Tuesday, November 20th, 2012
Tomorrow is Thanksgiving, and among all of the traditional family problems families across the country tend to experience this time of year, families of psychiatrists have the added complication of not knowing when one member of their dinner party will be called away to deal with a patient.
Many psychiatrists initially went into a private practice because helping others live better lives was important, but too often their own lives end up suffering. Psychiatrists have an ethical obligation to be available for patient crises and emergencies 24 hours a day, 7 days a week, 365 days a year. For the most part, this is an obligation many would take on voluntarily out of a deep desire to see their patients succeed. However, being pulled away from the dinner table year after year just as you’re about to cut the turkey can be taxing on your own emotions, as well as those of your family.
It’s well known that the holiday season can be a difficult time for many with mental disorders, and these patients might feel the need to rely on their trusted psychiatrists even more. Unfortunately, this means some psychiatrists never get to experience a real holiday – undisturbed by their practice. Getting a colleague to provide holiday coverage for your patients is usually out of the question.
If it’s time to have a real day off, a day to spend with just your family, a day where you’re able to turn off your phone guilt free, a day when you know your patients are being cared for, let PsychCoverage know. We’re here to help. We know the importance of staying fresh for your patients, the need to have some quality time off, the real danger of burnout, and we want to keep you passionate about your psychiatric practice.
We’re offering a special discount to all new psychiatrists who sign up for PsychCoverage’s services this holiday season. We’ll waive the holiday fee when you subscribe to patient coverage over the holiday weekend. Your patients will be cared for by expertly trained RNs, you’ll get a full report on any interactions we have with your patients, you’ll be able to sit down to a warm Thanksgiving meal and your family will finally have a quality holiday with you. Give us a call today.
Monday, October 1st, 2012
Our private practice psychiatric group, PsyCare, Inc., in San Diego, CA, has been relying on the weekend/vacation and after hours on call services as provided by PsychCoverage, under the leadership of Jack Coughlin, RN, for the past 17 years. The eighteen psychiatrists in our group have been 100% satisfied with the services provided by PsychCoverage. Their system is well organized, efficient and designed for immediate patient access and follow up. Our patients are treated with compassion and respect and their safety is always paramount. The PsychCoverage RN’s are consistently generous with the time taken to speak with our patients and their family members.
PsychCoverage provides support and reassurance when needed, answers questions and concerns about symptoms, medications or side effects, can assess if a patient requires urgent or emergent intervention, and will make all necessary arrangements, as well as communicate their interventions and status updates with our psychiatrists for our records. Our patients, their families and our physicians have offered only positive feedback and consistent complete satisfaction with the services provided by PsychCoverage. Our psychiatrists are able to take time off on evenings, weekends and vacations to have a chance to relax and recharge, knowing with full confidence that their patients’ after hours needs and concerns will be addressed and resolved professionally.
The PsychCoverage team will modify their services to meet the individual needs of the physician with regard to how they would like their patients’ concerns handled. The service provided by PsychCoverage undoubtedly enhances the quality of care that our physicians provide for our patients, as well as the quality of life for our psychiatrists.
Rob Friedman, M.D.
President / CEO
PsyCare, Inc.
San Diego, California
(858) 279-1223 Ext. 412
Monday, October 1st, 2012
PsychCoverage was started in 1995 by Jack and Jill Coughlin, 2 Psychiatric Registered Nurses in San Diego, CA. Jack and Jill began providing weekend coverage to 7 Psychiatrists from Psycare, then a small but growing outpatient Psychiatry Group Practice in San Diego. PsyCare is now one of the largest outpatient practices in San Diego County, and PsychCoverage continues to provide weekend and vacation coverage and triage services to 18 of the Psychiatrists in the practice, including 6 of the 7 original MD’s. We now provide after hours and Mon-Fri coverage for triage, prescription refills and clinical call backs for a growing number of Psychiatrists throughout the state of California.
Bringing a unique psychiatric nursing-based approach to managing after-hours urgent and emergent calls that we refer to as “Brief Care Management”, the RNs of PsychCoverage provide support, crisis management, education and follow up to private practice patients in distress during times when their Psychiatrist is unavailable.
PsychCoverage has evolved into a full time operation that has recently completed the development of Searchlight, the first of its kind web-based platform designed to provide continuity of care through documentation of after-hours psychiatric emergencies and electronic, HIPPA compliant notification to providers. Using 18 years of experience as a guide, PsychCoverage has developed policies and procedures which are designed to improve access and to establish standards of care for six distinct call categories that encompass the majority of after hours calls. They include Urgent Prescription Refill requests, assessment of symptoms and side effects, patient/family education, referral to Medical ER, Emergency Psych hospitalizations and activation of first responders for life threatening emergencies. The dual mission of PsychCoverage is to substantially improve the quality of after hours patient care and to provide a trusted, reliable and affordable service to Psychiatrists wanting a break from providing 24/7 on call access to their patients.
