It’s easier than ever to put health data on the Internet. Fitness trackers, health apps and other connected devices can give people a lot of insight into their health. Unfortunately, that’s not the only way that their health data ends up getting used. Health insurance companies are particularly interested in getting their hands on all of the data they possibly can about people. They end up adjusting their risk pools based on the added insight, as well as looking at individual subscribers and choosing to increase their rates or possibly deny service entirely based on it.
Insurers are in the Business of Data
The entire business model of health insurance revolves around data. They
use information to establish risk pools to determine which medical conditions
and characteristics result in more claims or higher claims. Because of this,
they try to gather as much information as possible about the population on a
group and individual level.
Where Do Insurers Get Health Data
Insurers can get health data from multiple sources, some of which are
freely offered up, and others that are purchased through third-parties or
gathered from publicly available online sources.
First-party Data
First-party data is the information that the health insurance company
has access to and generates directly. They have information about the claims
filed through their company, data from the partnering medical providers and
other records. The sheer amount of information that an insurer handles on a
daily basis is overwhelming to think about, and it’s only going to expand as
more ways of generating health information become possible.
Voluntary Disclosure
Some health insurance companies offer incentives for people to provide
additional information about themselves. This process could involve entering in
activity levels, going to get an annual physical, and disclosing information on
smoking, drinking and substance use. Since the subscriber is providing this information
directly to the insurance company, it’s considered part of their first-party
data.
Social Media
Social media profiles can show a lot of health information, even when a
person doesn’t mean to. If they’re engaging in high-risk activities, such as
extreme sports, or they go into detail about their health conditions and other
issues, the insurer would be able to see this information if the profile isn’t
locked down. Of course, given data privacy concerns from many social networks,
even a private account could still be at risk of having that information sold
or otherwise misused.
Shopping Records
Another unexpected source of health information is shopping records. If
someone is buying cigarettes, cigars, or pipe tobacco online, it’s a strong
indication that they have a smoking habit. The same goes for ordering alcohol.
Medical devices that indicate pre-existing conditions could also show up on
these records, which could become problematic when it comes to making insurance
claims in the future.
Wearable Devices
Fitness trackers and other wearable devices are able to track sleep
patterns, heart rates and other information about the person. They may also
share their height, weight, diet and habit data with these services.
Third-party Databases
Many third-party companies have databases available with information
that’s relevant to health information or that the insurance company can use to
add more context to the data they already have. This data is not always sold
with the consent of the user that it’s collected from.
Connected Medical Devices
More medical devices are able to connect to the Internet, which means that there are more opportunities for this health data to end up in the hands of people other than a doctor or another authorized party. CPAP machines are a commonly impacted device in this situation. Read more about that in this article.
What Health Insurance Companies Can
Do With This Data
AI-technology
helps health insurance companies derive actionable insights from this
information. In some cases, that can be beneficial
to healthcare overall when it comes to predicting whether
someone is at more risk for developing a certain type of medical condition and
being able to recommend preventative healthcare in advance of that.
Unfortunately, where it’s likely to come into play for health insurance companies
is whether they will raise someone’s rates or deny them coverage based on the
likelihood of developing expensive health conditions, even if they don’t
currently have them, or declaring something a pre-existing condition.
What Happens If Health Data Is
Stolen?
The healthcare industry is one of the most common targets for hackers,
due to how valuable their data is. When the insurance company is pulling
together all of this information without someone’s knowledge or consent, they
are putting it at risk of being stolen if they’re ever subject to an attack
that accesses their databases.
A few ways that a subscriber gets affected in the event of stolen health
data includes:
Someone using the person’s insurance
information for their own healthcare
Incorrect information resulting in
the denial of important care
Identity theft in other areas
An unauthorized party maxing out a
benefit limit
How to Respond To Stolen Health Data
People have a few ways to react in a way that prevents further data from
being stolen and to protect themselves against the negative consequences of
this situation. The first step is to get all current medical records and keep a
close eye on them to see whether unexplained or unexpected claims show up. Do
the same for credit reports in case they also use this information for identity
theft. Freeze the credit reports so they’re unable to open up accounts in that
name, as they could try to get a Care Credit account at a healthcare provider
or a similar medical account.
