Patient access problems in ambulatory practices are often misdiagnosed as staffing shortages, according to a sponsored article from Greenway Health. The piece, written by David Cohen, argues that long hold times, missed calls, and scheduling delays frequently stem from fragmented workflows rather than a lack of people. Adding staff to an inefficient process, he says, may simply put more people inside the same broken system.
Cohen says access begins before the appointment, with every phone call, message, or registration request generating behind-the-scenes tasks. When those tasks rely on manual handoffs and disconnected systems, friction accumulates. A patient may experience that friction as a delayed response, while staff see it as another item in an already crowded queue. The article suggests that practices should ask what is generating demand for staff intervention, rather than assuming more capacity is the answer.
The article advises practices to design workflows before automating, and to automate only routine steps that do not require human judgment. It also recommends measuring resolution—whether a patient's need was fully met—rather than just call volume or hold times, since faster answers do not help if patients must call back. The piece is a sponsored perspective from a healthcare technology vendor, so it should be read as an industry argument rather than independent research.