The Strategic Asset of Provider Data

Provider data is not merely a collection of names and contact details; it is a strategic asset that underpins patient access, care coordination, and operational efficiency. Accurate provider data ensures that patients can easily find and book appointments with the right provider for their needs, thereby enhancing patient satisfaction and trust. Moreover, it supports healthcare organizations in optimizing their networks and improving care delivery.

Inaccurate provider data, on the other hand, can create a domino effect of inefficiencies. Patients may struggle to find appropriate care, leading to frustration and potential loss of trust in the healthcare system. Additionally, healthcare organizations may face operational challenges, such as increased manual data updates and IT support tickets, diverting valuable resources from strategic initiatives.

The Role of Master Data Management

While master data management (MDM) is important for overall data governance, provider data demands a specialized approach. MDM provides a framework for centralizing and organizing data across an organization, ensuring consistency and accuracy. However, provider data requires additional attention due to its complexity and the role it plays in healthcare delivery.

Integrating PDM with MDM unlocks powerful capabilities. It allows healthcare organizations to maintain a single source of truth, facilitating accurate provider directories, streamlined care coordination, and optimized network management. This integration also supports compliance with government programs, such as 340B, where accurate provider information is essential for maximizing reimbursements.

Challenges in Provider Data Management

Managing provider data is not without its challenges. Organizations often pull information from multiple data sources, creating complexity in maintaining up-to-date and accurate data across channels. This complexity is compounded by the need to ensure data is consumer-friendly, enabling patients to make informed decisions about their care.

Moreover, the “build vs. buy” decision is a common dilemma for CIOs and IT teams. While some organizations attempt to build their own provider data management system, they often underestimate the complexity and resource requirements involved. Outsourcing PDM to specialized vendors can be a more effective strategy, allowing internal teams to focus on enhancing patient experiences.

The Benefits of Provider Data Accuracy

At its core, clean provider data supports better patient-provider matching, ensuring patients receive appropriate care from a provider who best meets not only their clinical needs, but personal preferences as well. When data accuracy is poor it can lead to poor matches and unsatisfied patients. 

Accurate provider data also enhances operational efficiencies and reduces administrative overhead. By reducing the need for manual data updates, healthcare organizations can reallocate staff to higher-value tasks, such as strategic growth initiatives. 

Engaging Providers in Data Accuracy

Accurate provider data is important as you work to attract patients across channels (internally, on your website, and across the web), which is vital as our research shows that over 50% of consumers access three or more online resources when gathering information about their care options. 

Providers play a crucial role in ensuring the accuracy of their data. However, healthcare organizations must recognize the demands on providers and partner them with administrative leadership to prioritize and manage data elements effectively.

Collaborative partnerships, such as those offered by Kyruus Health, combine external expertise with your own resources to optimize provider data. This approach empowers providers, streamlines processes, and ultimately drives organizational success.

Accurate Provider Data Drives Value

In conclusion, accurate provider data is a strategic asset that drives significant value for healthcare organizations. By integrating provider data management with master data management, organizations can unlock powerful capabilities that enhance patient experiences and operational efficiencies. While challenges exist, investing in a purpose-built provider data management solution and engaging providers in data accuracy efforts are key to overcoming these hurdles.

As healthcare continues to evolve, the importance of clean and centralized provider data will only grow. Organizations that recognize this and take proactive steps to m

anage their provider data effectively will be well-positioned to thrive in the competitive healthcare landscape. Interested in learning more? Schedule time with a member of our team.

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Ensuring accurate provider data and appointment availability across various channels, including health plan sites and search engines, can improve provider’s broader digital presence and facilitate direct scheduling from these platforms. 

Understanding the Impact of Patient Preferences on New Patient Acquisition

A majority of today’s patients prefer researching online to select healthcare providers. Recent research has found that not only do 70% of patients rely on the internet when searching for care, but over 50% actually access three or more different online resources before they make a selection. 

Patients trust the internet almost as much as personal recommendations from friends or family members. When selecting healthcare options, key factors such as cost, quality, and convenience play a crucial role in their decision-making process. The ease of accessing comprehensive and transparent information online allows patients to compare services, read reviews, and evaluate the credentials of healthcare providers. Organizations must understand that if they are looking to effectively capture new patients, they must prioritize their digital presence.

Step 1: Centralize and Optimize Provider and Location Data to Ensure Accuracy

Provider data is stored across various platforms within a health system or hospital, including spreadsheets, credentialing systems, and electronic health records (EHRs), among others. Managing this data can be quite burdensome and time-intensive, particularly due to the need for regular updates and the involvement of numerous users. 

