How Nurse Leaders Can Help Increase Patient Volumes

by Kathleen D. Sanford, RN, MA, DBA, FACHE

Nurse managers can offer their expertise and knowledge during planning and marketing.

I’m the nurse manager of a major service line at a hospital. Like many hospitals, we have seen a decrease in our volumes—both inpatient and outpatient. Patients seem to be putting off elective procedures and tests. What is my role as a nurse manager in increasing volumes? Should I be working with marketing or our physicians to try to get more patients into my service line? How can I best use my talents in this regard?

Sanford: You are to be commended for keeping an eye on the revenue side of your service line. While nurse managers spend a lot of time trying to control costs, we sometimes lose sight of the other side of the equation, which is ensuring revenue. This task is generally left to the marketing and strategic planning executives, but nurses can certainly lend some expertise.

First, you should meet with your CNO to discuss your concerns and request a meeting with those who oversee marketing and/or strategic planning for your organization. Strategic planning focuses on the overall direction of the organization. The marketing staff look at what the community needs, how to provide it, and how to advertise it. As an expert in your specialty, you can offer an additional level of insight regarding your particular service line.
 
When you meet with these colleagues, come prepared. Bring data on your services, including information on the decline in patients and how this is affecting your revenue. You and your colleagues should then ask the following questions:

• Is total demand for your service dropping?
• Are you losing market share to a competitor?
• Is there new technology or a new care setting that patients are choosing, or that providers are directing them to?

The strategy you develop will depend on the answers to those questions.

Physicians should also be sought out for input on these questions. They may have their own insights about why the census is decreasing and what can be done to grow it. Remember, patients often don’t choose the facility; rather, they go to the one suggested by their physicians. So if you discover that physicians are sending patients to another facility, you need to find out why.

After you gather this information, you may find that you need to try a new technology or make other service changes, or it may be a matter of improving your public relations.

For the last seven years, Gallup polls have found that nursing is the most trusted profession in America, so nurses and nurse managers can be invaluable community representatives. Consider making presentations to local community groups about what your organization has to offer. Attend local fairs and events and provide information about your services. Write op-ed pieces for your community newspaper, and make yourself available as a source to health reporters.

I was once part of a team in charge of building and opening a new facility in a community where there was competition for patients. During that process, some of the nurse leaders who would be working in the new building spent a significant amount of time speaking at community events, talking with community physicians about their needs, and leading focus groups of community members to get opinions from the public about what they wanted in the new clinic. These efforts were quite valuable in developing support and a positive image in the community. Similarly, it could be that your expertise and credibility is just what’s needed to bring patients back.

Related Exhibit:

13 Additional Strategies for Improving Patient Volumes