The Importance of Your Foundational Assessment

Overview

The Foundational Assessment one of the appointments that I offer in my own practice and also teach to others who want to start or improve their own practice. This video and blog is a two-part series. In this first installment, I'm going to be giving an overview of the appointment, and then in the second part, I'll be going into a bit more detail about actually executing the Foundational Assessment appointment. 

The Discovery Call

Firstly, you need to know that the Foundational Assessment is the second part of a three-step plan that we take patients through. The first piece is the Discovery Call, the second piece is the Foundational Assessment, and the third is an ongoing membership. The Discovery Call is intended to simply introduce a potential patient to your practice. They might give some vague information about their symptoms, and you could give some broad examples of what treatment may look like, but don’t make any concrete recommendations just yet. This call should be a pretty low barrier to entry, since it’s important for the onboarding process that people aren’t faced with too many hurdles too quickly. At the end of the Discovery Call, I explain to them what the next step would be, which is the Foundational Assessment. 

What Happens in the Foundational Assessment?

Before a patient arrives at the Foundational Assessment, I let them know that they’re going to need to get some tests done and that we’ll combine that objective data with the subjective data of their personal experiences, and hopefully come to a point where we know what to do going forward. The Foundational Assessment is supposed to begin to address the patient’s issues on a fundamental level; that way they can begin to make new lifestyle choices that can help them reach their goals.

The Foundational Assessment isn’t limited to just one appointment; in fact, my practice’s Foundational Assessment happens over three appointments. The first is a 90-minute appointment with myself, the second is a follow-up with my health coach, and the third is an appointment with my therapist. We do it this way so that we can quickly get the patient clear, actionable steps that they can use to improve their life. We aim to address the whole patient, with the goal of getting to the root causes of their symptoms. While the healing journey takes time (that's where a membership comes in), they at least come away with a strong starting point to understand what is going on from our full evaluation. 

After the Foundational Assessment, some patients are ready to move on to the full membership, while others may want some more time to think it over. That’s fine as well, but that does come with the possibility that the tests that were done may become outdated by the time they decide, and they would have to be redone. To make sure that the tests are still up to date before they begin the membership, I require the patient to sign up for the membership within two months of their Foundational Assessment. 

Earning a Profit with the Foundational Assessment

In addition to providing benefits for patients, the Foundational Assessment can also be very profitable for your business if done correctly. At my practice, the Foundational Assessment currently costs $695, and it includes all three appointments with myself, my health coach, and my therapist. It takes some time to get the steady income from memberships up and running, so the quick, one-time cash flows from Foundational Assessments are a good way to generate income in the early stages of starting a practice.

I highly recommend that you don't do any of the advanced testing in the Foundational Assessment. Some patients may want you to do more testing, but if it’s outside of the context of a recurring membership, then it won’t be very useful. Many advanced tests will require retests down the road, which could end up wasting time and money for both you and the patient.

The last financial benefit of the Foundational Assessment is that it can function as a great marketing tool. You can have people buy the Foundational Assessment for someone else as a gift. Additionally, even if they don’t continue on with the full membership, that’s one more person who might recommend you to someone with the same issues they had. 

Final Thoughts

In my experience, the Foundational Assessment really makes the membership sell itself. If you’ve provided the patient with excellent care through the first two parts, they’re much more likely to feel like the membership isn’t something you’re trying to sell them; rather, it will feel like the natural next step. The patients improve their lives, and you’re growing your business-- it’s a win-win for everyone, if done right. If you want more info about how to make sure you’re executing this plan right, part two is coming soon, and it can help you execute this plan.

Thanks for reading!