Centralizing provider data is essential for maintaining its accuracy and consistency not only across multiple access points within the organization, but also across digital platforms, which is vital for guiding patients to the right care. 

To optimize provider data and help consumers find a care provider that is best suited for their needs, it’s essential to curate comprehensive profiles that include key attributes such as accepted insurance, clinical expertise, and appointment availability—all crucial factors for patients making decisions.

Enhancing these profiles with additional details like personalized professional statements, introductory videos, and inclusivity indicators can further assist patients in assessing the patient-provider match. By ensuring this information is up-to-date, easily searchable, and tailored to patients’ priorities, organizations can significantly improve the care matching process.

Such centralization and optimization not only enhances online visibility and improves patient access but also streamlines the patient self-scheduling process. Ultimately, by centralizing provider and location data, healthcare organizations can provide reliable information to patients, thereby improving new patient acquisition and overall engagement.

Step 2: Automate Provider Data Updates Across Digital Platforms

Many organizations have up-to-date information about their providers on their own website, but struggle to manage their digital listings across the web. Consumers are often searching for care on their health plan website or a search engine, and managing information on these sites tends to be an extremely time consuming and manual process. 

By centralizing and optimizing provider and location data, healthcare organizations are empowered to manage listings more seamlessly and push updates live automatically across all digital platforms that are connected to their provider data management system. This reduces manual errors and inconsistencies, ensuring that the information remains accurate and up-to-date while reducing administrative burdens on your team.

The other benefit is that new patient acquisition and engagement also improve. A recent study found that 30% of consumers reported skipping or delaying care in the last year as a direct result of encountering inaccurate provider information. Ensuring that this information is accurate may help to prevent care gaps in the future.

Leverage Online Reviews and Social Media to Attract New Patients

In addition to having accurate information on your providers, organizations should encourage patients to leave positive reviews. These reviews help to attract new patients and build loyalty. Consider implementing systems to request feedback through online surveys or emails and respond to reviews whenever possible to show engagement and care.

Social media is another useful platform for engaging with patients, especially among younger consumers. Recent research has shown that over 25% of younger consumers utilize social media when searching for care. Organizations should consider using it to raise awareness and engage with potential patients. It’s a valuable tool for expanding your reach and improving new patient acquisition.

Step 3: Implement Patient Online Scheduling 

Earlier, we discussed the importance of consumer preferences on care selection. Some factors, such as the availability of patient online scheduling, are so important to patients that they will go as far as to seek care with someone else for access to this option. 

Patient online scheduling allows for a seamless connection with real-time availability that is directly integrated with a healthcare organization’s electronic health record (EHR). This convenience can promote greater patient engagement, increasing the likelihood of a scheduled appointment and thus improving new patient acquisition rates. 

Many organizations have patient self scheduling on their website, but fail to offer this capability in other channels that consumers frequent most often. With health plan websites being the first place that most consumers go when searching for care, it is a natural extension for organizations to offer patient self scheduling on these sites. 

Reach Farther, Grow Faster

Acquiring new patients requires a strategic approach. By prioritizing accurate provider data, ensuring an optimal digital presence across platforms, and embracing patient online scheduling, healthcare providers can effectively boost new patient acquisition. 

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Introduction to Patient Access Challenges

The 2024 Care Access Benchmark Report for Healthcare Organizations delves deep into key areas that healthcare organizations are focused on, including:

• Boosting new patient acquisition and engagement
• Getting people connected to the right care 
• Driving operational efficiency 

The research also highlights the need for improved patient access. The report discusses how important it is to provide consumers the digital experiences that they desire, however, it also stresses the importance of making sure those digital experiences are powered by accurate, enriched data. Doing so will ensure that patients are matched with the best care for both their clinical needs and personal preferences. It’s important to note that doing this will not only boost patient satisfaction, it can also greatly improve operational efficiency. 

Centralized Data to Power Multi-Channel Patient Access

With 52% of consumers consulting three or more online resources when searching for care, centralizing and maintaining accurate provider, service, and location data is crucial. Organizations can use this centralized data to not only power their owned digital experiences, but they can also push that data out to other third-party sites that consumers frequent most, such as health plan websites or Google. This approach not only aids in attracting new patients but also ensures that existing patients have a seamless experience when seeking care, regardless of where they begin their search.

Preventing Care Gaps Through Digital Patient Engagement

The report shows that 63% of people who skipped or delayed care in the last year could not find an appointment that was at either a convenient day, time, or location for them. 48% of those that skipped care even indicated that they would change providers for access to patient online scheduling. These figures highlight the need for healthcare organizations to expand patient access to self scheduling capabilities, whether that means launching it for the first time or adding additional appointment types or specialties, ultimately making it easier for patients to find and book care on their own time.

