Every surgical facility has unique case scheduling needs and challenges.  Effectively meeting those challenges by overcoming communications and efficiency bottlenecks can bring bottom-line benefits to the surgical facility and to its physician clientele.

Here are some questions to think about when considering how SCOR™ can best help you to meet your scheduling challenges and objectives:

Q. WHAT IS YOUR CURRENT SCHEDULING MEDIUM?

• Do you schedule by phone, fax or both?
• Do you know how much time your facility schedulers and physician schedulers spend on case scheduling?
• Do you know how many cases your schedulers can effectively process in a day?

FAX: Fax-based case scheduling has a number of drawbacks with the primary challenge being that fax-based scheduling can require a lot of facility scheduler time in following up with the physician office to complete the scheduling process:

• Illegible, missing or incomplete scheduling request faxes
• Confirmation of scheduling requests
• Adjusting case times due to equipment or personnel limitations or conflicts

SCOR™ can sharply reduce or eliminate these problems.  Here is how:

1. SCOR™ allows facilities to create online registration forms which enforce required information.  This can eliminate incomplete requests.
2. All information is collected through online forms eliminating illegible faxes.
3. SCOR™ can account for special equipment requirements and communicate other resource limitations.  This ensures that scheduling requests are made for a time slot which matches requirements of procedure(s).

PHONE: Some of the primary challenges with phone based scheduling are as follows:

• A scheduler has to be available to answer the phone and process a scheduling request.
• A scheduler can only share a finite amount of schedule openings through a phone conversation.
• Phone based scheduling is time consuming for both the physician scheduler and the facility scheduler.

SCOR™ can overcome the bottlenecks of phone based scheduling by improving the workflow, information exchange, and availability of the scheduling process.  Here is how:

1. SCOR™ allows scheduling requests to be placed virtually anytime.  This includes after-hours and on weekends.
2. SCOR™ provides physician schedulers a complete picture of the scheduling opportunities available to them.
3. SCOR™ can decrease the time it takes for a facility scheduler to process a scheduling request between 58% and 78%.  This advantage can make your scheduler much more productive.
4. SCOR™ allows for customized scheduling rules which makes scheduling more efficient and accurate.
5. SCOR™ eliminates time spent waiting on hold, as well as unanswered phone calls.
6. SCOR™ provides online messaging for change request management, meaning that change requests can be made at anytime as well.

Q. WHEN CAN PHYSICIAN OFFICES SCHEDULE CASES?

• Is scheduling limited to standard business hours?

If your facility can only accept scheduling requests from 8am – 5pm, Monday through Friday, then that is a bottleneck for your facility and for your physician schedulers.

Physician offices often have later office hours, and sometimes see patients on the weekend.  If they have to wait until normal business hours to schedule, then there is more opportunity for you to lose that case to the hospital or another facility, and not to mention the time management burden it creates for the physician schedulers.

Allowing physician schedulers to schedule after-hours or on the weekend provides them a customer service advantage.  Many schedulers do more than schedule.  They are often clinical staff or even office managers who need to take time away from prime business hours to do their case scheduling.

Q. HOW MUCH BLOCK SCHEDULING DO YOU DO?

• What percentage of your scheduling is block?
• When do you release block time?
• How do you communicate released block time to potential consumers?

Your facility schedule as it is represented in SCOR™ is synchronized with your local scheduling system about every 10 minutes. The scheduling information that is displayed reflects that of the facility schedule.

If you release block time then that time automatically becomes accessible to everyone through SCOR™.  This means your physician schedulers get a full view of openings available to them as soon as they are available.

Q. HOW DO YOU COMMUNICATE NEXT DAY SCHEDULE?

• Is time wasted sending a next day schedule to your physician offices?

With SCOR™ you no longer have to send a next day schedule to your physician offices, as they can check their own schedule online at anytime.

This saves your scheduler time, and it provides a customer service benefit to your physician offices, as they will check their schedule more often than they would otherwise.

Q. HOW OFTEN DO YOU HAVE CASE CANCELLATIONS OR SIGNIFICANT DELAYS BECAUSE OF SCHEDULING MISCOMMUNICATIONS OR MISTAKES?

• How much does a case cancellation cost you?
• What’s the bottom line impact of significant delays?

With access to SCOR™ physician offices will frequently check their schedule and they will notify you if they see any potential problems or mistakes with their schedule.

By making their schedule easily available, errors are caught and physicians can’t blame the facility because they had the wrong time. This feature also eliminates calls that the facility scheduler would have to handle regarding enquiries about a physician’s current schedule.

In addition, SCOR provides a great audit trial of ASC and physician practice communications.

Q. TO WHAT DEGREE DOES ANESTHESIA INFLUENCE THE SCHEDULE?

• How and when do anesthesia personnel review the schedule?

You can give your anesthesia personnel (as well as other internal staff or third parties) access to the view the entire schedule at anytime from anywhere. This provides them with an advantage when it comes to resource planning, and it means they can make schedule change requests in as timely a manner as possible.

Q. HOW DO YOU COMMUNICATE FACILITY NEWS TO PHYSICIAN OFFICES?

• How do you let them know when you have new equipment or that you can support new procedures?
• How long does it take to communicate changes in insurance contracts or changes to facility forms?

SCOR™ presents a unique marketing opportunity as when the physician offices are online you have their full attention and can communicate news and new opportunities to them immediately.  In addition, SCOR provides an online document library to provide access to your most up to date forms.

Q. HOW DO YOU KNOW THAT A PHYSICIAN OFFICE HAS DISTRIBUTED RIGHTS & RESPONSIBILITIES AND ADVANCED DIRECTIVES TO PATIENTS?

With SCOR™’s customizable and dynamic registration form this information can be collected at the time of scheduling.

Q. HOW DO YOU ENSURE THAT THE PATIENT KNOWS HOW TO GET TO THE SURGERY CENTER?

At the time of scheduling SCOR™ can provide turn-by-turn driving directions from the patient’s residence to the surgery center.

Q. WHAT’S YOUR ADVANTAGE OVER THE COMPETITION?

• What are the physician offices’ choices when it comes to scheduling cases and what sets you apart?

If you have physicians that schedule at more than one facility you can get an edge by making scheduling with your facility as convenient and easy as possible.

The physician scheduler plays a significant role in determining ultimately, where a case is scheduled.  They are most likely to schedule with the facility that makes it easiest for them to do so, and can meet the criteria of their scheduling need.

Physician schedulers as a whole appreciate SCOR™ as much as anyone.  They appreciate the convenience and ease at which they can make scheduling requests, check their physician’s schedule and access pertinent facility information (such as insurance information and patient forms).