Believe it or not, nearly half of a physician’s workday is dedicated to services that have nothing to do with seeing patients. Phone calls, required documentation, payer-related paperwork, and inquiry appeals eat away precious time that could be spent in exam rooms. Yet for many physicians today, the most frustrating part of their job is spending so many hours not being, well, physicians. After all those years of medical school and residency training, it makes sense why they did it, so they could help patients, not sit behind a computer sending emails and resubmitting prior authorizations.
However, the tides are changing at many practices as support systems strategically divert non-clinical responsibilities away from the people meant to be delivering care. It’s not simply about making physicians happier, although that is a major incentive, but instead about utilizing highly trained professionals for what they are trained to do and finding other, more efficient means of doing the rest.
The Never-Ending Documentation Burden
When electronic health records were first introduced, they were designed to be more efficient for documentation purposes. However, most medical professionals would argue that they’ve made matters more convoluted. From assessments and plans to coding requirements, letters of referral, and responses to patient portal messages, the average physician finds themselves spending two to three hours on documentation for every one hour of patient care.
This is not billable or technically advantageous for patient care but an absolute necessity for regulatory compliance, continuity of care and payment. In many practices, this is now offset by remote support that can assist in getting specific documentation parts together before a physician finalizes it all. For example, remote staff can compile a patient history narrative, sort through test results into one cohesive document, create templates for routine communications like prescription refills or uncomplicated inquiries, and assist in follow-up documentation. This way, a physician need only review and add their signature for approval; the time investment lessens greatly.
Phone Management Diverts Physicians From Intended Care
In a typical day in the clinic, whether emergency or routine, there’s the distraction of the phone ringing. Pharmacies calling about refills. Patients ringing in with questions. Providers asking for consults. Insurance companies gathering information. It seems innocuous having someone on the line for one minute here and another minute there; however, it’s disruptive and adds to the overall chaos.
While traditionally front desk staff can assist with calls, they lack the clinical knowledge to triage medication-related questions or retrieve documentation for referral requests. Thus, calls get transferred to medical assistants or nurses or even physicians who are then disrupted mid-visit to answer a three-minute question. Remote support for doctors offers an alternative solution; remote staff trained to field these questions can efficiently manage routine calls with appropriate triaging and only bring to a physician’s attention those matters that require immediate attention.
Insurance Work/Prior Authorizations
There is one thing that no physicians want to do, and that’s paperwork with insurance companies. Filing appeals for denials. Prior authorization requests. Benefit verifications. All of this work feels tedious and completely divorced from patient care, and it is. However, it’s necessary because patients can’t get treatments unless medical practices get paid.
Thus, during the limited time that physicians have for clinical responsibilities even less time is available for these torturous tasks. Most practices encourage the staff to handle these matters; however, no one else has time or good enough experience handling these matters on the ground level; thus, many times, after hours, physicians are stuck filling out forms themselves. This is ideally where remote support can come into play. Staff who specialize in all things insurance can take over the nuances, filing paperwork with the right department, making phone calls to gather information and going back and forth as needed. They are privy to insurance lingo and requirements; they can be advocating like physicians would but simply don’t have the time to do.
Scheduling/Patient Communication
The nuances behind coordinating a medical practice schedule are overwhelming. New patients require intake forms and semi-annual checks; follow-ups are set based on initial visit assessments. Procedures need time-sensitive slots whereas emergencies might need immediate accommodation. Cancellations create gaps which require people reshuffled. Then there’s all the communication related to telehealth links, confirmation calls, reminders via automated messages, and then people showing up at the wrong time or day.
When a doctor or nurse gets involved with scheduling complications, it’s because something has gone array, or a patient needs some special consideration. Either way, it’s interrupting care and getting clinical staff off-track from their other responsibilities. Remote support staff can easily handle the entirety of scheduling, from routine inquiries to conflict resolution and patient communication regarding appointments, and only involves clinical staff when a medically relevant question needs answering.
Prescription Management
Refill requests are unavoidable parts of the patient experience as patients run out of medications; pharmacies send asks for refills; someone needs to look at the chart and approve or deny the request. This should be an easy process for chronic medications patients have been on for years; however, it still requires chart access and clinical judgment, along with documentation, thereby taking time from physicians focused on in-depth consultations with new patients.
Many practices have remote workers who can access the request and provide the chart information needed so the physician looking it over can quickly approve it without having to use a minute-and-a-half detailing other necessities. Maybe they take five seconds since they’re not expending energy accessing information manually or attempting to recall specific details about patients they’ve probably met once over six months ago, not counting how often that was unsuccessful due to pandemic protocols for distancing! Remote support allows for expedited assistance through compiled efforts save everyone time.
Lab/Test Results
Someone must take action when results come into the system, doctors must ascertain if they need to do anything further on their end; patients must know if they need assistance with next steps; everything must be documented. For benign results that no one needs to address, this can take valuable time from medical professionals who could otherwise be tending to patients. Remote support can handle the distribution of such communications as well as documentation; in cases of abnormal results that require discussion or follow-up appointment setting, remote teams can flag them and glean any additional information needed beforehand.
Getting Back to What Matters
The shift toward remote administrative support isn’t about replacing the human element in healthcare. It’s about making sure physicians can spend their time doing what they trained for years to do, which is providing quality patient care. When doctors aren’t buried under administrative tasks, they can see patients without feeling rushed, they can think through complex cases more carefully, and they can actually finish their workday at a reasonable hour. The administrative work still gets done, it’s just handled by people who specialize in those tasks while physicians focus on medicine.
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