interactions with staff. Patients may interact with the receptionist, PT assistants, therapists, billing offices, and management. Everyone involved should be friendly, easy to talk to, and patient.
4. Technology. Do you have the right technology to communicate clearly with patients and remind them of their appointment times? They should also be able to access their medical records, appointment notes, and contact information for their care team quickly.  Technology can smooth interactions in various languages and assist those who have hearing loss.
5. Community involvement. Your clinic is a small piece of a larger community. Take the time to be involved in the local community in whatever way is meaningful to you. This builds trust that you know and care about the local people and that your services will be there to support them.

Communicate Often and Clearly About the Topics Patients Care About

Engaging patients outside of the office is also effective at retaining clients. And thanks to email newsletters and social media, it’s fairly easy and affordable — if you know how to do it right.

Email newsletters offer great opportunities to engage your current patients, especially if you provide them with compelling content.

• Share news about your practice and the industry in general
• Educate your patients about all the services you have to offer, and how all of the treatment modalities work to improve potential outcomes.
• Provide information and news about new research results, techniques and treatments
• Introduce employees and build a personal connection
• Give them suggestions for physical therapy exercises they can do at home, as well as additional health information that will keep them on track like nutritious recipes, movement goals, mobility exercises, or healthy sleep habits
• Provide incentives to current patients to encourage them to refer a friend, like contests, which can generate excitement (especially with prizes!) and motivate your current patients to refer friends, in turn decreasing churn rate

Include positive reviews or case studies in your newsletter if you have permission to share them. If you can inspire your patients to post about their great experience at your clinic, that’s the best free advertising of all!

Are you ready to start writing your monthly newsletter? Do you want to do it by hand, or send it out to be done? If you’re short on time or not sure where to start, you can hire freelance writers and graphic designers to help you pull it together. They’ll know what they’re doing, and will be able to create a smooth, professional email.

If you want to tackle this by yourself, there are many tools out there to help you. Once you know what topics you want to cover, you can create a draft email. With that text ready to go, there are a bunch of free, drag-and-drop email builders you can access to pull it all together. While this method is more work for you, it will also come across as more genuine to your readers who know and appreciate your voice.

Expand Your Services

Many patients think of a PT clinic only when they’ve been injured or are recovering from a procedure and have been referred for services. But, if you have the space and staffing, you could offer additional wellness services to keep patients engaged. With additional certifications, you could expand your physical therapy services. Areas that are in high demand include:

• Pediatrics
• Women’s health
• Sports rehabilitation
• Hand therapy
• Specialized services for chronic pain or chronic health conditions
• Training in adaptive technology or assistive devices
• Neurological rehabilitation
• Workplace health consultation

Other types of services that physical therapists are positioned to provide to patients and community members could include:

• Massage therapy
• Sports conditioning
• Nutrition
• Yoga, Pilates, or other fitness programs
• Dry needling
• Astym therapy
• Hydrotherapy

Think about the services you already provide, the technology you have, and your areas of interest or expertise. You could offer these as fee-for-service to any walk-ins. This provides another stream of income as well as a way to maintain relationships with patients who may have completed their course of treatment and increase patient retention for any future needs they may have.

Relationships Increase Patients Retention to Keep Them Coming Back

Regardless of the method you choose to reduce churn and retain patients, the basis of all tactics is relationships. Patients always want to have a positive experience with their health care providers and the infrastructure that supports their clinics. Focusing on clear communication, empathy, and streamlining paperwork won’t cost your clinic any money or time but make an outsized difference in the way patients view you and your clinic. Make sure you and everyone who works at your clinic communicate clearly in a way patients understand and give patients an easy way to get in contact with their providers so they feel they can ask questions and seek guidance as needed.