Increasing Your Functional Medicine Revenue With BHRT
Wondering whether or not your BHRT clinic will be profitable? Obtaining the level of BHRT revenue you desire may take time, but the future looks promising.
Here’s why functional medicine modalities like BHRT will continue to bring revenue to health practitioners and how to ensure that you’re on the right track with your clinic.
Industry Growth and Outlook
Patients are seeking opportunities to tackle their health problems in more holistic ways. They want practitioners to take more time, dive deeper, and develop highly personalized wellness plans.
Functional medicine revenue in a given clinic will vary depending on what’s being offered, and some sectors will continue to be in greater demand.
But we can rest assured that hormone replacement therapy will continue to be in demand and that it will continue to offer a high return on investment.
Consider 2019 data which suggests there are around 21 million women in middle age (45-55), most of them will be facing menopause during these years. While not all of them will choose BHRT therapy for menopause or even seek treatment at all, there’s a significant portion of the population that can make up your target market.
Even if you serve a region that has a population of about 100,000 people and 7500 women in mid-age, you can easily get one person a month to sign on.
When you move into lifetime value and consider that women are living longer than ever, you’ve got a substantial amount of people who are potentially seeking anti-aging treatments like BHRT.
Consider Why People Are Interested in Functional Medicine
We consider BHRT a patient-driven movement that will continue to hold weight as people and especially women — feel like conventional medicine fails them.
Some reasons why people are turning away from conventional medicine include:
- Lack of individualized care
- Lack of trust
- Lack of integration of alternative therapies
- Treats symptoms, not causes
- Prescriptions lead to side effects and addiction.
On the other hand, functional medicine modalities take into account our entire bodies’ systems, vitality, well-being, and longevity.
People are craving more personalized treatment and focused wellness plans.
And considering the aging population of women, they will continue to turn to hormone replacement therapy to help with age-related hormonal changes.
So there’s truly a case for BHRT revenue levels to grow in a new or planned BHRT practice.
Considerations for Increasing Your BHRT Revenue
When it comes to your functional medicine practice, you should make sure that you are personally compensated adequately, and that BHRT revenue levels are stable enough to support your business.
Here are some considerations for boosting revenue and patient satisfaction.
Offer Small Group Wellness Sessions
Bringing patients together to tackle common wellness challenges is a great way for you and your team to concentrate your resources.
If you have 10 clients, for instance, who are interested in learning more about which hormones cause which symptoms during menopause, you can invite them all to one 90-minute workshop aimed at empowering and educating.
This strategy can be both fun and engaging and an opportunity for community members to connect.
Create a Selection of Wellness Packages
Cash pay practices have moved away from a la carte pricing toward packages. It’s much better to help 10 new patients a month at a premium than 100 at a meager fee that requires much so work from you.
Ask for a higher investment through value-based packages, and steer away from discussions of standard fees and insurance. It may be helpful to explain why functional medicine isn’t covered by insurance since it’s’ a different model than conventional medicine.
Here are some points to consider which should help you boost your BHRT revenue:
- Average packages can start at $2500+ for a 4-month program (but maintenance packages may be less)
- Your ideal goal is an 80-85% margin, with each patient margin at $2000 or more in the first 6-12 months.
- Consider a 4-6 months program in lieu of a la carte visits
- Offer a number of different package programs
- Packages can include initial and follow-up testing, a set number of office visits, and sometimes even a bank of money toward supplements or a discount on supplements.
Once patients have paid upfront, they will continue to stick with you, since this is an investment they have already made and they should see its lifetime value. They should see this as a new lease on life, greater well-being, and overall health in the long term.
Offer Monthly Memberships Based on Long-Term Maintenance Plans
Some practices are now implementing monthly memberships for long-term maintenance, which keeps patients coming back instead of switching to different providers.
If you frame the value of health maintenance as sick care prevention — that is, it prevents you from needing your insurance for things like dialysis, hip replacement or other serious complications — you can create innovative packages which help patients with their wellness goals.
Make sure your patients feel special. Give them something extra to stay on with you after their initial package, like bonus educational tips or discounts on other services.
Build a Better BHRT Business
Providers may need coaching on how to discuss pricing with patients, as well as other components of building a successful BHRT clinic.
Make sure you/your staff and entire team have gone through your program, and encourage them to use their personal story to connect with patients.
Your BHRT revenue is bound to grow if you continue to focus on how it brings value to patients, while being innovative about the way you use your clinic time and resources.
Don’t feel bad if you need to raise your rates. Be confident in what you have learned in your training and your services – people will see this and pay for it.
Do show your patients the lifetime value they will receive as they invest in the most important thing: their health and well-being.
I’ve never met a BHRT provider who regrets taking the extra time needed to understand how to administer BHRT.
Learn to help patients in this modality, and you’ll be well on your way to earning optimal BHRT revenue levels.
Enjoyed this article? Here are three more to help you:
Pros and Cons of Different Dosing Forms of Bioidentical Hormones
An Overview of Anti-Aging Market Trends
What Happens When Women Age?