Healthcare Technology

Healthcare Technology healthcare technology

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The healthcare industry is facing many changes that pose new challenges to healthcare organizations big and small. In particular, the fast-evolving government regulations, technological innovations, and patient expectations create a new environment in which running a medical practice isn’t just about treating patients anymore.

Challenge

Cybersecurity

Due to the highly sensitive patient information collected by healthcare organizations, the industry has become a prime target for cyber-criminals. In 2017, the US medical and healthcare sector experienced over 350 data breaches, exposing 4.93 million patient records.

This trend will continue as many healthcare providers are still slow in responding to threats while the decentralized systems make them more vulnerable to attacks.

Invoicing and Payment Processing

Collecting payment has become more challenging as patients are becoming responsible for a larger portion of their medical bills. If you want to increase the speed and amount of your collections, you shouldn’t make your patients jump through hoops.

To meet patient expectations and improve the user experience, make sure your billing statements are patient-friendly. You should offer paperless statements and a variety of payment options (e.g., eCheck, credit card, etc.) via an online patient portal and utilize the latest payment technologies, such as mobile and text-to-pay.

Patient Experience

The medical insurance landscape has experienced some significant changes in recent years. As more patients are responsible for a larger portion of their healthcare bill, they naturally demand better services from their providers.

Healthcare organizations will face tougher competition in attracting and retaining patients who demand an experience that matches the level of customer service they expect from other consumer brands.

They demand a streamlined patient experience so they can “self-service” to resolve most questions, issues, or concerns (e.g., downloading an immunization record, booking an appointment, paying their bills, or checking their account/insurance status) whenever, wherever, and however is most convenient for them.

Effective payment model

In order to reduce cost and increase service quality, there’s now a trend toward determining financial incentives based on patient outcome rather than service quantity.

Payers and patients are demanding new payment models — such as bundled payments, disbursement to patient-oriented care providers, global payments, and shared savings — that encourage care providers to coordinate services and promote preventive care.

However, there are many challenges in implementing these new models and monitoring the processes within the existing systems. For example, new metrics need to be defined to measure performance and ROI.

Solution

Implementations across three critical access hospitals in North Dakota made it obvious that transparency was an important part of any EHR process. Change of any kind can breed fear or stress in staff, so a clear explanation of the reasons and goals behind a switch to EHR is important. Helping staff understand how electronic records fit into organizational goals and what benefits are expected builds increased internal support for the implementation, which usually leads to a smoother, faster process.

Consider including staff from all areas of the practice in brainstorming sessions, vendor reviews, planning, and testing. Everyone has something valuable to add, and you’ll end up with a better result if you ensure clinical, administrative, and technical staff are all represented.

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