Do's and Don'ts for Growing Chiropractic Practices

Growing your chiropractic practice has its challenges, from hiring the right staff to working with patients and making collection calls. To handle these challenges, you need to know the most effective ways to grow your chiropractic practice and the pitfalls to avoid along the way.

Every chiropractic practice is unique in the services they offer and the areas they serve. No matter what type of practice you have, these tips can help you find new opportunities for expanding your practice and reaching a broader group of patients.

Do’s for Growing Your Practice

Your chiropractic practice can benefit from implementing several practices related to your marketing strategies, online presence, and systems management.

• DO optimize your website. Chiropractic practices need attractive, professional websites designed to entice new patients. Review your website for usability, so new patients can navigate the pages easily and schedule appointments online.

Write about your services in detail and include the benefits of each treatment. Incorporate local and chiropractic SEO keywords strategically on your website to help patients find your practice.

• DO start or upgrade a blog. Blogging is a must these days to bring in new patients and retain existing ones. Aim to inform and educate your patients, not to sell your services.
• DO use email marketing. Email marketing makes it easy to communicate with current patients and invite new patients to schedule an appointment. You can use email marketing to offer health-related news and inform them about any new products or services.

In a 2018 marketing industry report, 59% of respondents said that email brings in the most revenue of all marketing channels. The return on investment (ROI) is impressive: One estimate is 3800%, or $38 for every $1 spent.

One of the most effective ways to use email to market your practice is to create and send a monthly newsletter. Consider building your email list by offering a gated e-Book or other item of value to your target reader in exchange for their email address.

• DO grow your social media presence. To expand your reach and bring in new patients, it’s critical to give your practice a strong online presence that makes a positive first impression. Consider your target demographic when determining which social media platforms to invest time in to develop your brand’s presence.

For a practice that caters primarily to adults, Facebook is likely the most effective way to market your services and post updates about events at your practice. For sports or family chiropractors providing care to athletes and younger patients, Instagram and TikTok will be more successful for connecting with potential new patients.

• DO offer incentives for referrals. A referral program can help you get more new patients through the door by incentivizing your existing patients to refer others to your practice. You can use incentives such as gift cards to nearby non-competitive stores or free massage services after they refer three friends.

You can promote your referral program through your website and social media platforms as well as by including it in your email campaigns.

• DO offer online appointment booking. Putting appointment scheduling in the hands of your patients has several benefits, including freeing up front desk staff for other tasks.

It also allows patients to reschedule or cancel appointments quickly and easily, resulting in fewer missed appointments and increased revenue. (Did you know that the average practice loses $3200 a month from missed appointments?)

What’s more, many people are now accustomed to making appointments online and enjoy the convenience. Offering this service may encourage people to book with you rather than another practice that is not so convenient to access.

• DO simplify payment processing. To make sure you are managing your patients better, organize all your patient payment information in one place.

A good integrated EHR system will let you save patients’ card information for recurring payments or membership subscriptions. It would then post payments automatically to the ledger, saving you time and steps and eliminating posting errors.

• DO consolidate insurance claims management. If you’re an insurance practice, you also need to process insurance claims. Choose an EHR software system like Chirotouch Advanced, which offers integrated clearinghouse and claims management, allowing you to manage your claims cycle directly from the system. This helps you avoid sending out auditing red flags due to incorrect CPT coding or other compliance issues. This feature will also get you paid faster.
• DO integrate your administrative and EHR software. If your staff has to use several systems for financials and scheduling or even rely on paper, then integrated chiropractic EHR software can help you.

You can keep everything on track, from billing to scheduling, in one seamless system. Scheduling, charting, patient engagement, and other essential functions of your chiropractic practice can be consolidated into a single software solution.Front desk staff, chiropractic assistants, providers, and chiropractic billers can keep up with what is happening without switching between separate systems.

An integrated EHR system that meets the specific needs of your practice can improve efficiency and automate processes.

• DO use an integrated EHR solution that’s created specifically for chiropractors. Many software solutions are designed for general healthcare use and don’t offer the efficiencies that software designed just for chiropractors will. You’ll want to choose a system that understands the way chiropractors work.

Don’ts For Chiropractic Practice Growth

Equally as important as what you do to grow your practice is what you DON’T do. Here are a few things to think about as you plan the direction you want your practice to take.

