Improving Your Time Management As A Medical Professional

Part of your education in nursing school is supplying you with the different base skills that you’re going to use during your workday. However, there are also other equally important skills that don’t necessarily get formally taught, like time management. In the medical world, you’re going to have a variety of different tasks you are responsible for on a daily basis. Being sure that you can manage your time effectively is key to both keeping on top of them and providing ideal care for your patients. Here is how you want to start.

Prioritizing

This is one of the best assets one can have when it comes to time management in a medical setting. At the start of a shift or right in the middle of one, you may be presented with an array of different tasks to do. Always step back for a moment and ask yourself exactly what is more important. The reason why you want to go this route is to make sure that the base minimum is always done but that you also have the flexibility to manage the unexpected. If you have to say, work something else into your schedule, you’ll already know where you can start in terms of skipping certain items.

Delegations

Another important thing to master, especially for veteran medical professionals, is being able to delegate properly. Trying to take on every single task on your own is just going to lead to burnout and, generally, not being able to complete said tasks as effectively as you could be. All medical professionals are part of a greater team, so there will be someone on hand that could help you. While you need to be mindful of their personal responsibilities, you shouldn’t be afraid to ask for support if necessary. For example, nurses should check in with doctors if they have patient questions but make sure all the necessary information is present not to waste the doctor’s time.

Managing Interruptions

As nice as it would be to keep to a set schedule, part of the medical profession is learning to expect the unexpected. This means that you want to make sure that you aren’t losing a lot of time to small interruptions to your day. This can mean something like checking a personal email or having a chat with your coworkers. Don’t be afraid to excuse yourself to get back to work if it means saving you a time crunch later.

Don’t Be Afraid To Say No

This may be a tough skill to adopt for people who are just getting started, but the fact of the matter is that you need to know your limits. If you are having a larger and larger workload to the point that you are concerned, it will impact your ability to provide quality care; then, you should be willing to say so. Saying no or suggesting an alternative option to a senior professional may seem difficult to do at first, but ultimately, it will create a better workplace for everyone. Just be sure to phrase things in a respectful manner.

Put Together A Proper Schedule

Some people may think they have all the tools they need to keep a proper time management system mentally. This is just making things more difficult for yourself. Whether you want to keep track in your phone or with a planner, having some form of physical record can help quite a bit with your time management regimen. This gives you the ability to fully map out your workload and goals for a given day or shift.

Take Care of Your Body

While this may be something you suggest to your patients, this can help a lot with your own time management and efficiency as well. Getting a proper night’s sleep is an essential starting point. Failing to have a proper sleep can lead to you feeling more sluggish and moody during the day. In addition, you want to watch your diet to make sure you are getting all the nutrients that you need.

Don’t Be Afraid To Iterate and Improve

Just because a single time-management plan works for you at one stage of your career doesn’t mean that it’s going to be viable at every stage. Your responsibilities may change, you may gain a new level of mastery over a certain task, or there may be changes in the workplace that you have control over. As a result, you always want to be revisiting your time management and how it impacts your job. Do you find that you’re starting to have less and less time to work on certain tasks? You may want to revisit what has changed and if you need to shift your overall strategy.

Saving Time In Other Ways

As you can see, when it comes to time management, you have a lot of different options on hand to help you be more efficient on the job. However, we should also talk about ways that you can save yourself some effort while you’re off the job. Confusing? One good example here is medical certification. All medical professionals will need to acquire and renew certain certifications in order to work in compliance. Traditionally, you could take a classroom course and test to renew/get a certification. From a time management perspective, this isn’t necessarily the best option on the table, though.

A better option to support your time-management plans is looking into online medical certification. This allows you to work at the pace that suits you when it comes to getting your certification. Simply take the modules and tests when it suits you and get all the quality information that you need. With this said, it’s important that you choose the best providers possible when it comes to online medical certification, and that means working with ProMed for their recertification. We provide certification and recertification courses that match AHA and ILCOR guidelines. We offer a 100% money-back guarantee for those who aren’t satisfied as well.