Specialty medical practices play an extremely important role in society, helping patients minimize pain, recover faster from disease, and learn to live with disabling injuries or chronic conditions — not to mention saving lives. Their focus on providing care makes it easy to overlook the fact that medical practices are businesses that need to be concerned with the bottom line.
A recent USA Today Classifieds blog noted the importance of knowing how to run a business as one of the most critical things doctors must do to ensure the success of their practices. It also provided nine tips to running a successful private medical practice:
- Hire the best people.
- Build your brand.
- Support your team.
- Become adaptable.
- Build a great website.
- Market your business online.
- Give back to your community.
- Learn to listen.
- Learn how to communicate.
What’s not on that list, but maybe should be, is having the ability to overcome the challenges a medical practice may face. These include changing payment structures, slow third-party reimbursement, the high cost of prior authorizations, collecting payments directly from patients and the huge cost of healthcare technology.
A Healthy and Growing Market
As of the end of 2018, about 16 million people were working in the healthcare industry — representing approximately 11 percent of all U.S. jobs. As might be expected due to the fact that people are living longer than ever, the outlook for future growth is strong. The Bureau of Labor Statistics has projected that employment in healthcare will grow 18 percent from 2016 to 2026, adding more than two million jobs over that time, far outpacing every other sector.
One trend having an effect on private medical practices is the rise in the number of retail clinics, urgent care centers, and freestanding emergency clinics. Many patients are choosing those alternatives for minor acute care visits, leaving traditional practices with more complicated cases they get paid less for in relation to the time they take.
Telehealth services are also becoming a popular alternative for getting minor acute care; according to FAIR Health, telemedicine utilization leapt by 1200 percent from 2012 to 2017. A recent ACP survey found just 18 percent of medical practices had the technology to do secure visits and only one-third had online consult capabilities.
The Need for Funding
Competing with these new treatment options, along with the traditional challenges of operating a business — ensuring capital is available to cover overhead costs like payroll, equipment, and other office expenses — can prove stressful for doctors. Most if not all of them focused on their craft, not how to run a business, and many have the added challenge of paying off the student loans that allowed them to complete medical school.
There are many reasons a medical practice might need funding, including:
- Finance or lease medical equipment to keep current with technology and/or add new services
- Protect the practice and its employees by ensuring it’s not negatively affected by lagging payments from patients and third parties
- Create an inviting space that helps people feel at ease and reflects the practice’s professionalism
- Have the ability to hire additional employees when demand warrants it
To meet these needs, two loan types, in particular, are often of interest to medical practices:
- Working capital loans — Secure cash to pay for anything that helps support ongoing operations — expenses like payroll, taxes, equipment, and supplies.
- Lines of credit — Have access to cash when it’s needed, so the practice is able to take advantage of growth opportunities, stay current with technology and get through potential slow times.
Why Clear Skies Capital
Traditional funding sources like banks have lots of hoops to jump through and a lengthy application process that more often than not results in a “no.” At Clear Skies Capital (CSC), we focus on saying “yes,” helping medical practices get access to the funds they need.
Our streamlined funding process includes very little paperwork, and approval can occur within 24 hours, even for those with less than perfect credit. We offer 24-hour access to funding, flexible terms up to 48 months, and a fixed payment and interest rate — plus the interest on our loans is tax-deductible. It might sound too good to be true, but it’s not; we’ve been successfully using this business model for many years.
The Takeaway
If you own a medical practice, you know it’s important to be able to fund your steady growth and evolve as necessary to stay competitive. Not having access to capital shouldn’t be the reason you remain stagnant. CSC has worked with many medical practices, so we’d love to share our expertise while investigating financing alternatives with you. Get started today! Discover how much you qualify for today.