Should I block out consultation time or just fit consults in whenever there’s a gap?
Block it. If you stuff consults wherever there happens to be a hole in the day, you wreck your flow and you risk running off schedule on the procedures that actually pay you. Think about the means of production in your practice. You are most efficient at procedures when you are already doing procedures. I will say that again because it matters: you are most efficient at procedures when you are already doing procedures. The more you string together before you hit that early afternoon fatigue, the better you get. Drop a surprise consult into the middle of that and you distract yourself and lose the rhythm. So protect dedicated blocks instead. Set a PM block on one day and an AM block on another so patients get a morning or afternoon option, and your procedure days stay clean.
If the answers you are finding here resonate with you, my team and I work with a small group of clients each year. The next step is a complimentary Discovery Consultation and Practice Review with Dr. McAnally.