Expanding the Digital Patient Journey and Promoting Operational Efficiency

Consumers have spoken: they want the ability to perform as many tasks digitally ahead of their appointment as possible. The days of needing to fill out a mountain of paperwork on a clipboard while sitting in the waiting room are over. Allowing these pre-visit tasks to be completed online will not only meet preference for enhanced patient access, but it will greatly improve operational efficiency by allowing your front-office staff members to focus on other, higher-value work.

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The healthcare industry is undergoing a digital transformation. Patients increasingly expect the level of convenience and ease of access they experience in other aspects of their lives. To meet these expectations, hospitals need to provide digital self-service options. EHR-integrated provider search and patient self-scheduling are options that allow patients to find and manage care on their own terms.

This article explores how MEDITECH hospitals can implement digital self-service solutions that improve patient access. The discussion also covers the importance of meeting consumer expectations with digital solutions, the benefits of reducing administrative burden through automation, and the impact of consistent, accurate provider information on the overall patient experience. Finally, the article provides a crawl, walk, run framework that MEDITECH hospitals can use when implementing digital self-service.

Consumer Demand for Enhanced Patient Access

In today’s rapidly evolving healthcare landscape, patients expect the same digital conveniences they experience in other aspects of their lives. Scheduling a car service, booking a flight, or even ordering groceries can be done with a touch of a finger. Patients want to be able to find information about a provider or care option and schedule appointments anytime, from anywhere. 

A recent survey shows that over 70% of consumers consult the internet when searching for care. Furthermore, almost 40% prefer patient online scheduling over other channels. This growing demand for digital self-service is reshaping the way healthcare organizations run. Hospitals that fail to adapt will struggle to remain competitive and risk losing their independence. 

Kyruus Health, a leading provider of patient access solutions, understands the unique needs of MEDITECH hospitals and has Expanse-integrated digital tools that help attract new patients and easily manage workflows. With just a few clicks, patients can now access the right care without having to call the doctor’s office or wait on hold. More than improving only the patient experience, this also reduces administrative burden. Front office staff members, allowing them to focus on other, higher-value work.

Patient Self-Scheduling Can Generate Operational Efficiencies & Increase Patient Satisfaction for MEDITECH Hospitals

The healthcare industry has been slow to adopt digital self-service in comparison to other industries, but there are signs that this is changing. Consumers increasingly expect to be able to manage their healthcare online. Hospitals and clinics that fail to meet these expectations risk losing patients to competitors that do. 

The benefits of digital self-service for healthcare organizations are numerous. These tools can help to improve patient satisfaction, reduce administrative burden, and streamline operations. Reducing administrative burden is one of the most important benefits of digital self-service. By automating tasks such as scheduling appointments, hospitals and clinics can free up their staff to focus on other activities. More attention on higher-value work leads to shorter wait times, better quality of care, and reduced costs. 

Digital self-service can also lead to improved patient satisfaction. When patients are able to access their medical records, schedule appointments, and perform other tasks online, they feel more in control of their care. This can lead to increased trust in their providers and greater loyalty to an organization.

Improved Provider Search and Patient-Provider Matching

Easy navigation and accurate information are essential for an effective provider directory solution. Patients should be able to effortlessly search for providers, locations, and services based on specialty, insurance, and availability. An intuitive interface and user-friendly design contribute to a positive patient experience and ensure patients can easily look for and find the right information.

Source: Kyruus Health, Care Access Benchmark Report for Provider Organizations, 2023.

Regularly updated information on provider availability, qualifications, and specialties is crucial. Patients can make well-informed decisions about their healthcare when provided with accurate information, leading to better patient-provider matching. This not only enhances patient satisfaction as they are matched with the best care for their needs, but it also builds trust with providers as they are seeing the right types of patients come through their door.

24/7 MEDITECH Expanse-Integrated Patient Self-Scheduling

Healthcare’s digital transformation demands an elevated patient experience, encompassing ease of access, prompt response times, and convenience. Integrating patient self-scheduling with MEDITECH Expanse is a vital step in achieving this goal. It enables patients to schedule appointments at any hour of the day that is convenient for them. 

While patient self-scheduling is not a new concept, there are many organizations who have yet to adopt the capabilities. Furthermore, those that have, do not necessarily have an intuitive user-experience. A whopping 40% of consumers noted in a recent survey that they did not schedule their last appointment online. They could not do so because they didn’t have the option available to them. On the other hand, 26% said it was because the experience offered was difficult to use. It’s not enough to offer patient online scheduling, it must be offered in a way that is simple to navigate.

Source: Kyruus Health, Care Access Benchmark Report for Provider Organizations, 2023.

