First measure demand for appointments and then for all other care processes. The only way to really know your true demand is to measure it.

Demand for appointments can be divided into external and internal demand. External demand comes in the form of new patients to primary care, and referrals (consults) and physician-to-physician phone calls to specialty care. Internal demand to both primary and specialty care comes from provider- and patient-driven return appointments and may also include phone calls, faxes, emails, walk-ins, and return visits generated from today's appointment.

True demand is the total number of requests for appointments received on any given day from both internal and external sources.

Related Measures

Daily Demand