Hospitals and health systems are changing the way they do business as the industry becomes more value-focused and provider organizations are challenged to improve care quality while also becoming more efficient.
Advances in technology are helping many hospitals navigate healthcare's shifting landscape. However, before provider organizations deploy new technology, it is critical for them to first define the problem they are trying to solve.
During an executive roundtable sponsored by Microsoft on Nov. 13 at the Becker's Hospital Review 6th Annual CEO + CFO Roundtable in Chicago, a group of hospital executives from across the country discussed ways technology could be used to improve patient engagement. The executives began by addressing when the patient journey actually begins.
The vice president of payer risk strategy at a two-hospital health system in the Midwest said the patient journey begins "before birth" and ends "after death," while other executives said the journey begins during the initial interaction the patient has with a hospital. Although the healthcare leaders provided differing views on when the patient journey begins and ends, they all agreed with Grayson Shroyer, digital solution architect at Microsoft, when he described the patient journey as complex.
Mr. Shroyer said enhancing patient engagement requires pulling information from many sources, including patient portals, kiosks, and in-person visits, to get insights into missed opportunities and areas of improvement. He and Molly McCarthy, RN, chief nursing officer and national director, U.S. Provider Market at Microsoft, provided a few examples of ways hospitals have used Microsoft's Dynamics 365 platform to improve patient engagement.
The first example they discussed involved a national specialty hospital that was experiencing problems with patient leakage. One in four patients who came to the hospital for care did not return, and the hospital wanted to understand why patients were leaving. The hospital also wanted a technology solution to help caregivers proactively address patient needs and communicate with patients when they were not in the facility.
The hospital implemented a Dynamics-based tool that allowed it to track the patient journey from beginning to end. The tool gave the hospital insight into both clinical and nonclinical information for each patient. "It gave [the hospital] a one-stop shop to understand their patients' needs," said Mr. Shroyer. The tool also helped the hospital "identify risks of patients who … were starting to not be advocates of or starting to move away from the system," he said.
After implementing the tool, the hospital immediately saw significant improvement in a few key areas. In the first 60 days post implementation, the hospital saw a 30 percent reduction in the number of patients who decided to seek care at an outside facility. Through proactive outreach, the hospital was able to remove barriers to care and made significant progress in retaining patients. These efforts resulted in the hospital recouping $3.2 million in the first two months after implementing the tool.
The second example was from an academic medical center seeking to get patients more engaged in their care. Specifically, the hospital wanted a technology solution to help get patients to take their anti-retroviral medications and to come to their follow-up appointments.
The hospital worked with Microsoft to develop a mobile medication adherence solution that included a number of features. The tool sent patients automated appointment reminders and personalized text messages to remind them to take their medications. The solution also included workflow tools to alert clinicians of non-adhering patients, which allowed clinicians to follow up with the patients sooner to try to eliminate issues preventing them from taking their medications.
After implementing the new solution, the hospital increased medication adherence from less than 50 percent to over 99 percent over a four-month period among a group of about 8,000 patients. "Something as simple, as easy as a text message really did impact [patients'] behavior," said Mr. Shroyer. Patients also reported the personalized messaging feature made them feel more connected to their caregivers.
The hospitals cited by Mr. Shroyer and Ms. McCarthy during the executive roundtable are representative of a nationwide trend, as hospitals across the country work to provide higher quality care more efficiently. Patient engagement is a key component to achieving this goal, but Ms. McCarthy said an equally important pillar is empowering care teams and employees. These two elements combined with the right technology can help hospitals and health systems proactively manage patients' care and put changes into place quicker, according to Ms. McCarthy.
"I think we're moving … to a system of intelligence where … our evidence-based practice changes aren't taking as long because we have the data there to look at and to implement those changes faster," she said.
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