In response to value-based purchasing, the move toward accountable care organizations and other emerging industry trends focused on maximizing reimbursement, healthcare organizations are placing more and more focus on improving the patient experience. For hospitals and health systems, this renewed emphasis on the patient and their perception of care means that seamless communication, both inside and outside of an organization's walls, is increasingly critical.
Bridget Duffy, MD, chief medical officer for Vocera, Helen Gregg, senior editor for Becker's Hospital Review, and Gautam M. Shah, vice president of product management for Vocera, presented on leveraging communication technology to humanize the healthcare experience in an Oct. 21 webinar presented by Becker's Healthcare.
"Good communication is increasingly critical for the value of care and for improving the patient experience. Significantly improving communication for patients, doctors and nurses can improve the patient experience," said Ms. Gregg.
"At what cost is technology making healthcare less human?" asked Dr. Duffy, whose career has included leading the patient experience movement and establishing the role of chief experience officer at the Cleveland Clinic. "We need to humanize care: to find the technology that puts doctors and nurses back at the bedside," she added.
When we map the gaps in the patient and family experience, the number one thing we find broken in healthcare is communication, explained Dr. Duffy. At one organization, there were nearly 11,000 complaints submitted each year, she said. Out of 10 categories, the number one source of patient complaints was communication. Patients were frustrated that they never knew who their physician was, that they couldn't reach a human being to answer their questions once they left the physical hospital campus, and sometimes patients even said they had been treated without dignity, compassion or respect. Dr. Duffy also noted that fatigue and burnout in physicians and nurses is often attributed to breakdown in communication and relationship.
The healthcare industry is going through a change: The care footprint is growing beyond the acute care arena and encompassing the primary care physician's office, outpatient care center and even the home. In this environment, the ideal communications network, according to Mr. Shah, has to “focus on restoring the human-to-human connection by creating trust, relationships, and connections: Not just between provider and patient, but between provider, patient and all members of the extended care team.”
The key to success, said Mr. Shah is to “create a seamless web of communication to all parts of the extended care team with a platform that makes the technology invisible. You shouldn’t be thinking about the device in your pocket; you should be thinking about how the information you’re getting, at the right time, in a usable form, on your device of choice is going to help you create a great patient experience or drive a positive patient outcome.”
“A platform is vital,” continued Mr. Shah, “a layer that connects all members of the extended care team together and then plugs into the source of all the data, whether that be the EHR, alarm systems, or other critical clinical systems.”
Communication issues can cause safety problems, waste resources and reduce revenue, affecting healthcare to the tune of $12 billion in inefficiencies each year, according to Dr. Duffy. "Our challenge is to get to root cause and realize that what is broken in healthcare is communication. We must be measuring gaps from the first patient impression to the last. Executives should walk in the shoes of their patients, patient families and staff," said Dr. Duffy of executives' duty to invest in technologies that humanize the healthcare experience.
"Communication by itself is an action. With context it is collaboration, and collaboration drives trust, and trust creates a better patient experience," added Mr. Shah.
To access the webinar replay, click here.
For more information about Vocera, please visit Vocera.com, call 1-888 -9VOCERA or email info@vocera.com