Patient centric approach to healthcare- need of the hour
A patient-centric approach is considered by most experts to be key to high-quality healthcare. Why? Studies suggest patient-centric care can benefit other important outcomes. On the business side, patients who report positive experiences have more trust in their providers and are less likely to switch physicians, allowing for more continuity in care. On the technical side, patients simply respond better. For example, studies have shown that heart attack patients treated in hospitals with highly rated patient-centric care show fewer symptoms and are more likely to survive a year later. Patients treated in patient-centric hospitals are also less likely to require readmission in the month after they go home. Which is why we at HMC are always focused on delivering the best experience to all our patients,
The transition to a patient-centric approach can be both time consuming and expensive but the biggest challenges arise in changing the existing culture. To start, healthcare systems must get physician buy-in, ensuring both doctors and their staff are prepared, adequately trained and the proper expectations are set across the organization. Additionally, healthcare organizations must understand how the shift to patient-centric care can mean new experiences for the team (doctors, nurses, and staff) and in turn, have an immediate impact on patient care. From a strictly business perspective, the transition to patient-centric care can create financial strain on a healthcare organization. Patient-centric care may result in the use of resources not currently reimbursed in most health insurance packages and reimbursement policies will need to adjust.
For patient-centric providers, tools and data play a major role. For example, patient-centric practices know the only person around for 100% of an individual’s care and appointments is the patient themselves. The right tools can allow for shared decision making, patient feedback loops, and multi-stage care plans. Additionally, tools should enable the patient to access and control their own records in an easy manner, while factoring in security and trust concerns. The right tools can help providers improve patient engagement and drive better care.
A patient-centric approach drives personalized interactions, pricing transparency, efficient customer service, and can help providers create more targeted and efficient multi-channel marketing campaigns. As a result, health organizations are becoming a partner in health and wellness beyond the clinic. New tools and office alternatives are also being introduced, including things like telemedicine and price comparison tools that add convenience and additional visibility to the patient experience. The result? Enhanced patient-provider relationships that drive patient retention and can help differentiate networks from competitors.
We all know that good health is the basic need of every human and therefore, people struggle to stay healthy and also intend to keep the members of their family healthy. Despite such struggles, if people are unable to get the services as per their requirements, then the efforts put in gets nullified. The reasons could range from people being busy with their schedule, or that they are unable to follow a particular diet regime or do not have the time to visit the doctor for check-ups and at the end tend to ignore their health. In the age of instant click and order, healthcare service providers are striving hard to attain the patient satisfaction goals.
This could also be referred to as on-demand healthcare, a by-product of a healthcare revolution wherein consumers can obtain the services they need, at the preferred time based on their feasibility and availability.
Making Patients to drive their own healthcare more proactively
Patient-centric care approach has taken a hit recently. Through this approach, the idea is to establish a patient-friendly network wherein patients are equal partners in planning, developing and monitoring their care to make sure it meets their needs.
In the past, patients were expected to fit in with the schedule that healthcare service providers offered, however inconvenient it might have been for the patient. In order to maintain a patient-centric approach, the service models of the healthcare providers had to change and were made more flexible to meet patients’ needs in a manner that is best for them and is chosen by them. It involves working with hospitals to create a caregiver network as per the patient’s convenience, and people and their families to find the best way to provide care.
Building patient trust and improving satisfaction
Patient-centric care is also about taking into consideration people’s wishes, values, family situations, social circumstances, and lifestyles; seeing the person as an individual, and working together to develop the appropriate care plan and follow-up services.
Follow-up services, post a consultation, is paramount to improving treatment outcomes. In order to successfully guide the patients about their disease and its management, providers must employ proven patient engagement strategies that have been effective in other aspects of clinical care. The form and frequency of follow-up care entirely depends upon the severity of the case. Follow-up care generally keeps patients healthier, drives positive care outcomes and brings in a sense of self-management. It also helps to reduce hospital readmissions. It enables a doctor to arrest the complications early enough and mitigate issues at the outset, thus keeping patients out of the hospital. Reducing hospital readmissions has also had positive financial outcomes for healthcare organizations.
Managing and Cutting No-Show Appointments
Given the lopsided doctor-patient ratio in most countries and the burden on doctors for monitoring patients, this aims to reduce doctor-patient ratio and improve their relationship. Post consultations with the doctor, patients forget to go in for a follow-up and ignore their health conditions. In the case of chronic diseases such as diabetes, follow-up care is crucial. Otherwise, it can lead to other severe health conditions like heart diseases.