Patient self-scheduling should not solely be limited to an appointment with a doctor, either. Patients are increasingly looking for the ease of scheduling a variety of different appointment types online such as mammograms, lab tests, urgent care, and other service-based appointments. Providing an option for patients to self-schedule with advanced practice providers (APPs) for lower acuity cases can allow patients to be seen sooner—increasing patient satisfaction and helping MEDITECH organizations with capacity utilization by enabling clinicians to practice at the top of their license.

A Phased Approach to Integrated Search & Patient Self-Scheduling

Hospitals seeking to adopt digital self-service don’t have to do it all at once. Organizations may find it helpful to adopt a “crawl, walk, run” strategy. This approach breaks down digital implementation into manageable phases, ensuring a smooth transition for both the organization and its patients. 

The “crawl” phase involves laying the foundation for digital transformation by establishing essential capabilities. These initial steps familiarize patients, providers, and staff with digital tools while laying the groundwork for more complex functionalities. 

The “walk” phase focuses on expanding the range of digital services offered. As patients, providers, and staff gain comfort and familiarity with accessing care digitally, hospitals can extend their reach and accommodate more patient preferences, thus resulting in increased patient satisfaction and retention. 

Finally, the “run” phase entails continuously enhancing the digital experience to remain competitive and meet the ever-evolving needs of patients.

For more details on the crawl, walk, run, strategy, see the Guide to Digital Self-Service for MEDITECH Hospitals.

Overall, the “crawl, walk, run” strategy provides MEDITECH hospitals with a structured and realistic approach to digital transformation. By prioritizing a user-friendly provider directory solution, integrating patient self-scheduling, and adopting a phased implementation approach, MEDITECH hospitals can enhance patient engagement, streamline operations, and achieve greater competitiveness in the rapidly evolving healthcare landscape. Embracing digital self-service is no longer an option but a necessity for healthcare organizations committed to delivering exceptional patient experience and staying ahead of the curve in the digital age.

Attending the MUSE Inspire Conference in Colorado? Stop by booth 115 to learn how Kyruus Health can help you attract new patients and reduce staff burden. 

SCHEDULE A MEETING

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Healthcare marketers from around the country recently gathered in Las Vegas at the Healthcare Marketing and Physicians Strategy Summit. The week of insightful presentations covered a myriad of topics including AI, web design, patient acquisition, and everything in between. One of the very first sessions on Thursday was centered on a topic that continued to bubble up in several other presentations. Throughout the duration of the event: cross-functional collaboration, key themes from the sessions included:

• How a partnership between Marketing and IT can spark a re-examination of patient experience strategies centered around an EHR
• What makes provider data management an important component of an organization’s digital strategy 
• Why patient online scheduling requires a multi-faceted approach that includes more than just the patient portal

Marketing-IT Collaboration Spurs Re-Examination of EHR Centric Patient Experience Strategy

The session: The MarCom & IT Partnership featured leaders from Penn Medicine, Mass General Brigham, and MultiCare Health System. Their discussion circled the importance of the relationship between Marketing and IT and how it’s integral to positive patient experience. While oftentimes IT is at the forefront of technology purchasing decisions, Marketing generally has the deepest expertise around patient experience. This can cause a disconnect between strategic decisions for digital solutions that make sense from a financial perspective, but may not be optimal for consumers interacting with said solutions. 

This can be especially prevalent when it comes to building experiences “in house” or utilizing functionality offered by an existing EMR—versus partnering with a vendor with deeper expertise, or a more consumer-friendly experience. The overall sentiment of the session was encouraging Marketers to get a seat at the table with IT. When these teams work closely and build a meaningful partnership, decisions can be made with both perspectives in mind. 

Several other sessions echoed this sentiment about working cross-functionally, including two focused on provider data management and online patient scheduling.

Investment in Provider Data Management is Critical to Power Digital Patient Experiences

Jeff Stewart, VP of Strategic Marketing at CHRISTUS Health led a valuable session, Simplifying Complexity: A User-Centric Approach to Drive Innovation for Your Provider Directory.  This session centered on Jeff’s experience with the importance of provider data management powering a successful provider search experience. He opened by telling the story of how CHRISTUS initially tried to build their own provider data management solution. The home-grown provider directory was intended to power a new and improved website, the launch of which fell below expectations. When CHRISTUS launched its new website and provider directory, they were immediately flooded with messages from frustrated clinicians noting discrepancies within their online profiles. Clearly provider data accuracy was still an issue that they needed to solve. Their conclusion was that they could not do this on their own. CHRISTUS Health would need to look for a partner to help get it done.