Let the insurance company and medical providers involved know if
anything unusual appears during this time frame. Stay on top of reporting this
information.
It’s difficult to keep health data safe when health insurance providers
are collecting it from so many sources. It’s impossible for the typical
layperson to know how much of their information is out there and how it’s being
used. However, they’re the ones bearing the most risk in the event of a data
breach. Protecting online activities by using an encrypted virtual private network
service, locking down social media accounts, and limiting the health
information shared online are all good steps going forward.
By Yves Archambault, strategic initiative director, Varian.
It’s hard to imagine what it can be like to go through cancer treatment, even when being treated with the latest adaptive therapy technology. You walk into the clinic, lay perfectly still inside a long, narrow tunnel-like machine…for about 45 minutes or so, as your clinician uses an MR-linac system to visualize and treat the target area. Uncomfortable? Yes. Slow and resource-intensive? Definitely. Expensive? Certainly. This is adaptive therapy today.
Despite its barriers to entry,
adaptive therapy is often dubbed as the “holy
grail” of radiation therapy as long-term
clinical adaptive therapy follow-up has shown significant improvement in terms
of tumor control and low toxicity profile cancers below the respiratory system
including prostate cancer. Additionally adaptive therapy has
proven to offer dosimetric benefits, especially with head and neck cancers and cancers below the
respiratory system.
Not all
Cancer Cells Are Created Equal
Adaptive
therapy is
a type of radiation cancer treatment that evolves over
time in response to the temporal and spatial variability of tumor
microenvironment and cellular phenotype. It accounts for
macro fluctuations in the tumor’s shape and position due to changes
in nearby organs. Adaptive therapy also considers physiological changes, like
bladder fluctuations. With adaptive therapy,
a clinician regularly adapts his or her treatment approach based
on how the patient responds or changes throughout
the treatment process, adjusting it to better target the cancer. It
takes daily variabilities into account. Unlike adaptive therapy, standard treatment follows
a strictly detailed, rigid plan that is set in place at the beginning and tracks
a pre-defined schedule, not accounting for unpredictable anatomy changes.
Adaptive therapy creates a personalized
treatment strategy guided by the individual patient’s experience. Updated
details about the patient’s internal anatomy and treatment response are constantly
being evaluated and are used to adjust the course of treatment. In adaptive
therapy’s current state, the slow process, significant capital equipment, hours
of training, and need for extensive involvement from a highly skilled clinician
makes it unattainable for many.
Limitations
Should Not be Ever-Limiting
The reality is, as healthcare advances,
we must adapt. Whether it’s the way clinicians interact with
patients, how we’re tracking prescriptions, or new
innovations that incorporate automation, industry is challenged to
evolve and grow alongside such advances.
This begs
the questions, “What does the future of adaptive therapy look like? Is there
reason to hope it will evolve and dismiss its current
patient and doctor limitations?”
In cancer care, the future is now. It is time to
remove these barriers and redefine adaptive therapy, so the experience becomes more accessible, comfortable, and executed
with more efficacy for both patients and clinicians. An
intelligent, accessible adaptive therapy approach has
the potential to improve patient outcomes that can result in a longer
disease-free life expectancy for patients. Additionally, it may
help open the door for more opportunities, research and advancements in
cancer treatment.
We
would be remiss not to acknowledge the fact that it will take time to overcome
these limitations, drive clinical adoption and see results. This present
reality, however, should not keep us from building its future today.
Nobody Said Change Was
Easy
As with any change or clinical evolution, there
are roadblocks to adoption. Clinics may choose to
remain conservative when it comes to new treatment methods
and hold out until additional statistically-significant data surface.
Additionally, the time, resources and training needed to implement new, or
unknown, technologies can hinder initial adoption.
