Reducing Paper in Your PT Practice

It’s no secret that a physical therapy office can produce a lot of paper—and a lot of waste. Reducing paper in your practice can have lots of benefits across the board, including increasing efficiency for your staff, convenience for your patients, and your environmental impact for the future. Moving toward a paperless practice helps to gather all the information your clinic utilizes into one place, just a few clicks away.

1. A practice management and EMR software

Moving to an EMR software is the quickest way to cut your office’s paper usage.

Taking your charts digital has endless benefits. You’ll be able to safely and securely retain back-up copies of records in case of emergency, without doubling your filing cabinet needs. Digital records are also easier to create, find, and organize, increasing your staff’s efficiency. Practice management software can even help you to generate key performance indicators and create easy-to-interpret data to help you analyze your productivity and drive your practice to be its very best. Plus, you can save reams of paper every year.

A green, paperless software solution isn’t just the practice of tomorrow—it’s already here.

2. A patient portal for intake paperwork

Having a comprehensive intake process helps you to treat your patients more efficiently and takes some of the pressure off your front office staff. However, intake information doesn’t have to mean an archaic process.

Many services allow you to take this information online, which has the added benefit of enabling patients to fill out their information at home, saving them time spent in the waiting room as well as piles of paper. Some of these portals may even import directly into your EMR, making data entry a breeze.

Bringing convenience to both your patients and your staff is a win-win all around.

3. An e-faxing service

Integrated communication is key when it comes to healthcare but staying connected while keeping protected health information safe can be a challenge.

An e-faxing service can allow you to throw out your clunky fax machine and instead communicate securely via the internet, without producing any additional paper to be shredded at your clinic. Not all faxing services are created equal, however. When shopping for an e-fax service for your clinic, look for solutions which specialize in confidentiality and HIPAA compliance.

You may even be able to streamline your existing workflow by utilizing an e-faxing service which integrates with your EMR, meaning less logistical work and more time with patients.

4. An email list

By switching your existing mailing list to an email campaign, you can create colorful and engaging marketing campaigns without all the added overhead for supplies. Your potential patients will have greater control to opt in and out of the campaign, ensuring that your efforts reach the right people—not the junk mail pile in someone’s recycling bin.

As an added benefit, you never have to lick a stamp again.