How much is my physiotherapy clinic losing when patients stop coming before their treatment plan is finished?
Measure average visits per new patient against the plan you recommend. A clinic with 40 new patients a month, prescribing six sessions at £60 but averaging 3.2 visits, earns £7,680 a month from them. Lifting the average to 4.5 visits is £10,800 — £3,120 a month, £37,440 a year — from patients who are already booked in.
£37,440 a year, without a single additional new patient or any change to price.
Drop-off hurts outcomes as well as revenue. A patient who stops at session three often has not completed the rehabilitation that prevents the problem returning, which is why it is worth fixing for clinical reasons, not just commercial ones.
The most effective change is booking the plan, not the next session. When a patient leaves the first appointment with all remaining dates in the diary, each one is a commitment already made; when they are asked to rebook at the end of every visit, each visit is a fresh decision to continue.
Explain the plan in terms of the outcome. "Six sessions over four weeks to get you back to running" gives the patient a reason to finish; "come back next week" does not.
Track visits per new patient by clinician. Differences between clinicians on the same caseload usually come from how the plan is explained, which is teachable.
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Figures are typical ranges for small businesses in the UK, US and Canada, given so you can check them against your own books rather than take them on trust. They are arithmetic on stated assumptions, not a forecast, and not financial advice.