How to gain access to healthcare referral sources

Clients and attendees of our training programs are always asking, How do we get in to see hospital case managers, physicians and other healthcare referral sources? They want to know how to maintain contact without coming across as pests.

Believe it or not there are a few easy ways that you can regularly gain access to and meet with referral sources—and do that in such a way that they welcome your presence.

1. Visit your residents/newly referred residents in the hospital. This gives you immediate access to hospital-based referral sources who will welcome your presence because it makes their jobs easier. It also provides you the opportunity to educate them about your services.

2. Evaluate newly referred residents in the hospital. Again, this gives you immediate, welcomed access to hospital-based referral sources, and you have the ability to meet the patient and the family at the hospital.

3. Send physical or occupational therapists to follow-up doctor’s visits for your residents. Clients have successfully used this tactic to gain access to all types of doctors and further develop their relationships with them.

4. Provide physicians a discharge summary report. This is self-explanatory, but providing physicians a discharge summary report of residents who are admitted to your facility is very helpful.

Using these four tactics, you can schedule in-services, face-to-face meetings and gain permissions to update referral sources about changes in your facility and services.

Luke Fannon is the Founder and Principal at Premier Coaching and Training, Unionville, Pennsylvania. PCT provides long-term and healthcare sales and marketing training, admissions and marketing team coaching and other strategic consulting services. For more information, visit www.premiersalesconsulting.com.

Luke Fannon

Luke Fannon is founder and CEO of Premier Coaching & Training, Unionville, Pa., which provides sales training, marketing team coaching and strategic consulting services to providers in the long-term care industry. For more information, visit www.pctmarketing.com.