CHRISTUS Health intended to use the voice of the consumer as their guide while embarking on a thorough digital transformation. Jeff underscored that a project like this does not lay solely on Marketing’s shoulders. It requires ongoing input and collaboration from stakeholders across the organization—executive leadership, clinical team members, and of course, IT. CHRISTUS ultimately chose to partner with Kyruus Health to streamline provider data management, adding a key component of their tech stack along with Epic, MERGE, and a few other vendors.

Online Patient Scheduling Improves Access and Operational Efficiency for Organizations of All Sizes

While we would like to think that online patient scheduling may be table stakes for most organizations at this point, research tells us a different story. In a recent consumer survey, when asked why they did not schedule their last or most recent appointment online, 40% responded that they did not have the option to do so. This highlights a large gap in functionality that many organizations need to address to meet patient preferences for digital self-service. Consumers are looking for convenient options. When they can’t find what they’re looking for on your website, they may turn elsewhere for care.

Leaders from Cedars Sinai and Austin Regional Clinic teamed up to share each of their strategies for patient online scheduling. Their presentation, Online Scheduling Secrets: Simplify Access, Enhance Engagement, Reduce Workload, interestingly told stories that were largely the same. Incredibly, despite the fact that they are so different in size and complexity, their methods are quite similar. 

While both organizations do have a patient portal that they aim to direct patients towards, they understand that there are still, and always will be, a cohort of patients who will not log in to the portal. This highlights the need for organizations to also offer an unauthenticated scheduling experience. This experience will capture both new patients, and those existing patients who struggle to remember a username and password. 

The other strong similarity between these stories was the cross-functional nature of the program. A project like this cannot sit solely with IT, or Marketing. Instead, it should reach all areas of the organization, especially the clinicians. Bringing clinicians into the process early allows leaders to build trust that providers will see the right types of patients. Notably, they will not lose control of their schedules if opened to patient self-scheduling, as research shows that this is one of their top concerns. Both organizations started with smaller subsets of providers when they launched, and scaled after they were able to showcase success.

Collaborate Early and Often for an Optimal Patient Experience

If there were one key takeaway from HMPS ‘24, it would be to make sure that teams are collaborating cross- functionally early, and often, for maximum success. It is not enough to be brought in, or pull others in, once a decision has already been made. Let patient experience be the guiding force for decisions and make sure to navigate these projects jointly.

Looking for tips on how to launch & scale patient online scheduling at your organization? Join us for our upcoming webinar sponsored by HMPS on May 16th at 12:30pm ET.

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1. Improving the consumer experience can also improve operational efficiency 

As organizations consider embarking on a provider data management strategy, they often struggle with  the internal debate around the same question, “why do we need to make this investment?” Amber Welch explained to us the key reasons that Ochsner settled on, which fell into two main buckets: improving the consumer experience, and gaining operational efficiencies.

Amber Welch: Creating a single source of truth for our data allowed us to create a better provider search and match experience for patients ensuring that they can find the right provider at the right time, with accurate information whether that be on the internet or on our website.

Another key reason for our investment in a provider data management strategy was to gain operational efficiencies. Streamlining efforts allowed us to reduce the amount of manual labor involved in keeping the information up to date.

Customer Impact:  What was once a labor-intensive process taking up the bulk of an FTE’s workload at Ochsner has now been dramatically reduced by about 80%.

At Silver Cross, a solid provider data foundation was key to building a robust consumer experience and a scalable online scheduling program. For them, having access to a robust clinical taxonomy that is layered on to their provider profiles was key.

Teresa Andrea: You have to put your consumer hat on and think like a consumer. It’s really easy to use terms and verbiage that make sense from a clinical perspective, but ensuring that you have that consumer perspective when it comes to how they will think when searching for a cardiologist or asthma is important.

2. Bringing key stakeholders to the table may not be easy, but it is necessary

Getting stakeholders aligned is key to moving forward with any enterprise-wide initiative, and provider data management is no different. So how can organizations highlight the numerous benefits for various stakeholders to gain real buy-in?

Teresa Andrea: Having a multidisciplinary approach is key. All of the different stakeholders are typically doing their own thing, once you bring them together and understand the “what’s in it for me?” for each department or stakeholder group it will be easier to center around the problem that you are aiming to solve and work together towards the solution.

Amber Welch: Bringing the stakeholders to the table and getting everyone aligned is probably the biggest challenge. It is important, especially from a marketing perspective, to do your best to show the rest of the organization the effect that inaccurate data has on a consumer. The loss of trust with your organization that can occur when a patient searches for something on your website and is pointed in the wrong direction is huge.

3. Understand your internal resources before choosing whether to build or buy 

Many organizations understand the importance of having a provider data management strategy in place, but they feel they can build it themselves. Ochsner tried this multiple times, with Amber sharing that the main question organizations need to consider when doing this is: Are the appropriate resources available to build and maintain this in house?