Policies
around payment and reimbursement will also likely be an obstacle for
the clinical community. There are protocols, processes, and standards
that clinics must follow when implementing treatment adjustments and
changes. The frequent changes made during
adaptive therapy require authorization from a radiation oncologist,
which can be time-consuming, tedious, and costly. But every
patient is unique, and it has been proven that one size does not fit all when
it comes to cancer treatments.
The Adaptive Complexity of Cancer Requires
Intelligent Advancement
We expect the
challenges to be worthwhile, as the future of adaptive therapy has the
potential to offer patients a better experience overall—faster, more
comfortable, and more accessible treatment. Additionally, faster
treatment will open the door to hopefully allow clinicians to treat more
patients each day. The AI and automation that the future of adaptive therapy
will incorporate may also empower clinicians to do more in less
time. Finally, as the future of adaptive therapy may be
more affordable, clinicians across the globe would be able to leverage the
technology in order to deliver better patient experiences.
It’s a continuous
process and we’re hopeful of advancements as we continue to build and improve
on what was done before. It is amazing to see how far adaptive therapy has come
in even the last two years. The future of adaptive therapy will offer a
personalized, long-term treatment strategy that can offer better experiences to
clinics large and small, and most importantly, to patients of every kind.
The Trump administration thorn may be officially piercing the side of hospital administrators. As a result of a recent executive order by President Donald Trump, they will be required to make information concerning their negotiated rates with insurers public.
Providers and payers will be ordered to give patients estimates for out-of-pocket costs for procedures in advance of the procedure, according to the order.
To read the rest of my article, visit MultiBriefs.
By Abhinav Shashank, CEO and co-founder, Innovaccer.
Children have entirely distinctive needs as compared to adults. Care is delivered to them in a manner entirely different than adults by care teams that hardly ever double-up as providers for the elderly.
Abhinav Shashank
In
fact, we hear numerous stories of organizations that transformed their care
delivery by fabricating children-specific strategies and have been really
successful in doing so. However, very few experts ever discuss how little
thought we put when it comes to developing healthcare technologies tailored to the
specific needs of pediatric organizations.
Do pediatric organizations have the
technology to succeed?
By
2017, more than 95 percent of hospitals had certified EHR technology. However,
these EHRs are heavily adult care centric and may not include measures that are
specific to pediatric populations. In fact, in a recent research piece
conducted on 9,000 pediatric patient safety reports, it was found that about 36 percent of reports were related to EHR
usability issues.
EHR
usability has been one of the underrated issues that we need to address if we
are to build an efficient pediatric landscape. This can be attributed to the
fact that even a slight misjudgment in comprehending the information stored in
EHRs can substantially increase the chances of errors and adverse events. The
issue is all lot serious for pediatric organizations where patients are
extremely sensitive to the care provided to them at any given point of time.
Complicated EHRs can do no good to neither children nor pediatricians.
Why is the EHR usability valid ask for
pediatricians?
Infants
born prematurely have different needs as compared to completely healthy
infants. A 5-year old kid faces problems that a 13-year old teenager does not.
Vaccination once missed can prove costly in the future. A child with Type 1
diabetes may require care plans entirely dissimilar to other children.
Theoretically and practically, each child is unique: from a prematurely-born
child weighing less than a kilogram to an obese 105 kg 14-year-old. The EHR
should be able to ingest all such details with perfection and should provide as
many measures that pediatricians may require.
Consider
twin siblings born on the same day, having an identical vaccination cycle, and
same last name. However, they may react differently to various treatments and
have different weight or gender. If they need some medication, they might be
given different mg/dose prescription. Amidst all this, the care teams have the
onus of ensuring that each exercise is taken care of with utmost precision. For
that, they need powerful EHR systems and alert systems, among other things. In
other words, organizations need advanced decision support systems, an ask that
is only valid to deliver value-focused care.
