Thanks jimmie,
I really hope you can get that three face to face visits down to 0. We have closed our practice to any in office visits. Too many finger touches. Too many coughs. Just too many asymptomatic people. I think the biggest threat to your office is your getting Coronavirus if you are a solo doc. I don't like working from home, it just doesn't seem comfortable.
The only thing I worry about are the five-day-old newborns. It's kind of an important visit. We even put the one-month visit out until two months. I'm telling you. They don't want to come in either. I will do zoom with them even if it is a 99213.
We did a blast text to 1575 successfully recipients about the availability of TM with a link to a document I wrote. Many people don't know and don't want to come in. Every once in a while I feel guilty about the 99213 with what used to be a message, but you know what, I have done 100,000 pages in 24 years for free. Our office has pulled its hair out every day handling 15 triage messages which turn into 25. So, we try to turn them into TM. I think the idea and I know Janet Mills, our governor, is just trying to keep patients healthy but out of the ED and keep the doctors healthy and afloat. So, they would rather err on the side of a TM that should have been a message. My CMA sent me a message from a patient. She said I didn't think it was of an acuity for a TM. I ended up spending 35 minutes on the phone. Back when things were normal, I would have replied back to my MA, yeah change the zantac to pepcid and sure increase the Prozac.
We would love to do zoom, but I can do do 20 TMs in the time it would take me to do 8 video. The beauty of the telephone only is most aren't scheduled, and I can go down the list and do them in 10 minutes. But, if they need 30, I give them 30. But, with video, it means scheduling it, my MA setting it up (or I), teaching the patient, etc.
Don't get me wrong, I am envious of you. And, you are doing a more thorough job that I. But, I find I end the day feeling refreshed. Almost like Concierge.
The only thing I worry about is switching back to face to face full time. First, I worry about filling an empty schedule with the exception of those that are rescheduling and we reschedule. And, just changing. I will say my concentration is down, and it is easier to say you I will have to think about that.
