In an age where businesses and medical practices are in constant competition to utilize the latest technology, there’s one thing that your veterinarian office should utilize to stay competitive: a virtual waiting room.
With a growing focus on patient convenience and digital options in the healthcare industry, virtual waiting rooms have seen an explosion in popularity in recent years.
For veterinary practices specifically, virtual waiting rooms are tremendously useful for people with pets who would prefer not to sit in a waiting room with other owners and animals.
Here are 5 ways that not implementing virtual waiting could be hindering your emergency vet practice’s operational efficiency and customer satisfaction.
1: Inefficient Time Management
The traditional waiting process in vet practices involves people crowding into a waiting room with their pets, oftentimes creating a level of chaos and slowing down the patient intake process as a whole. This can easily lead to a ripple effect of sorts, resulting in scheduling errors, missed appointments and overbooked days.
Without a virtual waiting room, vets can expect extended waiting periods, causing unnecessary stress and annoyance for both the practice’s staff and clients. Virtual waiting rooms ease this headache by creating a level of calmness and efficiency in the waiting room.
2: Decreased Client Satisfaction
Not utilizing a virtual waiting room can lead to unnecessarily long and uncertain wait times, as clients crowd the waiting room and cannot be seen in a timely manner. This will inevitably result in frustration, negative reviews, and potentially lost business as a consequence of unhappy clients.
Virtual waiting rooms allow the waiting process to be streamlined by empowering your practice’s staff to control who can enter the office and when. This leads to more organization, efficiency, and less frustrated clients who may have sought out another veterinary practice as a result of inefficient waiting rooms.
People with pets who may be aggressive to other animals will also appreciate the added convenience of a virtual waiting room. They can wait with their pet in a more secluded location, such as in their car, and minimize the time their pet is around other animals.
3: Impact on Staff Workflow
Unpredictable waiting times which are caused by practices not adopting virtual waiting rooms can leave your staff feeling stressed and unorganized. This is because traditional waiting rooms often lead to more pressure on reception staff, less efficient work, and a negative workplace environment that doesn’t attract new employees.
When the patient intake and waiting process is streamlined with virtual waiting rooms, staff morale and productivity are boosted due to the lack of stress and chaos that comes with traditional waiting rooms in vet practices.
4: Reduced Ability to Handle Emergencies
In any medical waiting room, let alone a veterinary practice, emergencies can pop up at any time and staff need to be able to react swiftly and calmly. Traditional waiting methods do not provide the level of flexibility that is necessary when handling unexpected emergencies.
When an emergency arises, a clinic with a traditional waiting room may have difficulty finding the resources to respond to the emergency due to the natural chaos associated with these waiting rooms. Their ability to prioritize critical cases can also be hindered when the waiting room is packed with owners and their pets.
Having a system that can adapt to changing priorities and needs with the click of a few buttons can make all the difference when an emergency presents itself in the waiting room. Virtual waiting rooms are great tools for keeping other patients out of the waiting room so staff can dedicate all of their attention and resources to the emergency at hand.
5: Limited Access to Modern Client Expectations
In the digital age, there has been a shift in client expectations where convenience and accessibility are more important now than ever. Using traditional waiting rooms and not adopting virtual waiting can make a practice appear outdated or less competitive, resulting in a potential loss of clients.
Keeping pace with modern technology by adopting a virtual waiting room enhances client relationships and loyalty by showing that your practice is willing to adopt the tools that make client experiences more convenient and less stressful.
Get a Better Virtual Waiting Room for Your Animal Health Practice
When it comes to increasing operational efficiency and bettering the customer experience in your veterinary practice, adopting our virtual waiting room software is a great way to achieve this. With the limitations of a traditional waiting room and the expectation that medical practices are current with modern technology, having a virtual waiting room is key to remaining competitive in the healthcare industry.
See more about how our virtual waiting room software can improve your veterinary practice for staff and patients and request a demo with ER Express today.