Amber Welch: There have been about three different iterations over the past ten years where our stakeholder groups have come together at Ochsner to try and build this in-house and to be transparent, it didn’t really work. We didn’t really have anyone truly owning the project and moving it forward so it was hard to get everyone bought in and invested to put time and resources into it. So after three tries we made the decision to get the money together to invest in this and bring in an expert to do the heavy lifting for us.

The message here is clear: the right investment in a provider data management strategy can positively impact the entire healthcare organization across patients, providers, and staff alike.

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Healthcare organizations need to strive to build a holistic Find Care experience that offers consumers the ability to find a variety of care types and options—the PCP who speaks Portuguese, the location that’s down the block from their subway stop, the virtual care option that fits around their work schedule—whatever care is the right fit for them.

Building an Effective Find Care Experience to Benefit Consumers, Providers, and Healthcare Organizations

Creating a Find Care experience is a four-step process that allows healthcare organizations to take control of their online patient acquisition strategy, build loyalty, and deliver on the convenience and flexibility that consumers demand—but there are also important benefits for both providers and consumers along the way:

• ENGAGE: Meeting Consumers Where They Are
  Making providers searchable across your digital properties and third-party channels makes it easy for consumers to find them when searching online for care. This also enables providers to convert demand from multiple channels—a job that is difficult to do on their own.
• SEARCH: Provide a Simple, Powerful Search Experience
  Creating a search experience that integrates clinical keyword search and natural language processing capabilities and that surfaces care options (i.e., providers, locations, and services) helps consumers easily discover their options and determine which best meets their unique needs. Organizations who help providers take steps to be more searchable enable these providers to surface in appropriate searches so they can be included in consumers’ discovery process.
• MATCH: Surface Information that Consumers Value Most
  Building rich, differentiating provider profiles ensures more precise patient-provider matching and connects consumers to providers that meet their clinical needs and personal preferences. Better matching also helps providers avoid scheduling patients who are not clinically appropriate for their practice, and ideally allows them to practice at the top of their license.
• BOOK: Create a One-Stop-Shop for Digital Self-Service
  Integrating self-service booking options, simplified scheduling workflows, and digital check-in enables healthcare organizations to convert online demand across a range of care types. This satisfies consumer expectations for a modern, seamless experience and aligns to the top tactics providers say can alleviate workforce shortages.

Getting Started

Healthcare organizations are instrumental to ensuring patients are matched with the most appropriate provider or service for their care. The Find Care experience provides a framework that can help ensure that this happens—all while allowing providers to practice at the top of their license and improving capacity utilization through appropriate appointment distribution. The bottom line? When done right, the Find Care experience is a win-win-win for everybody.

LEARN MORE ABOUT CREATING YOUR FIND CARE EXPERIENCE

Download Your Find Care Experience: Four Key Steps to Converting the Digitally-Empowered Healthcare Consumer to gain new insights into consumer preferences and actionable strategies for creating a holistic Find Care experience—including a self-assessment checklist.

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It’s not only about putting on a smiling face during patient interactions. Long wait times, an unclean waiting room, a feeling of being rushed with the clinician, and a seemingly inefficient front-office staff all have the potential to ruin a patient’s experience with your practice. 

As the (AHRQ) notes, patient experience includes several aspects of healthcare delivery that patients value highly when they seek and receive care, such as getting timely appointments, easy access to information, and good communication with providers. It’s a crucial factor in the success of your practice and is a key part of providing high-quality healthcare. 

The Consequences of a Poor Patient Experience 

A negative patient experience occurs more often than you might think. Research from Accenture revealed that only about 33% of patients said they had a positive experience with their physician. Roughly 22% of the respondents who had a negative experience reported that an inefficient visit is what led to it. 

With the rise of healthcare consumerism, patients are increasingly demanding a higher level of service from their providers. When that doesn’t happen, there often are consequences, one of which is delayed or missed care. 

Some patients will quit making appointments with their provider after a bad experience, especially if they had to wait a long period of time to get in for an appointment or they encountered a long wait time in the waiting room prior to their scheduled appointment. They may cancel scheduled appointments — or just not show up for them at all — forgoing preventive screenings and procedures. The result is poorer health outcomes and open spots in a physician’s calendar when a patient no-shows. 

A Low Retention Rate 

Low patient retention is another ramification of a poor experience. One survey found that almost 40% of patients left a healthcare provider in the previous two years. Most patients won’t inform you that they’re not returning to your practice — they simply just won’t show up again. 

