shift from laser treatments alone to a com- bined program of chiropractic care and laser therapy. Educating these patients about chiropractic is much easier from the inside. The change from a wellness prac- tice to a laser centre also has served as a perfect opportunity to recall inactive chi- ropractic patients by sending out a news- letter or e-mail announcing this exciting clinic news. Rebranding my practice as a techno- logically advanced centre has also opened doors to new medical referral sources. Most medical doctors are more comfort- able with technology than they are with a healing profession that has been around for a 150 years! This has provided me with a renewed opportunity to meet with doctors and specialists, many of whom would not have referred for chiropractic care alone. IMPLEMENTING CHANGE Change requires decision making, planning and execution. In shifting from a wellness clinic to a laser centre there were a few key areas that had to be addressed. Redesigning the patient care model. In our centre, laser became the primary modality. For acute or chronic inju- ries, the laser was used for the first two weeks of care to address the key issues in healing musculoskeletal injuries: de- creasing pain, decreasing inflammation and repairing tissues. At that point, the patient was re-examined. Chiropractic would then be integrated into care for any conditions that were not responding to laser or that had not reached maximal recovery. Of course, there are exceptions, namely, cases where spinal dysfunction clearly had to be addressed from the start of treatment with chiropractic. Training for clinic staff. Staff should be knowledgeable and comfort- able with any new changes to a clinic. Hopefully, they will be as enthusiastic about your changes as you are. In our clinic, all staff received complete train- ing on our new technology, including applications and full operation, regard- less of their role in the clinic. The re- ception staff required this knowledge, as well, to confi dently transfer infor- mation to callers and patients. Chiro- practic Health Assistants (CHAs) re- quired the training so they could assist with treatments when required. Learn- ing new skills is refreshing, to most www.canadianchiropractor.ca CANADIAN CHIROPRACTOR | OCTOBER 2009 • 27 employees, and fundamental to per- sonal and professional growth. Laser centre marketing. The direc- tion you choose to take your practice in can take many forms but the key to getting the word out about these new directions is marketing. If you have a signifi cant patient base, you may choose to keep costs low by sending an e-mail notice to all your active and inactive pa- tients. Marketing externally costs more, but brings in new patients. To spread the word about our new laser, we sent unaddressed ad-mailouts to local postal codes, flyers to local busi- nesses, placed ads and an article in a neighbourhood paper, and also sent a notice to all our existing patients and contacts. We redesigned our website and fi lled it with information on our new service. In future, we plan to look at larger newspapers and radio as market- ing tools, since they have been proven to reach wider and larger audiences. Continued on Page 33
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