The Impact Of Patient Engagement Technology On Healthcare Outcomes

Today’s tech-savvy patients expect cohesive technology solutions that support their medical journey. Using the right tools can cultivate patient loyalty and improve healthcare outcomes.

Increased Patient Satisfaction

Patient engagement technology enables patients to ask questions, request appointments and connect with clinicians. This improves a patient’s understanding of their health condition and treatment plan, which helps to increase patient adherence and satisfaction scores. This, in turn, boosts a practice’s reputation and drives revenue.

Today, healthcare organizations face staffing and budgetary pressures that are intensified by the need to keep patient engagement high. Automating SMS text message appointment reminders, digital patient portal notifications, and email surveys lowers operational costs by reducing the number of calls and emails staff members must manually handle.

Moreover, patients prefer to receive these messages using digital platforms they are already familiar with. For example, UPshow’s patient engagement system allows hospitals to display customized content on existing televisions and screen displays that patients can access and control from their mobile devices. It also includes features that allow patients to self-schedule appointments. Patients also want these messages to be interactive rather than one-way, such as being prompted to answer digital monitoring questions based on data they have entered, such as daily blood pressure measurements.

Reduced Readmission Rates

Patient engagement technology enables healthcare practitioners to connect with patients via secure voice, video, and text, eliminating barriers to care for those who can’t travel or cannot physically visit. This technology can help reduce readmission rates and improve a patient’s experience at home.

Costly readmissions strain hospital systems, and the resulting penalties can harm a provider’s bottom line. Engaging with discharged patients through remote monitoring technologies and patient portals can reduce the risk of readmission and keep healthcare outcomes on track.

Effective patient engagement solutions ensure that patients comply with their treatment plans by reminding them of upcoming office visits and appointments, providing resources for self-care, and providing automated outreach when metrics fall outside of predetermined thresholds (like weight gain). Combining these tools will create an active and engaged patient who is more likely to report back on their progress, leading to better compliance and improved health outcomes.

Increased Patient Compliance

As more patients better understand their health status, it becomes increasingly important to be active participants in their care journey. Easy access to their medical records, medication information, health education, and wellness tools helps them make informed decisions that lead to better outcomes.

However, many patients have personal barriers that hinder their ability to be proactive. These barriers could be related to their healthcare literacy level, digital access, age, sex, or religious beliefs.

Patient engagement technology platforms can help address these issues. Some examples include telehealth solutions that enable patient-to-provider communication over the phone or through video chat; marketing automation tools that execute structured outreach and build continuous relationships; and healthcare CRM systems that collect, organize, and analyze data to support targeted outreach and campaigns. Ultimately, these technology solutions can increase a healthcare organization’s operational efficiency, reduce internal costs and improve overall patient satisfaction. This, in turn, can reduce no-shows and increase revenue while improving patient retention rates.

Increased Patient Self-Reporting

With the patient experience being one of the biggest drivers for value-based care success, healthcare practices are increasingly adopting digital engagement technologies to improve the patient journey. This includes providing patients convenient ways to communicate with their physicians, manage their health information, self-care at home, and educate themselves.

Patients want to quickly and easily understand their symptoms and healthcare needs and find the right physician. However, KLAS research shows that only one in five patient engagement vendors measured offers a triage/symptom-checker.

Informed consent is another fast-growing area for patient engagement technology. It helps reduce no-show appointments, which cost the average practice $200-$300 a day in lost revenue. Automated appointment reminders with a personalized, mobile-friendly approach can help overcome these barriers to care. This is particularly important for disadvantaged populations, such as low-income people, who may need regular smartphone access. The best-informed patients are those who feel confident in their ability to make the right decisions for their health.