Physician practices: Insufficiency leads to inefficiency

What it’s all about

A rule too little considered in the management of primary care and specialty practices states that the more a medical practice implements best practice standards in practice management, the more efficiently it operates.

German medical practices work inefficiently

The standard describes all regulations, instruments and behaviors that are essential for smoothly functioning work even under changing requirements. The higher the degree of implementation, the better the efficiency (see article image).

One figure shows just how great the potential for increasing efficiency is in GP and specialist practices: on average, only 52% of the best practice standard is implemented in German medical practices. The consequences of this practice management insufficiency are felt daily by patients, but also by medical assistants and physicians, and are also reflected in the inadequate strategic sustainability of many practices.

On the other hand, activating the inactive 48 %, for example with the help of best practice benchmarking, leads to a significant increase in the quality of work and care as well as in the financial success of the practice, not only in each individual company, but also in outpatient medicine as a whole.