Healthcare Provider, Knowing Thine Patients Means Also Listening, Not Just Taking Notes

"It's better to be healthy and rich than sick and poor" is a common adage.

While the question – "do you want to be healthy rather than sick?" – is inane, many other questions are important to the care process and to the patient journey. This is why an open, two-way channel of communication is so important for healthcare providers.

While all healthcare providers have databases full of patient records, it’s the actual communications with the patient that’s important for many aspects of care and patient journey – from referrals to appointment scheduling, or from health management and patient engagement to emergency care pre-admission questionnaires, each phase of the care path has its own need for interaction with the patient.

Though most healthcare providers have in place some type of two-way communications with their customers, it’s the inclusion of the interaction itself as a proactive element in the patient journey that is the challenge.

A main component of Q-nomy's latest Q-Flow for Healthcare patient journey optimization product is Connect 2 – an interactive hub for any type of communication with the patient. By using Connect 2's flexible, omni-channel communication capabilities, healthcare providers can include patients’ answers as a proactive step in their journey. For example, completing an online form in a specific way can determine - and promote – the path the patient takes in their journey towards better health and receiving better service.

This is most important in pre-scheduling and pre-admission phases, in which the information given by the patient determines how the journey continues. Keeping the patient engaged and informed is also important, and easily achieved by sending SMS notices when certain back-office tasks such as blood tests are moving forward – the patient then knows what's going on and has one less cause for concern.

Letting patients have an open communication channel with their healthcare provider can also improve clinic performance by reducing no-shows through a more flexible appointment scheduling mechanism, and improve overall quality of service by letting patients speak their mind in online surveys at any relevant stage of their journey. 

Contact us to schedule a meeting with Q-nomy's patient-journey optimization experts during the 2017 HIMSS Conference & Exhibition, taking place in Orlando, Florida, Feb. 19–23, 2017.