Prioritizing is what I have found most helpful. With prioritization comes focus and a road map to tasks. Additionally, you have to take care of yourself. With taking the high needs cases first, you must also prioritize your availability and what demands your time. You can’t allow something that is not pressing to take time from your attention to meaningful tasks. Lastly, be kind to yourself. I often say “Rome wasn’t built in a day.” There are tasks I may not get to and that’s ok. I can rest assured I ensured importance of items and time management.

In my experience, I review the case load and prioritize by urgent and imminent need. If I have completed certain tasks along the way during the initial assessment stages, a patient leaving to follow up with their outpatient therapist would need an appointment set up and maybe a ride home from the facility. Conversely, a patient that has been medically cleared but is meeting inpatient psychiatric admission criteria needs all documentation forwarded to the receiving facility and insurance pre-authorization approval before they can go. Work flow is important but pay attention to the details along the way. I try to focus on what can wait (or what will take) a little while versus what can't.