Doctors need reliable EHRs to understand
the complete picture
More
often than not, there are only two sources of information during any given care
episode — data stored in the EHR and patient’s own words. However,
pediatricians cannot expect much support from their young and very young
patients. For infants, it gets all lot difficult since it gets even harder to
comprehend their symptoms.
For
such patients, EHRs need to tell the complete picture each time lest errors are
bound to happen. Goes without saying, children are more vulnerable to such
errors as compared to any other patient population. Ideally, pediatric
organizations need to have extremely robust, agile, and accurate EHR systems.
However, the situation is far from ideal even at this age and time.
Pediatric organizations need custom-made
EHRs and IT infrastructure
To
begin with, EHRs should have an extremely user-friendly interface, support for
adding or converting charts locally for specific syndromes, extremely precise
dosage range, and capabilities to identify missed or pending vaccination. They
should strictly have a pediatric-specific threshold for each symptom,
treatment, or trait, while also having a feature for identifying copied and
newly-added records. Alerts, as discussed earlier, for potentially wrong data
entry should also be a default feature.
Coupled
with a layer of advanced analytics system on top of their EHRs, pediatricians
can successfully navigate the challenges as they come their way. If pediatric
organizations have a system in place to send regular immunization and wellness
visit reminders, they can both increase adherence rates and reduce potential
risks.
Role-based
access to sensitive patient information and automatic triggers for varying
health trends can further play a substantial role in making care more efficient
for the young. All such steps combined can help us in realizing the dream of
creating the “Internet of Healthcare,” where every stakeholder is connected
with each other and there is a seamless exchange of information at all places
in real-time.
The road ahead
As
we embark upon the journey of creating an “Internet of Healthcare” where
everyone would be connected with everyone, we first need to have quality IT
infrastructure that can make this possible. EHRs are the building block for
such a system. It’s time we add the human touch to such technological
solutions, and take the first step in the direction of reinventing EHRS.
A business has to find ways to flourish, reach out to people, and thrive. Every company has a purpose, and they need to serve; that is the way people accept them — even a field like medical practices that everyone requires every-now-and-then needs a particular form of a marketing boost. You have to show what makes you better than the rest and improve your goodwill and reputation.
Brands don’t only
work due to the level of advertisements you place. There are reviews, word of
mouth, and many more ways to shine out. When you’re from the service industry,
it is essential to know what people have to say about you because they don’t
have a product to review.
If you are a
doctor who sits in a specific chamber and consults patients, you indirectly
have a small business that needs marketing like any other. You want to serve
clients and help them get healthier, but the truth is you get business only
when people fall sick! Doctors have one of the noblest professions in the
world, but they can’t shy away from the fact that they need marketing to help
more and more people visit them.
Healthcare is not
only about primary physicians. It includes caregivers, pharmacies you
collaborate with, helpers, and more. When you have a business, you will think
about all these aspects of medical services and how you want to contribute to
it as a whole. It helps you cut down on clutter and give your patients all that
they need from one place.
How to market medical practices?
You need to know
some of the vital steps you must take to market your skill and serve people.
Check them out as listed below:
1. Develop a focused message
You need first to
start and see how good you are in what you do. No, we’re not doubting your
credibility but asking you to understand how it is to channelize what you know.
Medical practices involve a lot of studies but often ignore aspects like
dealing with humans and their psychology.
You have to give a
clear message to your potential clients and also let them know about your
knowledge and craft. You need to see the competition you have and how you can
stand out among others. It is essential to let people know how you are
different and map out attributes that will make them take your service.
2. Create a website
Everyone needs a
website irrespective of how big or small their business is. In the era of
digital media, you have to integrate internet marketing methods. A company like
Yeah! Local SEO can help you
create a website and help you rank. They optimize it so that you get the right
level of searches and increase your client base.
Along with the
website, you need mobile optimization. People must know how to find you, reach
you, or connect with you. Digital marketing tools are way cheaper and effective
compared to print ads. So, you must consider getting your digital game healthy.
