Practice Management

As summer winds down and the holidays begin to come into focus, it’s beneficial to take time to reevaluate the goals we set forth months prior. It’s time to take a look at how we’ve progressed in accomplishing them.

The Practice Success Series, brought to you by Wells Fargo Practice Finance, prepares you for the most significant transition you'll make in your career. This eBook is designed for anyone contemplating making a switch.

Check out our favorite optometry memes!

Millennials, also known as Generation Y, can drive Generation Xers and baby boomers crazy. Many Gen Xers and Boomers don’t embrace those young, fresh faces because their approach to life is so foreign.

Summer offers a unique set of challenges for optometry offices.

Where you live can play a big role in how much cash you’re bringing home. Not only does your state affect your scope of practice, it affects your bottom line.

It's raining “eyecare” apps. Just for a second, I’m going to embrace the hate because we can use it to help lead us to a better understanding of the situation and ultimately to a solution. In our technologically enhanced world there seems to be an app for everything-including for eye care.

It is not uncommon to hear a doctor or office manager lament that they are so busy, they can’t get anything done. It is all the daily tasks that keep them from planning, looking ahead, or improving. “It just seems like I am always putting out fires,” is a common way to express this frustration.

At a recent meeting I attended one of the discussions included a quick and brief outline of what is termed SWOT. SWOT stands for Strength, Weaknesses, Opportunities, and Threats. The idea here is that a scan of the internal and external environment is an important part of a strategic planning process for any business.

I like to describe my practice as “concierge like.” We are all familiar with the concept of MD VIP practices. They require patients to pay a flat fee to be part of the practice’s patient base, and, in return, the patient has free access to his physician at any time.

Point-of-care (POC) diagnostic laboratory testing is not common in eye care. This is not due to any lack of clinical need-it is rather the result of a lack of specific tests known to demonstrate diagnostic and/or treatment relevance to the optometrist and a general resistance to adopting new diagnostic technologies.

How can your office avoid spending a lot of staff time on patient vision care plan questions and better ensure that you get paid? We asked optometrists on ODs on Facebook and ODwire how they handle this common problem.

An optometric practice is a business just like any other business where the same rules apply-revenues minus expenses equals profit. Too many times we borrow ideas from mediocre businesses, practices, and people.

A U.S. Senator from Wisconsin, Gaylord Nelson, founded Earth Day in 1970, and it has been celebrated annually since that time on April 22. In 1990, his efforts were revamped to include recycling efforts. This got me thinking-how am I addressing this in my office now, and what can I do better?

The burden of student loan debt is one of the hottest topics in the optometric community. Catherine Dimon, CFP, of Morgan Stanley shared her advice for debt management for young optometrists at Vision Expo East.

Executives from online refraction companies discussed their services during Vision Expo East. Opternative CEO Aaron Dallek; EyeNetra CTO Vitor Pamplona, PhD; and myVisionPOD Founder Hal Wilson shared information about their companies and answered questions from the audience about the future of online refraction.

The medical model can help make your practice more profitable and serve your patients better-a few changes to the way you practice can make a big difference, says Scot Morris, OD, FAAO, during a session at Vision Expo East.

As owners and/or managers of small business, optometrists usually think of firing in terms of how and when to fire an employee or associate. However, there are times when it is necessary and prudent to fire a patient. This is one of the most difficult tasks we encounter, and it is actually very hard to do.

I hear a lot of talk about having a culture of service in the office. I know of some offices that are truly remarkable in their service culture. These offices have patterned themselves after Nordstrom, Ritz-Carlton, or other noted service culture mainstays.

When I got out of school, I looked 15 years old. I had elderly patients leaving the practice so often, my employer actually framed my resume for people to read before they saw my face. I wore suits for the majority of my first 10 years in practice. I focused on children because they thought I was the babysitter.

We often hear from ODs about their problems managing their staff, but once you read these staff horror stories, we bet your staffing headaches will look tame in comparison.

There’s nothing more exciting than working in an office that continues to grow and expand. Recently, our practice has taken a gigantic step and purchased a brand-new, state-of-the-art office that allowed us to merge our two offices into one, larger space.

After many years as the sole optometrist in a busy ophthalmology practice, I found myself feeling isolated. I had excelled in my career managing many complicated ocular disease cases and making a difference in the lives of the patients whom I served; however, I was lacking the collaboration with my peers I had experienced during my residency and years in school.

With a change of perspective, any optometrist can add sports vision to his practice.

Jerry Hayes, OD, shared the secrets of high-producing optometrists during a session at SECO.

Many of your patients are interested in maintaining or improving their vision, but they may walk into your office with wrong information.

If you have not been reading industry social media sites lately, you missed a big announcement from the Centers of Medicare and Medicaid Services (CMS) to end Meaningful Use.

Super Bowl 50 is in the books, and the Denver Broncos and Peyton Manning are the Super Bowl champions! What a storybook ending for Manning and the Broncos. Not all of our practices will ride off into the sunset with a world championship, but there are many lessons we can learn from the Super Bowl.