Most telephone answering services will take on a wide range of clientele, from roofer, to funeral home, to property management company, to consultant, to attorney. Oh yeah, they’ll handle healthcare too. Really?
These answering services try to be all things to all people. They’re generalists. Some do okay on it and others not so well. As the saying goes, “They’re a Jack (or Jill) of all trades, but a master of none.” Is that who you want answering your patients’ phone calls? Not if you value your practice.
A Generic Answering Service
All answering services who want to stay in business know they need to grow. They realize that with growth comes increased economy of scale. This helps them serve their clients with greater efficiency and increase their bottom line. Because of this push for growth, they’re willing to handle any type of business or situation.
Sometimes they end up taking on some pretty strange accounts. Such as a clown or a rock star or an entrepreneur with a questionable business ethic. Add the medical field to their eclectic mix of clients. For them, every call is completely different because every client is completely different. Sometimes they handle this client-multitasking challenge fairly well and other times, not so well.
When an operator at a generic answering service answers the phone for your medical practice, imagine what type of account they handled just before yours, how the caller acted, and the way they responded. Does this prepare them to talk to your patient with excellence and treat them precisely the way you want them treated? Some telephone answering service operators can make this mental transition, whereas others struggle.
A Medical Answering Service Specialist
Seeing the downside of these generic, one-size-fits-all answering services, some answering service owners and managers have realized that trying to be all things to all people doesn’t work out so well. They decide to specialize. When they specialize, they become experts in their niche. This allows them to provide a higher level of service then what would be possible if they remained a generic answering service and open to all types of clientele.
They decide to specialize in healthcare. They become a medical answering service—a medical answering service specialist, if you will. This allows them to focus on things that are important to their clients in the healthcare field. This includes being empathetic to callers and their healthcare situation, knowing how to handle health emergencies and on-call personnel, and the importance of taking appointments to maximize effectiveness.
The result of this is a high level of patient-centric service that meets the needs of the healthcare industry, including medical practices, clinics, hospitals, and healthcare networks. When it comes to handling the communication needs of your healthcare operation, you want a medical answering service specialist that knows what they’re doing.
Summary
When it comes to selecting an answering service for your healthcare organization, you can go with a generic answering service that’s a generalist and handles all types of answering service clients. Or you can select a medical answering service specialist that understands the industry and can address the unique needs of your medical practice.
When it comes to healthcare, the medical answering service specialist wins every time.
Learn how medical answering service from MedConnectUSA can help your practice, clinic, or facility. Then get a free quote to discover how affordable their healthcare communication services are. Peter Lyle DeHaan is a freelance writer and call center authority.