April 15, 2015
By Laurie Sorrenson, OD
, FAAO
From new instrumentation to the frames in your optical, a practice owner makes daily decisions on investment and enhanced work processes. Here are six changes that my practice made last year that significantlyincreased our profitability.
New Progressive Lens Options. We switched our progressive lens options when presenting to patients from “good, better, best” to “good and best.” This resulted in significant gains in sales of high-end progressive lenses and profit. Instead of offering three to four Physio products and three to four Hoya products, we now only offer our “best” Physio Enhanced Fit and our “standard” Physio. This has greatly increased our high-end progressive sales. One hundred percent of the “better” middle-of-the-road progressives, which we mostly sold before, are now sold at the high-end level! Amazing!
Chemistrie Sunlens Clip-Ons. Our gross profit margin in 2014 for this product was about $11,000, andwe now have an additional way of enhancing patients’ comfort in the sun while protecting their eyes from ultraviolet radiation.
Devoted One Optician to Back-End Optical Work. We moved one of our opticians off the floor to do all the filing, ordering and other back-end work, which has given him time to research the best value for stock lenses. Our preliminary estimate is that we have saved 15 percent on costs.
Greater Use of B-Scan Ocular Ultrasound (B-scan). We now use this instrument on all patients with floaters or other potential signs of retinal detachment. This test provides us another important way to monitor the eye health of patients. We generated $7,000 in 2014 from use of this instrument, and there is the potential for it to generate even more this year.
Simplified Contact Lens Fitting Fee Structure. Patients are more satisfied now with easier-to-understand fees, and the simplified system also makes it easier for staff to quote fees. We had six levels for non-medically necessary contact lens fit/power analysis fees. We consolidated to three simple levels:
1. Previous soft contact lens wearer
2. New multifocal previous contact lens wearer/ previous RGP wearer
3. New to multifocals and new to contact lenses or new to RGPs.
We are now generating 34 percent more dollars per contact lens patient than we did previously!
Focusing on Improving Patient Recall. First, find a way to truly track it with your practice management system or with specialized software. My practice is able to do this with help from our Crystal Practice Management system. Second, if you do not have a dedicated person with dedicated hours for calling patients who are overdue for exams, get one or hire datappointment.com to do it. You can pay them to mine your database for 10-20 hours per week or more. They are good about turning the service off and on or decreasing or increasing hours as needed.
Small, often inexpensive changes, can go a long way to creating more satisfied patients and staff, and a more profitable practice.
What changes are you thinking of making–or did you already make–that resulted in increased revenues and/or an enhanced patient experience?
Laurie Sorrenson, OD, FAAO, is president of Lakeline Vision Source in Austin, Texas. To contact her: lsorrenson@gmail.com.
