Dual Customer Focus – Healthcare IT Best Practices Benefit Patients and Employees Alike
Customer focus and supporting the effective delivery of quality care is the aim of healthcare information technology solutions. However, it can be all too easy to forget that practices have two customer bases to please: employees and patients. As you seek to satisfy the needs of both sides, consider implementing the following healthcare IT best practices.
Mirror Portals
Patient information technology has developed at different rates. In-office computerized patient record systems came into common use years before many practices invested in patient-facing electronic health records. However, when portals are a mix of these two different record systems, communication is made difficult. Care must be taken to align these systems.
Ensure information like test results, prescribed medications and prior procedures accessible to internal customers—nurses, medical assistants and aides—mirrors information available to patients at home. After all, patient engagement often relies on information availability and transparency, as well as timely communication. Make sure your patients aren’t among the 40 percent of patients who are unsure if their physicians have a patient portal system.
Keep Information Where Your Customers Are
Patients receive information about their health in a variety of media. Most IT-related solutions ensure that data can be accessed through mobile devices, home computers or printed documents. Caregivers also need the same ability to access information to respond to patient queries quickly.
Consider how much time can be saved if an out-of-office practitioner can access a secure patient snapshot and answer a simple question. Now, the issue doesn’t need to be elevated, diverted or put on hold until Monday. Easy access from anywhere also ensures that information sharing isn’t subjected to a gatekeeper. If only one person knows about an issue, other equally qualified professionals are unable to respond if the gatekeeper is out-of-reach.
Respect Your Time and Your Patients’ Time
Precious time is often wasted updating routine health information at the start of appointments. With the availability of next-level technology, instead request patients update their records from home prior to appointments, or during time spent in the waiting room. Practice-supplied tablets can be handed to patients upon check-in, primed to walk patients through a questionnaire. This same software can then alert the caregiver to changes and prompt on-target discussion.
The most beneficial healthcare IT solutions for your medical practice are those that are equally beneficial to both health professionals, caregivers, and patients alike.
From mirrored portals to accessible data and optimized in-office time, by working with the right IT services provider, practices can leverage technology to heighten both patient and employee satisfaction.
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