Elizabeth Woodcock, M.B.A., C.P.C., F.A.C.M.P.E.

A dermatology practice is a hotbed of activity. In addition to the clinical care you provide, there is staff to manage in carrying out your orders, supplies to use, bills to be sent and money to be tracked. The complexity of a practice makes outsourcing - using outside firms to handle work you would normally perform in-house - appear quite appealing.

If you're feeling sullen after meeting with your business office staff to mull over the challenges of collecting from patients, maybe it's time to explore opportunities to integrate credit card transactions into your collections process.

Your employees are your practice's single most significant expense category, but they are also one of its greatest assets. A highly productive workforce is essential to ensure your dermatology practice runs effectively. That said, there may still be ways to decrease - or at least keep the lid on - staffing costs without reducing efficiency or service quality.

Motivation, opportunity and rationalization. This may sound like the title of a new James Bond film, but in reality, it's the triad of factors that provides fertile ground for the internal fraud that is an all-too-common occurrence in dermatologists' offices. A recent survey by the Medical Group Management Association (MGMA) revealed that 82.8 percent of managers had worked in a practice that experienced embezzlement.