Executive Summary
Las Vegas Eye Docs, a 15-location optometry group, partnered with Teem to support continued growth, manage rising staffing costs, and improve patient access across its organization.
What began as a targeted initiative to eliminate dual data entry quickly evolved into a fully integrated, multi-department hybrid workforce, combining in-house staff with Teem’s remote team members.
As a result, the organization achieved $400,000 in annual staffing savings, reduced staffing costs by 40–50%, and reclaimed over 120 hours per week across its teams. At the same time, patient wait times were reduced by 50%, enabling faster access to care and an improved patient experience.
The Organization
Las Vegas Eye Docs is a Nevada-based, 15-location optometry group with over 35 doctors, serving a high volume of patients across multiple service lines. As the organization expanded, so did the complexity of its operations, particularly across scheduling, billing, patient communication, and clinical documentation.
A key operational challenge was the use of two separate EHR systems, which required ongoing manual data transfer and coordination across teams.
The Challenge: Scaling Operations Without Increasing Costs
As Las Vegas Eye Docs continued to grow, its operational model began to show strain. Administrative workloads increased significantly, driven in large part by the need to perform dual data entry across two EHR systems. This created inefficiencies that consumed valuable staff time and limited the organization’s ability to scale effectively.
At the same time, in-house team members were increasingly spending time on repetitive administrative tasks rather than focusing on patient care and the in-office experience. This shift limited overall productivity and created added complexity across locations.
Patient access was also impacted. With limited call center capacity, average wait times reached approximately 2 minutes, creating bottlenecks in scheduling and affecting the overall patient experience.
Alongside these factors were rising labor costs and the challenge of scaling in-house teams quickly and efficiently, an issue faced by many growing healthcare organizations.
The Turning Point: Solving One Critical Bottleneck First
In 2024, Las Vegas Eye Docs partnered with Teem to address its most pressing operational issue: data entry across two EHR systems.
The initial implementation focused on a small, dedicated team of five virtual assistants, carefully sourced to align with the organization’s workflows, culture, and role-specific requirements, and tasked with eliminating dual entry and reducing administrative burden.
The impact was immediate. By offloading this high-volume, low-leverage work, the organization was able to streamline workflows, reduce strain on in-house staff, and begin operating more efficiently across locations.
The Solution: Scaling a Virtual Workforce Across the Organization
Following early success, Las Vegas Eye Docs expanded its partnership with Teem, evolving from a single use case into a comprehensive, multi-functional virtual workforce.
Within less than a year, the organization scaled from 5 to 33 virtual team members, embedding support across key operational areas including data management, patient communication, call center operations, billing, and clinical documentation.
This role-specific deployment allowed each function to be handled by dedicated, trained support, eliminating redundancy, and improving overall responsiveness. Rather than relying on generalized staff to manage multiple responsibilities, the organization created a more structured and efficient operating model.
Teem’s approach to custom hiring, role-based training, and ongoing performance alignment ensured that each team member integrated effortlessly into existing workflows, functioning as a true extension of the organization rather than an external resource.
“Partnering with Teem has reduced our staffing costs by approximately 40–50% while allowing us to reallocate 120 staff hours per week toward higher-value patient care. This has improved scheduling responsiveness, reduced wait times, and enhanced the overall patient experience across our organization.”
— Dr. Girisgen, Las Vegas Eye Docs
Results: Measurable Impact Across the Organization
The impact of this transformation was both immediate and sustained.
Las Vegas Eye Docs reduced staffing costs by 40–50% across the functions supported by Teem, resulting in approximately $400,000 in annual savings. These savings provided meaningful margin relief and allowed the organization to reinvest in areas that directly improved patient access, most notably by expanding its call center capacity.
Operationally, the organization reclaimed an estimated 120 hours per week across its teams by eliminating redundant workflows and redistributing administrative responsibilities. This created a more efficient and scalable operating model, enabling staff to focus on higher-value work.
Patient access improved significantly as well. Average wait times were reduced from approximately 2 minutes to 1 minute, a 50% improvement that enhanced the scheduling experience and reduced friction for patients seeking care.
At the clinical level, providers and in-office staff gained more time to focus on patient interactions, contributing to improved care quality, better workflow efficiency, and more positive patient feedback.
Strategic Impact: From Staffing Constraint to Scalable Infrastructure
This transformation fundamentally changed how the organization operates, shifting from a model dependent on continuously adding headcount to one built on scalable infrastructure that grows with demand.
By rethinking how work is distributed across the organization, Las Vegas Eye Docs was able to reduce its reliance on local hiring markets, improve staff utilization, and create a more resilient operational foundation.
What began as a tactical solution to an administrative bottleneck ultimately became a strategic lever for long-term growth and efficiency.
Conclusion: A Blueprint for Enterprise Optometry Growth
The experience of Las Vegas Eye Docs demonstrates that enterprise optometry groups do not need to choose between growth, profitability, and patient experience.
By starting with a focused operational challenge and scaling a workforce solution strategically, the organization built a model that supports all three, enabling sustainable growth without increasing internal burden.
For practices navigating similar challenges, this case offers a clear blueprint: operational efficiency is no longer limited by staffing, but by how effectively work is structured and supported.
