Marketing to Referral Sources
Summary: Evidence is described that shows markting to referral sources increases admissions to organizations that treat people who misuse substances.
Members of the Network for the Improvement of Addiction Treatment (NIATx) are organizations that treat people who misuse substances and that want to increase admissions to as many people as possible who need their services. Increased admissions usually increases revenue, which offsets the costs of delivering the service.
In some cases, these organizations need to balance the mix of patients between those who have their costs covered by some means, and those who do not. All of the organizations recognize that there will always be patients who cannot cover their costs of treatment. The organizations' interests, therefore, are to admit enough patients who do have their costs covered by some means, hoping some of these patients can pay enough to also help cover the costs of those who cannot cover their own costs.
The process of marketing addiction treatment services to referrers allows service providers to both 1) increase admissions when there is excess capacity, and 2) increase admissions from sources that refer patients who can cover their own expenses. It is also expected that some of these patients will also pay more than their costs and will contribute to the costs of treating those with no coverage. While this is an unfortunate circumstance of the health care system we have in the United States, all health care providers manage their revenue this way. It is the only way service providers can survive financially and it is the only ethical way for health care providers to manage their mix of patients so that patients without coverage are not turned away.
Comments, questions, feedback, criticisms?
Send feedback
- E-mail the author of the module, Marketing to Referral Sources
Footer
More about this content: Metadata | Version History
This work is licensed by Don Holloway under a Creative Commons Attribution License (CC-BY 2.0).
Last edited by Don Holloway on Jan 5, 2005 10:02 am US/Central.