Business Exchange

The appearance of your practice, some of the seemingly insignificant areas, is something that most patients notice whether consciously or subconsciously. One area is your staff, how they dress, how they present themselves. Many practices do like to use scrubs as a uniform. They are very comfortable, they can get messy, they’re inexpensive. You can throw them in the wash. It’s great from that perspective. However, they often do look pretty casual and sometimes they can be a little off-putting to patients who are looking for more of a professional look. Personally, I would take a look at having some sort of uniform, not necessarily the standard or stereotypical white uniform but it could be a nice pair of dress pants or a skirt with a top of some sort including, you might have polo shirts with the name of the practice which could be emblazoned either screened or embroidered on the shirt. These things are fairly inexpensive. You can buy three or four for all your employees and it brings a standard look. Also, when they go out and about, you also have effected what is an advertisement for your practice as people go out and about during the day, perhaps for lunch or perhaps coming to and from work.

Secondary to look at is identification. It’s one thing in a small practice but, particularly if you get larger, you should have some sort of identification badge for all of your employees, including physicians. It’s very important that when someone walks through a hall, they know who works there, who isn’t, who doesn’t work there. When someone comes into the room to see the patient, they should identify themselves by name and what they do. It’s not always clear from someone’s dress, age or demeanor whether they’re a physician, whether they’re a nurse, whether they’re a nurse assistant or what their position is. You need to tell patients who they are, particularly when they’re new to the practice. That’s one of the things that an identification badge helps with. Also, as you get larger, for the purpose of security, you can see very quickly who works there and who doesn’t work there.