4 Strategies to Prevent Medical Patient Cancellations

Five chairs in doctors waiting room
Having a string of cancellations and no-shows patients in your clinic can really ruin your workday. They can cause interruptions or delays to other patient appointments and stress the team unnecessarily.

You might think that cancellations only affect your clinic, but they are also detrimental to your patients.

Patients who don’t keep appointments tend to have lower treatment adherence, and can be more demanding when things aren’t going well.

Of course, like most issues in a medical clinic, a lot of this can be prevented by having systems and processes in place.

To prevent and better handle late, no-shows or patient cancellations, here are four strategies to try:

1) Design a clear cancellation and no-show policy

Knowing what you will do if and when patients cancel their appointments is key to reducing them. If you have a policy in place, you can then use it and also educate patients about it.

Here are a few examples of typical cancellation policies for medical clinics:

– A small fee ($25 – $50) is charged to any patient giving less than 48 hours notice that they cannot make an appointment.

– The same fee is billed for patients who do not arrive for appointments on the day.

– The fee can be waived at the discretion of the doctor or office manager for special circumstances, such as when a patient is simply unable to make the appointment.

– The fee may also be waived the first time a patient cancels less than 48 hours before, but they will be advised this is a one time possibility.

 


2) Educate patients the first time they visit

Setting up your patients the right way so that they attend appointments means explaining the cancellation or no show process.

Saying something as simple as “We do our best to run on time at our clinic, and because of this we ask all patients that they make sure they can keep appointments. We try to avoid charging cancellation fees.”

This encourages patients not to cancel last minute.

You can also pre-empt cancellations by saying “If for some reason you can’t make the appointment time we’ve planned for, please let us know within 48 hours, so we can give this spot away to another patient.”

 

3) Adhere to the policy while maintaining good rapport

In situations where the patients do cancel, or do not show for appointments, be sure to maintain rapport. Remember that to you, they may be simply another patient, but from their perspective, they are your only patient.

If you have clearly explained the cancellation policy, most patients will understand and be considerate, and will also willingly pay the fees if they break the policy.

If a patient is disgruntled for any reasons, make it a personal challenge to rebuild the rapport with patient through courtesy and understanding.

The more you focus on building great relationships, the more patients will want to do what they can to help you, and keep appointments.

 

4) Track and manage chronic cancellers

There will always be some patients who are consistently late, or cancel last minute. Typically if a patient breaks the policy more than three times, you may need to be more proactive with them.

While still keeping rapport with the person, you may want to implement some additional steps to reduce the chances of their behavior continuing:

– After three events, you might ask them for a small deposit to hold an appointment time
– Ask them if they would like additional reminders two days and 12 hours before the appointment
– You can book them only at times that won’t affect the team, such as at the end of the day.

 

 

These are some simple ideas that can help to reduce and prevent cancellations or no-shows in your medical clinic, while still building and maintaining good patient relationships.

Remember that before implementing any of these strategies, you might want gather some data how many of your patients cancel each week or month, and select your policy accordingly.

Keep track of cancellation metrics monthly, and monitor improvements in cancellation rate over time.

Finally, be sure to reward your front desk team for taking on the extra effort and energy that these strategies will require.