3. Ask patient’s for testimonials
When you’re
starting, you will need people to give you recommendations. One easy way that
gets you more people are testimonials from patients. You can ask your patients
to provide a review of their experience and post it on your website. Many
healthcare institutes do this to get more people to consult them.
4. Host an open house
When you’re just
starting, or you’re around a month old, you must host an open house meet and
greet. Ask your staff, referral coordinators, regular patients, colleagues, and
well-wishers to join in.
It is a great way
to know your people better, offer prizes, motivate people, and more. Most
businesses have openings to let people know who they are and what they aim to
do. This can work as much as for healthcare that much for any other business.
5. Referral gifts
If loyal patients
are connecting you to more patients, you must give them a referral gift. In can
be a free consultation for them or a small token of appreciation. It encourages
people to spread word of mouth and is a compelling way to improve a
service-based company.
6. Send emails
Every business
needs a personal touch as it goes a long way and has a lot to say about you.
Sending a birthday greeting through emails or keeping a checking a check on a
patient’s recovery shows that you care. In the email, you can also mention that
you recommend once a year or twice a year checkup, that indirectly boosts your
business and shows concern.
7. Consider community outreach
You must try and
get involved in the community to know more about the patients. You can start
volunteering or get your employees involved in this. It helps you have a better
understanding of their lifestyle and help you treat them better. The more you
know them, the more they want to know about you. It helps you have a focus on
your efforts and help you improve your reach.
8. Guest posts
Although you can
depend on your SEO and web design company for this, you need to know what it
is. Guest posting is a form of indirect marketing where you create content, add
links that redirect to your website, and have them post in high authority
websites. It helps you gain direct traffic and make more and more people know
what you do.
9. Set up Google Adwords
You might not
become a marketing genius, but you will gradually make an impact. Google
Adwords helps you monetize your online presence and use the right tools to make
you rank high. This is another aspect that an SEO company will cover for you,
but you need to know what you gain from it.
Integrating
Adwords lets you make use of Call Extension, link social media pages, and much
more. It is a smart way of having an alternate income while promoting your
website.
10. Add content
A website needs
blogs and content to improve their rank and tell people more about what they
do. Healthcare sector is the most searched niche on Google so that you will
have an added advantage anyway.
Strong content not
only makes people rely more on you, but they also let you monetize from it with
the help of Adwords.
11. Build email subscribers
Once people take
your services and you have access to their email ID, you can use it for email
marketing. It is an effective way to ensure people open their inbox and check
what you’ve sent. It is also a great way to update them about offers,
facilities, and more. Since people have the option of opting out, it is
harmless on both ends.
12. Integrate social media
Now every business has pages or profiles on Facebook, Google+, Twitter, LinkedIn, and more. You need to have these to grow your business and build a large community of your own. These are interactive ways to keep in touch with people, educate them about health and fitness, and make yourself seem more reliable to potential clients.
There have been trends over the years with healthcare services being on social media and creating interactive and fun content to connect with people online, this can show them that learning medical facts can be interesting. Not only does this build on the general populations knowledge but it opens them up to things that they may have not realised before, helping them to put their health first.
You might not think platforms like TikTok or Instagram are also needed, but they can actually be quite beneficial, plus it shows you in a more open light to potential patients/clients. If you want to build on your following, you can always look at how to buy TikTok followers, for example, so you can add to your engagement and visibility initially, helping you reach out to your intended audience.
Final thoughts
You’d surely agree
to the fact that digital marketing is essential and a credible way to leave an
impact. If you want to grow your base and take your healthcare initiative to
another level, you must consider ways an SEO agency can help you.
Whether you’re aspiring to be a personal trainer or have already begun your career journey and are looking for ways to pick up some momentum, eventually, you’re going to wonder what steps you can take to get more clients. Luckily, with a bit of hard work and the right guidance, you’ll probably wind up with more work than you can possibly handle.
