You know this situation: after the Report of Findings, patients are confused about how many times they are suppose to come in, how and when they are going to pay and if their insurance is going to contribute. They end up so bewildered about the whole process, it is hard for them to accept care in the first place.
This is an untenable situation. To address it, I went to many seminars and heard a great deal about practice management as I searched for ways to keep patients in my office for a lifetime of chiropractic care. I researched numerous payment plans, treatment programs, corrective care plans, family plans, and wellness life plans. In the end, I found that most were so complicated, I couldn't even begin to know how to present them to the patient.
As a strong proponent of lifetime wellness care, I also wanted to find a way to make chiropractic affordable for more people. None of the programs I researched satisfied my twin goals of affordability and lifetime wellness.
So I developed an innovative chiropractic membership program that works very similarly to a gym membership. Patients know that on the first of the month their credit card gets charged, and they get to visit their chiropractor once a week week for as long as they wish.
How Chiropractic Membership Works
The plan works very much like a monthly gym membership. The way the program works in our office is very simple:
We stand up to our obligations and promises in regard to weekly chiropractic care, and the patient stands up to their financial obligation with an automatic credit-card withdrawal on the first of the month. This makes it convenient, easy and affordable, and provides ongoing care, month after month and year after year.
There is complete communication and understanding on what the patient will receive and what their financial responsibility is. With a membership plan, the patient will never be billed extra because their insurance company didn't contribute as it promised it would. The patient will never be billed extra on certain visits because we performed an extra modality or a re-examination on one specific visit. Everything is already included in their monthly membership. The membership plan I use is $120 per month for four visits.
As doctors and owners of the clinic, we no longer have to worry about chasing insurance money which means less staff, less frustration, and less time. We also do not have to worry about patients dropping out because wellness care is too expensive or too confusing. Again, just like a gym membership, the patient has access to a lifetime of chiropractic care in exchange for a monthly membership fee. It really is that simple.
How To Set Up a Chiropractic Membership Plan
First off, before you begin, you need to check with your state association regarding dual fee schedules. It is generally considered illegal to have dual fee schedules for insurance patients as opposed to membership patients (I have a mix in my practice). In other words, if you charge $30 cash for an adjustment, you cannot charge $40 for that same adjustment to an insurance patient. The way to get around this with a chiropractic membership program is to work through a medical discount plan.
This is not an insurance plan, but rather a clearinghouse for providers who are willing to provide services at a discounted fee. In other words, rather than the insurance company deciding what its discount rate will be, you decide the amount of that rate. The membership fee then goes through the medical discount plan.
Once you have established that, you can then move on to setting up your membership rates. Keep in mind that the key is to make it affordable, particularly for your patients without insurance or whose insurance may not have good coverage for chiropractic care.
[pb]The next step is to begin marketing this to your patients. I had many patients tell me how great they felt after an adjustment and how they wished they could continue to get them on a regular basis, but the cost was just too high. These are the patients who may benefit from the option of a chiropractic membership. Present them with this option when you discuss the benefits of lifetime chiropractic care and wellness. Once the patient fills out the contract to sign up for the membership, you are on your way.
For best results, I use a community-style room, with several tables. A patient signs in and then lays down on the first open table to wait while I am working on somebody else. This allows me to see a high volume of patients as efficiently as possible.
Benefits of Chiropractic Membership
Think about how nice would it be to get in most of your collections on the first of the month. If we can get paid on the first of the month, all we have to worry about is treating patients and spreading the chiropractic truth the rest of the month. It has definitely taken away all the stress out of running the business side of chiropractic and allows me more time and focus to treat patients and educate my community on the benefits of an active chiropractic lifestyle.
Ever since implementing the membership program, chiropractic has become fun and enjoyable again, just the way it was meant to be. I no longer have to convince or sell patients to keep coming back for wellness care. I am no longer chasing insurance companies for payments they promised but have not delivered upon. There hasn't been a collection problem with patients. How much more fun do you think practice would be in this type of stress-free clinical setting?
It is time for us to stand up and give the general public an option that makes it so easy for people to have chiropractic wellness in their lives. How much healthier would our great nation be if the general public was coming in for lifetime wellness care? The chiropractors who came before us and were heavily scrutinized for teaching and preaching chiropractic wellness deserve a big thank you for laying the foundation for the chiropractic wellness leaders of today.
For years, chiropractors have been trying to change the mold of the general public thinking of our profession as back pain doctors. It is very refreshing that at this point in time, with all the health care reform talk and all the insurance problems in America, chiropractic can give great quality care for an affordable price to the general public. It should now be our mission to take the next step and serve the general public with lifetime wellness chiropractic care and make a great living doing what we love to do.
Monthly Savings With a Membership Plan
Here's how the monthly savings with a membership plan will break down for an insurance patient who pays $50 per visit.
Insurance
$50/visit x four visits (one month) = $200
Membership
$120/month x four visits (one month) = $120
Using this example, it's easy to see that the patient saves $80 a month under the membership plan, since it is a flat fee. This could really be considered a bargain for the insurance patient, as that $80 is roughly equivalent to one and a half visits ($75) under their insurance plan.
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