It also helps in reducing the no-shows and maintaining patient’s continuity in seeking services. With the help of follow-up care and the saved medical record of each visit, the doctor can analyze the situation of the patient and compare the progress the patient has shown week-on-week.
Just as the app-based cab-aggregators disrupted and re-invigorated the transportation sector, the emergence of patient caregiver networks and on-demand services may be seen as a disruption of the business of traditional healthcare. In reality, it offers yet another low-cost, convenient patient choice.
Although this model is still in its infancy, it is evident that healthcare organizations will have to adapt to it to stay in demand with today’s patient population. This model has all the ingredients to be successful as it has already been proven in the West.
Proactive, Knowledgeable patients will drive the process and in turn this will also result in reduction in utilizations such as readmission and frequent Emergency Room Visits.
In the healthcare environment often patients and their families/ friends are excluded from the decision making process. This results in leaving the patients in the dark as how to manage the problems and get cured from the disease. Advancement in medical sciences and various newer technologies also distanced doctors from patients. A transition is needed by changing patients from a passive recipient of care to an active decision making member. The active involvement of patients and families is very important especially when there are different options available for curing a disease. When therapy is needed for early detection of breast cancer or prostate cancer or taking steps for lowering lipid profile in preventing heart diseases, the involvement of patients and acceptance of the treatment plan is very essential to yield better results. This will lead to better understanding of the risks by the patients and less conflicts with the service providers. The side effects and complications expected from each option need to be explained to the patients. The patients’ preferences and priorities need to be understood to choose a suitable option.
What is patient centric care?
Patient centred care is not disease centered, technology centered, physician centred, hospital centred or area centred. It provides health services from the patient point of view instead of hospital point of view. Patients will be made as part of the decision making process where more than one option is available. It is an art of running a business with positive experience of the patients in mind. From a mere service provider’s role, the realisation of feeling part of a patient’s life is the patient-centric approach. There are changing needs of patients from time to time. The process should be in a position to take care of them. It is the responsiveness to individual preferences, needs and values of patients in all clinical decisions. Many studies have shown that patient-centric care improves the satisfaction of patients, quality of care and clinical outcomes along with reduced costs for healthcare. It does not mean a fixed set of guidelines but it is a flexible practice which will benefit patients and service providers with enhanced safety and quality. This approach is likely to reduce anxiety and depression, while indirectly building trust and confidence on the doctors. Patient-centric approach: It is an approach in which doctors engage patients in a two way communication. The patients and families need to be helped for participating in clinical decisions. This will bring the doctor closer to the patient and develop bonding. Doctors need to give personalised care and customised drug therapy. When more than one doctor is taking care of a patient, there should be a coordinated effort to obtain patient satisfaction. Doctors need to consider the patient’s level of literacy on health, understanding level and need to provide information suitably. With insufficient information from the Internet, many patients get confused about their health conditions and panics. It is the responsibility of the service provider to make the patient understand the real status by sharing the correct information and make the patient part of the decision making process. Patient-centric approach is a state of shared information, shared deliberation and shared mind.
Patient-centred approach does not end only with doctors. The security staff and the top management also have a role to play. If a patient-centred approach is to be made successful, three basic elements are needed. They are the patient, family who are interested in participating in the decision making process and professionally qualified healthcare providers who are willing to share information and educate the patient about his health condition and care plan. A well-established infrastructure which can coordinate and integrate the patient-centred system is needed for successful implementation. The latest IT tools can play a major role in implementing the system. Patient-centric approach needs to be present from top to bottom of the organisation. The organisation leader is the person responsible to initiate the approach. It may not be successful, if implemented partially. Every member of the organisation needs to understand the importance of the approach and need to follow in their best way. This culture should be present across the organisation.
Challenges
In this competitive and tightly scheduled environment, it is doubtful whether doctors can spend much time with the patients to make them part of the decision making process. The acceptance and understanding level of patients to take up the essential role in the process needs to be looked into. The level of emotional support that can be extended to understand patients’ values and preferences is a challenge. Due to improper understanding of the various options given by the doctors, when something goes wrong, the patient or attendants can seek legal assistance for getting relief. Training the members of the organisation right from the house keepers to the top managerial staff is a big challenge. The volume of training needed for various categories of the hospital employees and the rate of attrition that the industry is facing is another challenge.
We at HMC have always believed in the efficiency and good-will behind a patient centric approach to healthcare. Patient satisfaction and quality experience is always our utmost priority, which is what we strive to better each time.
To know more or book an appointment with us, you can visit us here- https://www.hmcmedicalcenter.com/
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