Not retaining patients means your medical group has to acquire new ones to sustain your bottom line. Not only are new patient visits typically less profitable, but attracting new patients costs an average of five-to-eight times more than keeping an existing one. Conversely, by increasing patient retention by just five percent, a practice has the capability to increase the value of an average patient in lifetime profits by 25-100%. 

A Damaged Reputation 

Does your medical group boast a favorable reputation in the communities you serve? Patients with negative experiences will change that in a hurry, either through word-of-mouth or bad online reviews. 

With more than 90% of individuals sharing their bad experiences through word-of-mouth, news of a poor experience can spread quickly through a community. In addition to that, nearly 45% of people share negative reviews on social media, this being even more problematic, with more than 80% of Americans reading online ratings or reviews before booking an appointment with a healthcare provider. 

A Hit to Your Bottom Line 

The biggest visible impact of negative patient experiences lies in your bottom line. In addition to the lost revenue from patients you failed to retain, you now have to spend time, money, and other resources to acquire new patients.

A negative patient experience is strongly associated with decreased profitability. When you lose a patient, you’re also missing out on potential revenue from their family and friends. You might not even hear from these patients — for every customer who complains directly to you, there are many more who remain silent. 

Read more: How to Improve the Customer Experience in Healthcare 

The Perks of a Positive Patient Experience 

Now to the good news: promoting a positive patient experience can benefit your practice in numerous ways. Evidence demonstrates that a good patient experience is associated with higher levels of adherence to recommended prevention and treatment plans, better clinical effectiveness and outcomes, increased patient safety, and lower healthcare utilization. 

That reputation problem? Approximately 45% of individuals who report having a positive patient experience said they would tell someone about it. That means higher conversion rates, increased profitability, and better online reviews and ratings. A positive patient experience even translates to lower staff turnover. 

The Digital Difference 

The first step in rectifying a negative patient experience — especially if it’s a common occurrence – is addressing the problem instead of avoiding it. Accept responsibility for the issue(s) causing the problems, and address them internally. Each patient is different, so no one approach will work for everyone. 

Also, realize that poor patient experiences probably indicate some procedures or processes in your medical group that need to change. You can’t please every patient, but not attending to some squeaky wheels may result in the entire vehicle falling apart. 

A growing number of patients equate a good digital experience to a positive provider encounter. In fact, 41% of patients say they’d switch providers over a poor digital experience. 

Consider utilizing digital health tools that improve access to care by automating administrative tasks and streamlining patient outreach and communication. The best solutions are those that enhance the patient experience through smoother and quicker interactions while minimizing touches with staff. 

Offering online scheduling is a key part of delivering a positive patient experience. When healthcare providers give patients the option to self-schedule their appointments, they’re more likely to differentiate themselves from competitors. The result is better patient attrition and retention and higher revenue.  

Patient intake technology also aids in promoting a favorable patient experience. Along with reducing wait times, digital check-in satisfies patients’ desire for convenience and efficiency, eliminates the delay associated with manual data entry, and provides you with all the information you need to timely and accurately submit claims and receive reimbursement for services rendered. 

See how our patient engagement platform can help your medical group ensure a positive experience for your patients. Also, check out our blog on Putting Patient Feedback to Work for Your Practice.

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“We’ve got so much work to do, we can’t do it alone, we can only do it together.”
 Reetika Kumar, MD, Independence Blue Cross (IBX)

The Importance of Payer-Provider Collaboration

Payer-provider collaboration can happen in a variety of ways but one thing is clear: we can’t do without it. When we think about putting the patient first and focusing on their overall experience, it is clear that this type of collaboration has to happen. 

At the end of the day a member and a patient are the same person. And on that thread, Jeff spoke about the need to extend the work CHRISTUS Health System has done with their digital experience over to the health plan side of the business, so that when a consumer interacts with CHRISTUS Health system it is no different from the experience they have with CHRISTUS Health Plan. This cohesive experience is a benefit of payer-provider collaboration that is not limited to IDNs, however. Patients and members are looking for consistent, accurate, up-to-date information about their providers regardless of where they seek information. 

Dr. Kumar shared a particularly impactful sentiment, noting that if a health plan can realize that the TRUE healthcare relationship is between a provider and a patient, then plans can accept that their role is “to enable both parties to have a successful, seamless experience with good outcomes.” 

The Role of Accurate Data in Patient Experience

The experience that a health plan member has when searching for and booking care can set the expectations they have for what their in-person care experience will be. Both panelists spoke about the need for accurate, robust information to be displayed about providers in both system and plan directories to ensure a positive experience. 

