Let’s always keep in mind that patients come with some problems that they hope will be solved quickly and without any hassles. So, how does one keep the patients happy? While keeping a smiling face makes good sense, giving the patients a great experience is an art by itself. Here are a few valuable tips that can help you do just that.
Give them the right to have a better choice
Being transparent is probably the first step in giving healthcare to patients in distress. Allowing them to make the right choice, or rather giving them the right to do so is very important. The Centers of Medicaid & Medicaid Services’ (CMS) rating system gives the patients a fair choice by letting them decide which healthcare provider is best for them. Most of the leading healthcare experts concur that this rating system does justice to patients. What with patients being more internet savvy today, online rating systems are viewed and assessed by most of them. Earning a 5-star rating from CMS is almost an obsession with most hospitals.
Accountability is as important as caring and sharing
Communication becomes a lot smoother when patients’ Electronic Health Record (EHR) is shared. You can’t rule out the possibility of vital information being lost when medical charts and other info are shared verbally in person or over telephone. Accountability is more meaningful when EHR is adopted universally and ensures patients records are maintained and shared with 100% accuracy. Robert Green, author of Community Healthcare: Finding a Common Ground with New Expectations in Healthcare is all for accountability, which he found to be an all important thing while playing patient advocate for his mother-in-law who was down with Alzheimer’s.
You can’t ignore the telephone – not yet
Although more and more people are becoming tech savvy, one can’t ignore the fact that the ubiquitous telephone is still the preferred mode of communication. Especially with the latest advancements in mobile technology and the advent of the Smartphone there are over 1,000 mobile health apps that are in use. A popular survey conducted by Research Now says that health apps are giving the patients renewed hope and encouragement. More than 80% of the people surveyed felt that such medical devices will go a long way in enhancing patient knowledge about diseases, medical conditions and their treatment.
Should the patients end up having an experience?
The answer is an emphatic “no” according to Reid B Blackwelder, President of American Academy of Family Physicians (AAFP). Talking to American Medical News, Blackwelder said that patients should never end up having an “experience”. Patients always have problems, for which they seek solutions. Safety is paramount in the minds of patients who would rather have doctors explain their symptoms and methods of treatment, rather than have the doctors fill out symptom checklists in a detached manner. The best way to do away with so called “experiences” is by focusing on security when it comes to sending text messages, handling patient portals, emailing and mobile infrastructure.
A deluge of data is not a great idea
Tech savvy or not so tech savvy, no patient is happy with too much data that is rather difficult to comprehend. As such the healthcare industry abounds in such data, whereas the need of the hour is deft handling of influx of patients with appropriate responses. The healthcare industry probably already has more data than it can handle. There is a compelling need to be proactive and ensure all concerned organizations are well equipped to handle stringent data governance policies. The best solution would be to adopt a non-holistic approach as far as data collection is concerned so that patient recovery needs are understood better.
