Primary Care- Scheduling/Clinic Management Advice?

[amalay, MSN, RN]

This question is going to be directed to any NPs out there working in outpatient primary care clinics. I currently work for a pediatric primary care site that has had SIGNIFICANT issues with scheduling in the past year (amongst other greater issues in middle and upper management leading to very high turnover and poor retention of providers, nurses, medical assistants, etc).

I just wanted to poll around to see how your schedules for providers are organized:

- Do you have slots of 10-, 20- and 40-min for certain visits, or 15- or 30-min slots for sick vs well child/more complex mental health visits?

- Do your providers have a set template of XX many physicals in the morning or afternoon or is it a free-for-all?

- How do you guys manage or set aside time to accommodate for walk-ins?

- What is your policy for late arrivals (say if someone is 14-min late for a 15-min appointment, or 15-min late for a 30-min appointment)?

- What about double-booking?

My clinic tends to double-book a lot, which is stressful because we don't have a high no-show rate whatsoever.

I'm leaving this practice soon to move onto a (hopefully) better managed office- but I wanted to be able to give the office manager some advice on how to better and more smoothly run a schedule so patients are happier and to make sure providers don't burn out as quick.

[OCRN3]

Do you have slots of 10-, 20- and 40-min for certain visits, or 15- or 30-min slots for sick vs well child/more complex mental health visits?

the front office is supposed to schedule 15 minutes for established patients/sick visits. 30 minutes for new patients and wellness exam, but they often mess it up and give 15 minutes to a new patient for a sick visit. its really the fron office who picks and chooses.

- Do your providers have a set template of XX many physicals in the morning or afternoon or is it a free-for-all? yes we are supposed to have 5 major appointments in the Am and 5 in the PM, but that also is never on point.\

]- How do you guys manage or set aside time to accommodate for walk-ins? walk ins are added as needed and sometime they ask my input, if i can accommodate

- What is your policy for late arrivals (say if someone is 14-min late for a 15-min appointment, or 15-min late for a 30-min appointment)? they get 15 minutes to arrive late, we will still see them in another slot if there is a new show but they are not garaunteed a spot, also up to front office,

- What about double-booking? they will do it to me if there are no shows but also depends on who is in the front