Jeff explained that, at CHRISTUS, they realized that demographic information as basic as gender was inconsistent across their provider network. Knowing that these inconsistencies existed in their data raised some concerns around how they could expect consumers to trust them. To rectify and sort through the complex data and inconsistencies, they engaged Kyruus and Healthsparq to help. As CHRISTUS thinks through what success in this area looks like, Jeff says it’s simple: “if you are able to find a doctor and make an appointment, we are assuming that was a reflection of accurate data and that you have been able to find what you’re looking for.” 

From a clinical perspective, Dr. Kumar explained that not only do consumers want peace of mind that they are choosing a provider that is the correct match for them clinically, but they also need to trust that the provider can care for them appropriately. This points to emerging data needs that are critical to patient/member experience. Questions like: Does the physician look like me? And, do they understand me as an individual? are important considerations. She explained how race and ethnicity information can oftentimes be more difficult to capture in health plan directories as providers don’t always send it to their health plan partners. This presents an important challenge to address when working through areas of collaboration between payers and providers: identifying what data needs to be shared to go beyond checking the box and into delivering the best member experience.

The Goal: OpenTable for Healthcare

As Jeff looks to the future he is hoping that we can get to a place where healthcare can think of the consumer, member, and patient experience all more cohesively. Part of this is breaking down internal barriers to do so.

“We often hear about how behind healthcare is in terms of consumerism. Why can’t provider and payer organizations offer an amazon-like or OpenTable-like experience when seemingly every other industry has figured it out, and the consumer demand is solid?” 

The post Improving the Member Experience through Payer-Provider Collaboration: Reflecting on the Becker’s Payer Issues Roundtable appeared first on Kyruus Health.

For those organizations that are ready to begin their journey to launch online scheduling, be sure to take into consideration these 5 key steps:

1. ESTABLISH A SINGLE SOURCE OF TRUTH FOR PROVIDER, SERVICE, AND LOCATION DATA

To help ensure that patients are booking appointments with the appropriate providers for their clinical needs you will need to first build out a single source of truth for your data that not only houses accurate, up to date information, but also includes elements that matter most to consumers when selecting care—such as clinical expertise, appointment availability, and insurances accepted.

Real-World Spotlight: Geisinger Health System understood the importance of getting their provider data in place before they could reap the benefits of online scheduling. After establishing a single source of truth and ongoing validation processes, they saw a 30% increase in their provider data accuracy.

2. ENGAGE CROSS-FUNCTIONAL STAKEHOLDERS ACROSS YOUR ORGANIZATION

Online scheduling touches many departments and stakeholders within an organization. Don’t wait until after you launch to gather feedback and opinions from these groups, involve them from the start. Doing so will set your project up for success by opening clear paths of communication and ensuring that everyone is working towards the same goals.

Real-World Spotlight: In order to meet their goal of enhancing the digital patient experience, Inspira Health aligned a cross functional team consisting of leaders from marketing, IT, clinical, and administration. Establishing this partnership early-on enabled them to successfully collaborate in order to meet and exceed their goals.

3. CREATE A STANDARDIZED, REPEATABLE LAUNCH PLAN

Set your organization up for success by taking a phased approach. Prepare to launch with a smaller subset of your providers to ensure a smooth roll-out and to analyze how things are going and gather learnings along the way. Once this is done, document what worked well and use that as your guide as you continue to expand your offerings.

Real-World Spotlight: Banner Health chose to launch online scheduling as part of a phased rollout—scaling within six months to eventually offer online scheduling for more than 300 primary care physicians resulting in over 4,000 online bookings. These results allowed them to make a case for further expansion within primary care as well as amongst specialists.

4. BROADEN BOOKING OPTIONS ACROSS SPECIALTIES, APPOINTMENT TYPES, AND SERVICES

After you’ve seen success with your initial launch of online scheduling, broaden your offerings to include additional specialties and services. Being able to showcase your success with certain providers will not only help to get others on board, but it will also serve as a great business case when trying to get funds allocated to the project if you have plans to further expand.

Real-World Spotlight: Northeast Georgia Health System went live with online appointment scheduling, initially for primary care, and later expanded to include both cardiology and preventive gynecology. In less than a year, they have been able to demonstrate ROI, which has in turn allowed them to develop plans to further expand their online scheduling to additional specialties as well as mammograms.

5. OPTIMIZE AND EXPAND UPON SELF-SERVICE CAPABILITIES

Recent research has shown that consumers now access a variety of sources when looking for care online. To ensure that you’re reaching the most consumers possible, consider extending your reach to a mobile app or other third party sites that are most frequented.

Real-World Spotlight: Legacy SCL Health (now Intermountain) is leveraging the ProviderMatch API to power provider search, match, and scheduling in their mobile app as well as a virtual assistant on the main Legacy SCL Health website, allowing them to extend the consumer friendly experience to additional channels.

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