Ryan Devane (he/him), LCSW started Grounded Wellbeing, a gender-affirming psychotherapy practice offering traditional psychotherapy, gender-affirming support, transformation coaching, and more, to all individuals located in Atlanta, GA. It quickly grew and became a group practice in 2023. Grounded Wellbeing believes in the power of healing within the community and works towards providing a brave and affirming space for its clients to explore current challenges. With a focus on trauma recovery for queer, trans, and gender-expansive individuals, Grounded Wellbeing aims to provide holistic healing and wellness care to its clients. Its therapists offer a range of services, including traditional psychotherapy, gender-affirming support, transformation coaching, EMDR, religious trauma recovery, clinical hypnotherapy, sound healing, meditation, reiki, energy healing, and more. Ultimately, their goal is to provide a safe space for individuals to feel supported and empowered to express their gender identity.
With so much activity happening in the office, Ryan explained, they were in need of someone–or something–to direct office traffic. But for a growing practice, hiring a person to staff the front desk full-time wasn’t really an option.
The office entrance opens to a waiting room, which has another door that leads to the offices where the clinicians hold their sessions. Between sessions, therapists have limited time to check the waiting room to see if their next client has arrived.
“It’s too much back and forth from the front to the back,” Ryan said. “And sometimes clients are running late. We found ourselves walking to the front too many times.”
As a listener of the All Things Private Practice podcast, Ryan heard an episode that featured The Receptionist for iPad. After comparing a couple of different visitor management systems (VMSs), Ryan decided The Receptionist for iPad met his business’s needs best.
“I liked that we didn’t necessarily need the iPad,” Ryan mentioned, as a feature of The Receptionist for iPad allows the visitor to check in using a QR code, which is one way Grounded Wellbeing welcomes clients and other visitors.
Discovering an Affirming Check-In Feature
A benefit of The Receptionist for iPad that Ryan calls out is the ability for clients to check in under a name or pronoun that might differ from the one on their clinical chart. This works well for those who are trying out different names or pronouns, and the clinicians are still able to tell which client is about to enter their office.
“Some clients are trying out a new name or a new spelling,” Ryan explained. For some folks in the LGBTQ+ space, using a different name can be gender-affirming and an important part of their mental health care. It can also be a way to open up the therapy session organically. “It’s a natural conversation starter that I didn’t even know was going to happen. It’s been a fun way of incorporating it into the therapy process.” When he sees a client using a different name or different name spelling when they check in, he asks them about it. “It’s nice that they can check in however they want and I’ll still know who they are,” Ryan said.
A Positive Customer Experience Goes a Long Way
When it came time to set up and begin using The Receptionist for iPad in his practice, Ryan leaned on the Radical Support® of the customer experience team.
“Even just from an implementation standpoint, I had such a good experience with The Receptionist staff and the sales team,” Ryan recalled, “and even just getting it set up in a way that would work well for our practice, y’all were very hands-on and really helpful…Having someone to really help me sit down and think about the best way to set it up and structure it was so helpful and I know you don’t get that from every company.”
Of his experience using The Receptionist for iPad in his practice, Ryan said, “I would say it’s definitely worth the investment. It’s increased our efficiency, communication amongst us, and with clients.”
Interested in learning about how The Receptionist for iPad can help streamline workflows and save time in your group practice? Take our Behavioral Health Product Tour here.
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