Although a particular physical therapy practice is likely to provide high-quality services and have high patient satisfaction rates, the number of clients coming from referrals might be influenced by a variety of issues unrelated to clinic activity. This makes referral relations play a particularly important role in practice development.
Firstly, referring patients to a physical therapist implies a number of peculiarities that differ from dealing with direct consumers. As a rule, referral relationships involve the participation of healthcare providers who have previously treated the patient. As such, the number of patients coming from referrals is affected by the frequency of referral relationships. The nature of health conditions seen by physical therapists might also be partially determined by the presence of such relationships.
Secondly, as far as physical therapy relies heavily on referral activity, regular communication with referring healthcare professionals is required. This way, they will feel confident that their patients have received all necessary treatments in time. However, referral relationships might weaken if there were no feedback, which implies a loss of potential clients.
Thirdly, referral activities often imply the involvement of healthcare providers whose expectations need to be met. In some cases, they might expect prompt replies to their questions regarding the progress of their patients, notifications when the course of treatment is completed, or availability schedules. Thus, a good rapport will help to establish positive referrals.
However, increased demand might result in scheduling difficulties, which might affect referral relationships. If the physical therapy clinic experiences problems with booking appointments, referrals will start to go to other specialists as soon as their access to medical assistance becomes easier. In some cases, referring healthcare providers are likely to send their patients where they will find an opportunity to receive consultations promptly.
Moreover, referral relations might affect the geographical range, which can be covered by a particular physical therapy clinic. In this regard, one should mention two possible scenarios. First of all, some clinics attract patients residing nearby. Others tend to receive more referrals from more distant sources. Besides, changes in healthcare delivery may affect referral activities due to increased accessibility of therapy providers' information online. Still, recommendations from referring specialists are likely to remain highly valuable as they appear at the moment of decision-making.
In general, referral patterns might change due to some non-medical reasons related to patient-provider communication, referral relations, or other factors affecting patients' choices. As such, changes in the number of referrals do not indicate poor performance and should not be considered a negative factor in this case.
Thus, referral activity requires special attention on the part of practice managers. Referral relationships can be viewed in the same manner as other elements of running a business, including staffing and capacity planning. It would be unreasonable to consider them as unchanging as physical therapy clinics face constantly changing demand. However, referral management should not affect patients' needs for healthcare assistance.
