Dr Humphreys recently brought in experienced optometrist Marlena Di Grac, who joins him in forming the clinical team. They're supported by Kirsty Almond and Fiona Pentecost, who traverse the roles of managing the practice, dispensary, and front of house. Kirsty describes the ethos of the practice as a mix of passion and attention to detail. It's this high standard of patient care that sets the practice apart.
She says Dr Humphreys has had patients coming to see him for decades, many travelling from overseas or interstate. For Kirsty, it’s important that these standards carry over into all areas of the practice’s operations and patient experience, particularly when it comes to payments.
Easy setup and integration
Maximeyes was one of the first providers to adopt CommBank Smart Health. The practice has been using it for more than 9 months. Kirsty says setting up CommBank Smart Health was “very smooth”.
With one code, Maximeyes could log in to the desktop portal, the CommBank Smart Health hub, then link the CommBank Smart Health terminals and integrate with specialist optical practice management system, Optomate*.
Having the modern sleekness of the terminal on the practice’s front desk has made us look professional. We’ve achieved huge time savings through the easy integration of CommBank’s Smart Health solution and Optomate. It means we don’t have to spend all that time keying in claims and has reduced the chance of human error.”
“The easy integration between CommBank Smart Health and Optomate has been brilliant,” Kirsty says. “We received good support from the CommBank Health team in the early stages of setting up, adding new optometrists and using the solution.
It now takes a quarter of the time to process a claim than it did with our previous solution, and crucially, with all the differentiated CommBank Smart Health features, we’re able to deliver a modern, seamless customer experience that benefits us and our patients.”
Saving patients and the practice time
The next benefit Maximeyes experienced was the time it saved processing health claims for patients. Before integrating the CommBank Smart Health solution with Optomate, Kirsty would have to key in the details of every claim twice; first into Optomate then again via the terminal.
“Manually entering each health claim took a lot of time, and there’s the possibility of making a mistake. It must have looked so cumbersome and antiquated to patients compared to their experience with, say, a physio or a dentist.”
Kirsty explains that from the patient perspective, they seek to minimise the time they spend in the practice. That means she’s constantly looking for ways to make the nonclinical aspects of the practice as efficient as possible.
“Some people have an extensive consult, they come out of that appointment, and we help take measurements so they can choose the right frames. If you then have a complicated payment and claiming process, it takes more time patients don’t have, and you can’t underestimate just how long it can take,” Kirsty says.
“We have many health fund claims being processed throughout the day, and we can now do in under a minute what used to take up to three minutes. That can start really adding up.”
“With CommBank Smart Health, we streamlined that process with the claim going straight from Optomate to the CommBank Smart health terminal. It’s a big advantage and leaves patients with a positive impression and a good memory because it’s at the very end of our engagement with them. It’s professional, and quick; it’s been a huge advancement for us.”
Kirsty adds that the ability to look up transaction details in the CommBank Smart Health hub or terminal is another positive change. “Being able to flick through the transaction history saves time, where in the past we would probably have had to call the bank.”
Helping patients realise benefits
Maximeyes sees patients of all types and recognises there can be varying reactions to the costs involved. For example, people who have been wearing glasses for years may be more accustomed to the price than those getting glasses for the first time. Irrespective of their situation, Kirsty says they encourage patients to check their optical benefits by swiping the card through the terminal. CommBank Smart Health’s seamless integration with Optomate means a quote outlining the Private Health Fund benefit can be generated on-the-spot and provided to the patient prior to purchase.
“People don’t necessarily keep track of their benefits, and often they have some leftover that they didn’t realise, so it’s great for customers who can get more off their items”.
Maximising the solution
Kirsty says that the Maximeyes team are now “very comfortable” with using the solution and have had little need for support.
However, “it’s nice to know that there are on-demand resources and human support available if we need it.” The practice now intends to expand its use of the reconciliation and reporting features available in the Smart Health hub, which Kirsty says, “can make things a lot easier”.
This refers to the bank reconciliation reporting function that shows disbursements from Private Health Funds. Should anything be missing during a reconciliation process, the practice can search the transaction history and access transaction details if they need to query a payment.
For Kirsty, it’s another example of how the solution can drive more efficiencies for the practice. And with everything working seamlessly, it can unlock a better experience for both the Maximeyes team and its loyal patients.
