To truly offer patient-centric healthcare, customer experience strategies must be integral to an institution's mission and operations. It requires meeting patients where they are and providing them with a robust suite of both in-person and digital options.
According to recent longitudinal research on patients’ perspectives on digital healthcare, more patients are using digital healthcare solutions than ever—and they’re experiencing better outcomes because of it.
Creating successful digital healthcare solutions requires understanding how they can empower patient-centric care and impact patient outcomes. It also means knowing how to overcome common challenges that can arise, as well as how forward-thinking digital healthcare experts are leading the charge.
To that end, we’re sharing new trends in patient-centric care and use cases as of February 2024.
Modern-day patients and their families are as digitally empowered as consumers in everyday life. It’s important to remember that they are actually the same people. Patients aren’t comparing your experience to your competitors - they’re comparing it to the other digital tools they use every day.
Digital transformation in healthcare and cutting-edge digital healthcare solutions can improve experiences by better connecting patients, providers, and treatments. Mobile healthcare apps and solutions that give patients easier access to the tools they need and improve the accessibility of services and real-time care. [Download Mobiquity's digital healthcare features radar]
Patients discover healthcare solutions in various ways, from their physician, using Google search, product brochures, and community support groups. Once they start using a product, a new path in their journey begins.
From adverse effects to positive outcomes, each patient’s journey is complex and varies based on their unique health condition.
There is no hidden secret to success or perfect therapy. Still, the patient’s journey can be improved and personalized by closing the gap between all stakeholders involved in the process. This is where digital healthcare solutions come into play to improve the patient experience and create successful outcomes.
On one level, digital solutions allow providers to cater to their patients more effectively. Administering care via a website or online platform creates large amounts of accurate, useful data that can personalize experiences and foster engagement.
And on another level, those same capabilities for gathering and analyzing data can benefit providers. Serving patients more granularly and personally allows providers to better understand them. So, the optimized customer experience translates into improved treatment and retention.
Research into the intersection of digital health (DH) and artificial intelligence (AI) has uncovered myriad new ways to prioritize the patient. Precision medicine puts patients’ individual characteristics front and center and has hit a stride in the digital age.
Here are some of the benefits of what some scholars call “precision medicine 2.0”:
Digital healthcare solutions like these are what the future of digital health and patient-centric care is all about.
As noted above, advanced digital healthcare solutions bring benefits not only to patients but to providers, as well. This is because digital healthcare can help foster trust between provider and patient—something that’s increasingly hard to come by, particularly among younger patient populations.
Patient satisfaction and engagement are critical to retention, especially in the context of primary care providers. For instance, most Americans surveyed in 2023 (58%) said they were more likely to visit a pharmacy for non-emergency issues. And Millenial and Gen Z participants were more likely than older generations to prioritize pharmacies.
These figures are likely related (at least partly) to many pharmacies embracing digital transformation. Forward-thinking providers of all stripes should follow in the patient-centric footsteps of digital-friendly pharmacies.
Despite their many advantages, there are potential obstacles to patient-centric healthcare solutions. Among these, some of the most common include digital security needs, friction integrating advanced digital healthcare solutions in legacy systems, and finding solutions for patient bases lacking technological literacy.
Overcoming digital healthcare transformation challenges requires careful planning and flexibility. Above all, it’s about keeping the patient at the center, or as the highest priority, in all considerations. Working with a digital transformation consultant will help you identify your patients' varying needs and expectations so that you can tailor apps, websites, and other digital interfaces according to their needs.
One of the biggest stumbling blocks facing healthcare providers seeking a digital healthcare solution is the potential for patient data breaches and compliance violations.
Providers, coverage plan administrators, and healthcare clearinghouses are covered under the Health Insurance Portability and Accountability Act (HIPAA). They and their business associates need to install controls that ensure patients’ protected health information (PHI), like treatment records, are only used or disclosed in specific ways enumerated in the HIPAA Privacy Rule. And, per the HIPAA Security Rule, they need to regularly scan for vulnerabilities that could compromise the privacy of PHI.
However, collecting and analyzing granular personal health data that qualifies as PHI is critical to many of digital healthcare’s most impactful patient-centric features.
Special care must be taken to ensure that all electronic health records (ehr), as well as the collected PHI within them, is safeguarded. Getting expert guidance can be crucial to making sure all relevant precautions are taken.
Another major roadblock to patient-centric healthcare is that organizations are often implementing new digital interfaces in complex systems. Patients, providers, and connected third parties are often enmeshed in legacy systems with fewer bells and whistles. This means they may be resistant to new technologies, at least at first.
The ethos of meeting patients where they are is critical here. Digital solutions should never be added at the expense of other protocols patients are familiar and comfortable with—or, at least, the change should never be sudden.
Practice patience, and be sure to offer all the same functionalities digitally that patients are used to in traditional consultations in person or over the phone. Patient-centric solutions for patients and providers promise that digital healthcare solutions will make it easier to access care. Make sure to keep that promise.
Mobiquity has helped countless healthcare, life sciences, and related organizations meet their patients’ needs through digital transformation. We’ve seen first-hand the value that digital healthcare solutions bring to patients by putting them front and center.
Our work optimizing the patient experience of healthcare providers includes:
This is a small sampling of the digital experiences healthcare providers can create for their patients and other clientele using digital platforms to their fullest potential.
With the rapid adoption of digital healthcare solutions worldwide, digital tools such as telemedicine, mobile applications, virtual video consultations and examinations, and remote monitoring have become the new norm. Patients are willing to adopt digital services if they prioritize and match their needs and ensure high quality. Many patients even prefer mobile healthcare apps and digital-friendly pharmacies to in-person consultations.
Interested in discovering more digital healthcare insights and technology advancements? Visit our digital health solution page.
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