Therapist Burnout – Bad Advice vs. The Obvious Solution

Outpatient rehab is at a crossroads.

One path resolves therapist burnout.

The other path will put our industry in even greater peril.  During a recent webinar,  the CEO of another leading EMR advised that therapists should address burnout by negotiating shorter days or more vacation time.  She summarized with the statement,

“The power belongs to those who negotiate.”

This advice deserves a reality check:  The therapist’s patient load is being increased because the practice is tighter on cash than ever before.  If the therapist then takes more time off (and treats fewer patients), cash will decline even further.

The answer is to eliminate the factors that are causing therapist burnout.

The Obvious Solution:

If therapists are able to document their notes at work,

and then relax enjoy their nights and weekends, without documentation homework

our industry won’t be talking about therapist burnout!

Both of the following recent conversations validate the right approach to addressing therapist burnout:

Lisa interviewed a DPT to join her practice.  The fit was great, and Lisa offered the position to the therapist.  The DPT responded, “I’ll take it.  But I’ll only treat patients for six hours per day, because I need the other two hours to catch up on documentation”.

Lisa was stunned.

Lisa asked, “What experience do you have that would require two hours of protected documentation time per day?  What EMR were you using?”   The therapist answered that she’d been using a well-known, Web-based PT EMR.

Without saying a word, Lisa documented an evaluation on Systems 4PT, real time, in front of the job candidate.  Minutes later, the DPT accepted the position, agreeing to treat patients 8 hours per day, and confident that her documentation would be complete, without homework.

Another anecdote:

On a Sunday afternoon, the owner of a clinic who had recently joined S4PT called Dan Alloway (VP of Development).  “I had to call you.  I just said to my husband, it’s Sunday and, believe it or not, I’m not documenting notes!  As you know, with our old EMR I spent EVERY Sunday catching up on notes!  I’m sooo thrilled, I had to call you!”

“Burnout” is not a factor when therapists document with an efficient EMR that enables them to enjoy their evenings and weekends.  It’s no more complex than that.

The Obvious Solution:

• Update to an efficient EMR
  • That allows therapists to document compliant notes for every patient visit
  • During their normal workday
  • And then, enjoy their nights and weekends

The Solution is Systems 4PT

• Our EMR data mines the electronic patient check-in portal and recommends 1250 patient-specific words in the average eval. If you type 60 words per minute, this saves over 20 minutes of typing
• Our EMR provides a library of your frequently used treatment plans, which auto load your favorite flow sheets in the blink of an eye vs. typing 20 – 40 rows of treatments and exercises. Your flow sheets are pre-loaded with clean CPT codes that get paid, and with unit charges that maximize legitimate charge capture. You then edit the plan
• The CMS’ 2019 Final Rule (released 11/1/18) gave us permission to document less in daily notes. Our daily note workflow has since been updated to take advantage of this. Most Systems 4PT daily notes are signed before the patient leaves the practice

Treat More, Type Less™

Better yet, you be the judge, document a Systems 4PT

evaluation on your own computer with our “hands-on” demo.