Table 1

Practice strategies used by physicians with consistently low TNA

Practice strategies used by physicians with consistently low TNA		Percentage of staff physicians reporting they ‘always’ or ‘often’ use the strategy on department-wide survey (n=65)
Theme	Specific strategies
Adjusting the appointment template based on demand	Adjusting clinic schedule based on TNA*	23%
	Starting morning clinic before 09:00	22%
	Using administrative slots at the start of clinic to accommodate urgent visits	18%
	Scheduling clinic half days to be spread out across the week*	92%
	Adjusting number of same/next-day slots based on patient demand	18%
	Educating patients on use of same/next-day slots*	42%
Reviewing the appointment schedule in advance	Reviewing to ensure booked patients are part of roster*	70%
	Ensuring that patients are not booked with more than one appointment*	37%
	Reviewing to see if email/call to patient directly can mitigate a visit	46%
	Ensuring that test results have come in which are necessary for review in the upcoming visit	54%
	Ensuring that patient does not need an earlier appointment for an urgent issue*	42%
	Ensuring that a longer appointment is not required for a more urgent concern	57%
Max-packing of visits	Using fax prescription renewals*	95%
	Dealing with multiple problems in one visit if the patient brings them up*	98%
	Proactively addressing multiple patient issues in a single visit to avoid another visit (ie, max-pack)*	89%
	Proactively bringing up preventative health maneovres even when a patient is coming in for something else*	94%
Using phone, email and/or secure messaging	Communicating with patients via email or secure messaging for clinical issues	25%
	Communicating with patients via email or secure messaging for administrative issues (ie, appointment booking, forms, referrals)	20%
	Integrating phone appointments with patients into my regular clinic	14%
	Communicating test results with patients using email, secure messaging, phone or mailed letter	63%
Managing complex patients	Booking longer appointments for complex patients*	52%
	Adjusting the time between follow-up appointments based on the disease stability for complex patients*	86%
	Booking the next appointment before the patient leaves (for complex patients)	81%
Managing planned absences	Informing patients of upcoming absences*	41%
	Booking fewer routine follow-ups in the weeks following vacation	39%
	Avoiding taking vacations during typically busy periods	28%
	Using postvacation blocking	63%
Involving the interdisciplinary team	Using non-physician team members to help with well-baby checks*	81%
	Using non-physician team members to help with immunisations	91%
	Using non-physician team members to help with hypertension follow-up	44%
	Using non-physician team members to help with cancer screening	5%
	Using non-physician team member to help with reminder calls	53%
	Using non-physician team members to help with communication of test results	59%
	Using non-physician team members to help with preventative health exams	52%

*Denotes strategies used by all interviewed physicians.