Choosing The Right Partners For Your Healthcare Startup

Outsourcing plays a major role in helping to meet the responsibilities and duties promised by most modern startups across all industries. This includes healthcare practices. As a physician, who you choose to partner with matters even more than with most companies as your patients’ health may depend on it. Here, we’re going to look at some of the partners you need and what you can do to ensure that you’re fostering good working relationships with the right ones.

Your IT

Most healthcare businesses are going to be relying on tech for a lot of things, with patient records being the most important consideration of all. As such, when you’re looking at outsourcing your IT services, it’s vital you look for those that have experience in working with health care companies. In particular, you want to look at those that have experience in working with the electronic health records systems that are mandatory across the industry. Most generic small business IT providers do not have that expertise, so it’s important to take a closer look.

Labs and extra medical services

The most common example of medical services that physicians are likely to outsource is that of the lab. When it comes to getting bloods tested and the like, you should take a look at the reputation of local labs. However, beyond the labs themselves, it’s worth looking at laboratory billing services. You’re likely to rely on these services a lot at varying levels throughout the year, so finding a way to streamline how you get billed and pay them can simplify the process of working with them significantly.

Your local pharmacies

A lot of practices will operate their own pharmacy. However, smaller practices may not have that as a viable option, given the costs of running an entire pharmacy alongside a growing business. Furthermore, partnering with an external pharmacist has been shown to decrease burnout among primary care providers. As such, it’s worth looking at which pharmacies in your are conveniently located for the majority of your patients, as well as those that are willing to take on another practice as a partner. Many will be looking for the growth opportunity but some may not have the capacity at the moment.

The marketing side of things

Growing and retaining your list of patients is crucial for the ongoing survival and growth of your business. However, while you may have the medical expertise to know what you’re talking about, a lot of health care providers do not have the marketing know-how to know how to convey that in the most convincing way. As such, when you work with marketing firms, it’s important you choose those that have health care marketing expertise, as they will know how best to reach and convert your market.

Any physician running a practice must ensure that they’re relying on partners that can be trusted and creating working relationships and are as efficient and pain-free as possible. You don’t need to be worrying about your partners potentially letting you down when you’re trying to treat people.

This is a contributed post.