Medical office nurse becomes author

Sheila Richmeier, MS, RN, BC, CMPE, now has something to add to her list of credentials — author.

“Leading Your Clinical Team: A Comprehensive Guide to Optimizing Productivity and Quality” details the management of the clinical team in a medical office. After obtaining her nursing degree, Richmeier worked in a physician’s office. She said she became concerned that there were no materials published on medical office nursing.

“If you weren’t a hospital nurse there was nothing out there,” Richmeier said. “I was never taught how to be a nurse in an office.”

Now a practice enhancement facilitator at TransforMED, Richmeier helps transform medical practices into patient-centered medical homes.

Richmeier began forming ideas about her book in February 2008 and started doing research. She wrote the first two chapters that April to present to the publishing company and proposed her idea in May.

By the time Richmeier’s manuscript was due in December, she said she had rewritten her book about 15 times. After going through intensive editing, the final version published in July 2009.

“I was surprised at how easy it was,” Richmeier said about getting the book published.

She attributed this to the scarcity of books on this topic.

“This is a topic that hasn’t been written about,” she said. “Medical office nursing is not seen in the same manner as hospital nursing, although it takes experience and skills to be an office nurse.”

Richmeier said her book targets a variety of people. It’s written for non-clinical managers to help them understand the clinical side of managing a medical office. It’s also written for clinical managers who already have base knowledge but can learn more about effectively managing the clinical part of the practice.

“As an RN, I would like to teach non-clinical managers how to effectively manage the clinical side of the practice,” Richmeier said.

Richmeier said it’s common for physicians to hire someone to manage their businesses. This manager most likely will have a business degree and will not be as familiar with the clinical aspect of a medical office. The clinical side of the office “can be very costly because of the use of resources both in staffing and supplies,” Richmeier said, so it must be managed well.

Richmeier’s colleague Diane Cardwell, RN, ARNP, practice facilitator at TransforMED, read particular sections of the book. She said she was especially interested in the subjects of how to use the nursing team effectively and the different nursing models.

“I think it is a great resource to provide some concise information,” Cardwell said. “I think she does a good job of presenting some of the practice models but also giving tools for people to have objective data.”

Cardwell sees the importance of a book about managing a clinical team because medical offices need to work to maximize the uses of their teams.

“Frequently we will see staff members who feel they’re underutilized,” she said.

Richmeier published the book through the Medical Group Management Association. She joined the association when she became a medical practice manager to learn more about the field.

“Leading Your Clinical Team: A Comprehensive Guide to Optimizing Productivity and Quality” is Richmeier’s first book, and her second book is close to being finished. The second book focuses on how to be an effective supervisor in a medical office.

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