• DON’T  fail to invest in patient communication. Feedback from patients can help you improve your practice and services. While verbal feedback is a positive tool for building your brand, testimonials and reviews provide a greater range of benefits, from promoting your practice via word of mouth to boosting your reputation beyond your target demographic.

One way to do that is to use email to invite your patients to leave social media reviews following their visits. Ask for testimonials and add them to your website. Then, keep them updated.

• DON’T use paper billing. Cash flow is crucial to a practice’s success, and using paper invoices and making manual insurance claims slows down the process of collecting your receivables.

Using chiropractic EHR software with payment processing built in allows you to get paid quickly, whether you are a cash or insurance-based practice.

• DON’T waste time calling your patients. Calling every patient for their upcoming appointments can take up too much time and energy for staff members when they could be focused on other tasks such as promoting your practice and building relationships with patients.

Again, online appointment management is the way to go. A good chiropractic EHR will also allow you to send automated appointment reminders by email or text — much more convenient than telephone calls and paperwork, for both you and your patients.

• DON’T neglect documentation compliance. CMS and HIPAA compliance is a constant concern for chiropractors, especially if they use an outside consulting firm that finds errors in your documentation system during an audit.

An integrated chiropractic EHR with built-in, customizable templates and macros can offer structured formatting that helps ensure documentation compliance.  As a bonus, these features can also help providers take notes quickly with minimal text entry.

• DON’T fail to protect your patients’ data. Patient privacy is paramount, and failure to protect their personal and health information can have serious consequences.

Breaking HIPAA laws, even inadvertently, can mean incurring hefty fines, up to $250,000 (not including restitution to patients) and possible jail time. The damage a privacy breach can do to your company can be irreparable.

To protect your patients’ data, invest in EHR software with a robust security system that has undergone rigorous testing for hacking and firewall penetration.

• DON’T rely on manual data backups. When you rely on manual system backups for your sensitive data, you put your patient information at risk of human error, fire, and natural disasters.

For maximum security and peace of mind, consider an off-premises, cloud-based digital system with automated updates and backups.

Using a chiropractic EHR system with world-class AWS (Amazon Web Services) infrastructure is a necessary step for any growing chiropractic practice.

• DON’T overlook practice performance indicators. When attempting to grow your practice, failing to track your progress can be detrimental. You need an EHR system that offers practice performance reports to give you an overview of how your practice is performing at a glance.

Data that’s simple to interpret and can be exported for your records is essential for the success of any growing business.

• DON’T forget about scalability. Growing practices need a record system that will grow with them. A cloud-based EHR system is much more suited to growth than a paper-based system with its ever-growing demand for filing space.
• DON’T settle for an EHR system that doesn’t meet all your practice needs. When it’s time to invest in an integrated chiropractic EHR, get it right the first time with ChiroTouch.

ChiroTouch Sets the Standard in Chiropractic Software

ChiroTouch not only meets the needs of all types of practices — including solo-practitioner, multiprovider, cash, and insurance — it also has features meant to serve the needs of the growing chiropractic practice.

What’s more, we designed ChiroTouch specifically for chiropractors, and we know chiropractic. You can rely on our experience in the chiropractic industry to empower you to personalize your EHR for each role in your practice.

We offer two basic pricing packages, ChiroTouch Core and ChiroTouch Advanced, for different types of practices.

ChiroTouch Core is perfect for cash-only or sole-practitioner practices and offers the following benefits:

• Anywhere, anytime access
• Compliant, 15-second SOAP notes
• Online scheduling features
• Integrated payment processing
• All-in-one charting screen for providers
• Receipts, ledge, and invoicing
• Patient management features
• Practice dashboard and reports
• CMS-1500 and superbills
• Secure, cloud back-up in real-time with unlimited data storage

ChiroTouch Advanced is ideal for larger insurance and multi-provider practices.

With ChiroTouch Advanced, you get access to all the features of ChiroTouch Core, plus the following:

• Customizable macros for recording SOAP notes and treatment plans
• Full claims cycle management, including claims submission, updated status, and ERA auto-posting
• Single vendor support for billing

ChiroTouch also eliminates the need for multiple vendors and apps by consolidating your software operations into one system. ChiroTouch allows you to check in patients, access patients’ EHRs, create SOAP notes quickly and easily with preloaded macros and templates, manage payments, and process insurance claims, all with a single sign-in. With ancillary features like CT Engage, CT Verify, and CT InForms, you can improve your patients’ experience and streamline daily workflow for your staff.