Life in a Primary Care Practice during the COVID-19 Pandemic – Week 4

Follow our series highlighting the celebrations and struggles of a small, independent primary care clinic, located in Colorado Springs, Colorado. Follow along with the Practice Administrator and add your comments as they share good news, top priorities and needs!

Status on May 6, 2020
Another busy week, but it feels much better. We’re seeing results of our hard work!

Good News (Accomplishments) 
Received our Paycheck Protection Program (PPP) Loan! Starting today all staff are back to regular schedules!!

Thanks to additional changes in Telemedicine regulations; we started offering audio only visits for our patients with no video option. Although this is not a large number of patients, they are some of our highest risk patients and need very close monitoring. This is a great option for care until we can safely see them in the office again.

We completed our portion of the process to receive Medicare Accelerated and Advanced Payments (part of CARES 3.5).

Team Care (Self-Care/Support)
This past weekend we held an emergency virtual all staff meeting. We shared the news about the PPP  loan and our plans to return to regular schedules. Although this happened during their weekend, the team appreciated hearing this news asap. I think it also built more trust and credibility with them. We continue to show commitment to good communication and transparency. 

Top Priority
Although we never stopped seeing patients and have quickly implemented Telemedicine, our volume is at 60%. Our top priority is to scrub our panels; identify patients with care gaps and close them.

What we need to do  
First, develop the workflows to support and provide the necessary accounting documentation to improve the likelihood that our PPP Loan will actually be a grant. Second, determine the role of telemedicine in our practice. We need to evaluate our current process and strategize our next steps; what do we keep, expand and how do we sustain theses services.

Stay tuned for our next update!

Blog Series:

Week 1: https://www.healthteamworks.org/news/life-primary-care-practice-during-covid-19-pandemic-week-1
Week 2 and 3: https://www.healthteamworks.org/news/life-primary-care-practice-during-covid-19-pandemic-%E2%80%93-week-2-and-3
Week 4: https://www.healthteamworks.org/news/life-primary-care-practice-during-covid-19-pandemic-%E2%80%93-week-4
Week 5: https://www.healthteamworks.org/news/life-primary-care-practice-during-covid-19-pandemic-%E2%80%93-week-5
Week 6: https://www.healthteamworks.org/news/life-primary-care-practice-during-covid-19-pandemic-%E2%80%93-week-6