The first quarter of a new year is a good time to reflect on the prior year and plan for any changes needed for the year ahead. I’ve been lucky to be in this role for a year and a half now, but 2022 was my first full year as president of Urology Austin. In that time, we’ve seen a lot of changes and new structures designed to make our practice more efficient. This year, we’ll continue to fine-tune those new approaches to provide the best experience possible for every patient.
Right now, we are finalizing plans to start the construction of Urology Austin Surgery Center, which will be the first surgery center under the Urology Austin corporate umbrella. This is a truly exciting project that will benefit our physicians, patients and practice in many ways, and I look forward to sharing more details about it soon.
Another initiative I am keenly focused on in this first quarter is improving communications between our team and our patients. With a practice of this size, it’s critical to have the infrastructure, policies and procedures in place to ensure that customer questions and concerns are handled in a timely manner. While we have a call center in place to handle our high call volume, we are implementing some new approaches to ensure that every caller receives the attention they deserve, in a timely manner.
I’ve also received many questions from patients about our patient portal. We are currently working to replace our electronic medical records software, and at the same time, modernize the portal through which we communicate with patients. As this is a complex undertaking, we expect to have these new systems live by the beginning of 2024. In the interim, we are working on some hands-on approaches to ensuring that patient messages in the portal receive a timely response. To better serve you, we are also working to bring additional training and education to our front-line team members to help ensure positive patient experiences.
We at Urology Austin are constantly learning and developing to be the best urology practice nationwide. As home to many of America’s most renowned urologists, we have the resources to create our own top-notch educational opportunities to keep our physicians ahead of the clinical curve. This month, we hosted our first educational summit for our providers, bringing in leading experts on prostate cancer, bladder cancer and kidney cancer to share the newest information and treatment techniques with our Austin-based team as well as our UA partners in Louisiana and Denver. We look forward to making these types of summits an annual event.
Thank you for placing your trust in Urology Austin. We are proud to be the best place in the Austin area for patients to find caring, competent urology care.
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