Private practices need all the services any business needs such as local and long distance phone (and pager) service, regular office cleaning and maintenance, and possibly lawn care in the warm months and snow plowing of the parking lot during the winter. Plus there are services unique to medical practice including medical waste removal, answering service, and possibly transcription support. Computer support by experts in healthcare information technology is also critical, and will become a bigger need soon as more practices convert to electronic medical records.

Equipment purchases usually get much more consideration before the practice commits, but the small recurring charges can often accrue to amounts well above the cost of any particular piece of equipment in your office. Managing purchasing, negotiating for discounts, and always shopping for bargains will help your cashflow and improve your bottom line at the end of the year.

This quick list of services and supplies needed by medical practices is just an overview. Like all medical office protocols and procedures, purchasing also needs to have checks and balances within your practice. A good office manager should handle these purchases for you, and you need to decide at what dollar amount you need to co-sign the checks. If you can pay for these recurring costs with a credit or charge card that rewards points, perhaps getting a trip to a nice resort once a year with those points will help ease the pain of paying for all those medical office supplies!

Seeing that I was starting out, he offered to also set up my scanner, printer server, and install some software at a reasonable “bundled” price. He explained deceptively that he received discounts from software manufacturers because he ran a computer business and could pass those discounts on to me. I was under the belief that I was paying for my own full version of original software. To make a long story longer, when I needed to upgrade my software I discovered that he installed limited or upgraded versions (he had the original software discs) that I was unable to upgrade. I had to buy the original software “again” to upgrade. Needless to say I never utilized that computer vendor again. But I digress.

The only other exception to my advice to buy only used/refurbished equipment when starting out is your waiting room furniture. You want that to be new, clean, and up to date as it is the first impression of you to your patients arriving at your office. But even furniture can be rented for cheaper than buying when starting out. The goal is to minimize money out until you have sufficient cashflow coming into your practice each month. Only then should you buy new waiting room furniture and other equipment for your office. Take it from someone who learned the hard way.