Unlocking Innovation: How Risk Management Empowers Alternative Therapies

Alternative therapies are just that – alternative. When operating in non-traditional spaces, there can be fear around innovation due to unknowns. New treatment options may elicit side effects, new openings may cause pushback from communities, and operating in a grey space of state and federal laws is a justifiable cause for nerves.

A risk management plan can help you meet that fear head-on. Creating an alternative therapies risk management plan requires the proactive identification of risks and identification of solutions for dealing with these risks.

The framework of a risk management plan provides structure within exploration. When you go scuba diving, you’re trained on how to handle malfunctions with the equipment. When you create a risk management plan for alternative therapies, you’re able to train your staff on potential problems and how to deal with them, so no one is caught off guard.

Risk management plans are ongoing, and tracking your perceived risks versus the ones that come to fruition helps you identify gaps in treatment protocols and improve them. Informed decision-making on the part of the patient and your staff requires knowledge and data, which a long-term risk management plan provides you.

You’re not invoking the worst by talking about it or creating a plan to do with it – in fact, you’re doing just the opposite. A risk management plan takes the unknown and makes it known and manageable.

When establishing new treatment methods and substances, there is, understandably, a healthy amount of public skepticism. How companies handle this skepticism in times when issues arise can make or break public perception (and a company’s future.) A lack of transparency around risk management practices can erode client trust in emerging alternative therapies.

While there is some truth that customers don’t want to be scared with potential issues or bored with protocol, clear communication from companies to customers is key for building trust.

Clients engaging in alternative therapies must make an informed decision – and this requires an understanding of potential risks, their likelihood, and how your staff would handle a problem. Transparency around how your team handles problems helps customers feel assured that they’re working with experienced, knowledgeable providers.

And people want to feel assured. Transparent communication about potential risks builds rapport between clients and practitioners, allowing clients to get all of their questions answered and feel confident in the ability of your team to help them. How a person feels internally about their decision to engage in alternative therapies can have a major impact on the effectiveness of these therapies, and confidence in a good decision goes a long way.

A good decision isn’t kept a secret, and since people still trust the recommendations of real people more than any advertisement, you want your customers to share their trust in you. Openly sharing your commitment to client safety and ethical practices is a selling point for your customers, telling their friend, mom, or cousin’s neighbor’s sister about their treatment. Early adopters of new therapies can help or hurt a company’s reputation, and being able to sing the praises about how safe they feel is a major selling point.

Creating and implementing an alternative therapies risk management plan doesn’t have to feel overwhelming. At AlphaRoot, we’ve had lots of experience with these plans, and have broken the creation process into five easy steps, which you can read more about in our guide to risk management plans.

The five steps of risk management are:

1. Identification – figure out what risks your business faces or will face. Nothing is too small to include here.
2. Analysis – assess each risk you’ve identified to determine the likelihood and the impact. Some risks will be more likely than others while others will have larger fallouts.
3. Evaluation – creating a plan for each risk based on your analysis.
4. Tracking – watching your business over time, noting which risks occur and which do not.
5. Treatment – updating your risk management based on your tracking.

It is in the evaluation phase that you will spend the most time creating a plan for dealing with risks. Here you’ll need to create migitation strategies to minimize fallout of likely issues. This includes creating communication protocols, establishing levels of clearance within the organization, assigning responsibilities, and creating an umbrella of insurance coverage.

While your clients don’t need to know the nitty-gritty details about your insurance coverage, it is essential to have to protect yourself, your employees, and your investment. Policies like general liability, worker’s comp, professional liability, and product liability ensure that even if something does go wrong, your bottom line is protected and people can get the help they need.

Insurance is just one part of a robust risk management plan, which is an essential pillar of success for alternative therapy companies.

Protecting your alternative therapy company can seem confusing; however, we’re a full-service insurance brokerage working with carriers worldwide to offer you the best coverage possible. We’re here to help! Please reach out to us today by email [email protected] or calling 646-854-1093 for a customized letter or learning more about your alternative therapy insurance options.