Finding new clients when you don’t have extensive experience or brand presence to position yourself as an authority can be quite difficult. If you’ve been unable to fill up your work schedule and are looking for ways to maximise your income and client solicitation success rates as a personal trainer, try starting with the following five steps:
1. Offer Free Consultations
Making yourself accessible and showing that you’re willing to prove your expertise are two crucial efforts that you’ll need to make in order to persuade prospective clients in your favour. The easiest way to get your foot in the door in the personal training game is to offer up a free fitness consultation.
During this initial meeting, you can assess the client’s current condition, provide a few tailored recommendations, and come up with a plan that you could help them execute for optimal results. If you’re not sure how to perform a fitness consultation, you may want to take a few personal trainer courses on the subject.
2. Post Videos on Social Media Routinely
Publishing instructional or conversational videos on social media sites like Facebook and Instagram can help you make your personality and knowledge visible on a public platform. Don’t expect amazing results initially, as you’ll probably only get a few people viewing your videos in the beginning. However, if you’re consistent about posting regularly and making an effort to provide great advice, it’s a fairly reliable way to gain free exposure.
You could also try doing live Q&A sessions with people in your community through the live streaming features on Facebook or YouTube. If you really want to push the issue and do some aggressive marketing, you could invest wisely in a PPC ad spend budget with Facebook Advertising or YouTube to display your videos to a targeted audience based on all sorts of filters including demographics and location.
3. Make Yourself Available on Numerous Platforms
In an ideal world, you won’t even have to pitch your services to new clients because you’ll have a list of them wanting to work with you on backorder. While it may take a while to develop such a reputation and demand for your services, such a reality is much more likely to pan out if you’re openly listing yourself on business directory sites like LinkedIn and freelancing sites like Upwork.
On the same token, you should try to diversify your advertising efforts across the top platforms, especially Google, YouTube, Facebook, and Instagram. It’s a simple number’s game really – the more advertising and directory platforms you’re listed on, the more prospective clients will see (and potentially hire) you.
4. Browse Through Online Classified Ads and Project Listings
Sometimes you can find personal training clients just by responding to classified ads that people post in search of a local trainer. While this is a less common and often hit-or-miss approach, it can and does work occasionally and is, therefore, a worthwhile step to include in a well-rounded client solicitation regimen.
Along the same lines, sometimes you can find people who are searching for remote training services via video chat by looking through freelancing job ads under the personal training or fitness categories.
5. Target Local Keywords Related to Specific Conditions
Finally, taking advantage of certain keyword combinations in your SEO campaign is another great way to get the attention of locals who may be in need of your personal training services. This is a relatively underutilized technique that can be applied to any niche:
Take the name of your city, town, state, or county and combine it with the name of your service. Then insert the word “for” and add the name of a condition or problem that your service treats or solves. For example, “London personal trainer for tennis elbow.” Now you have a keyword that you can base some of your content around in order to attract targeted, organic search traffic.
There Are More Than Enough Personal Training Clients to Go Around
When you consider how many people have the short-term or long-term goal of getting in shape, and the fact that there’s currently a shortage of personal trainers worldwide, there’s really no reason for a skilled trainer to lack clients, especially if you take the five steps mentioned above.
Healthcare providers are among the long list of service providers that have embraced the mobile technology revolution. Some healthcare providers are supplying mobile healthcare devices to their staff, and others have introduced the Bring Your Own Device (BYOD) program that allows their staff to bring their devices and use them at work. Whichever the case, mobile technology enables staff to work remotely, which presents several benefits to healthcare providers.
Risks Associated
with Use of Mobile Devices for PHI
While there’s no
denying that mobile technology has revolutionized how people work, healthcare
providers cannot turn a blind eye on the risks that come with the use of mobile
devices. Owing to their small size and portability, mobile devices are at a
greater risk of being stolen or lost compared to their immobile/fixed
counterparts.
In the unfortunate
event that a mobile device containing unsecured electronic protected health
information (ePHI) is lost or stolen, there’s an increased risk of a data
breach that can trigger HIPAA breach notification obligations for a
HIPPA-covered entity and/or their business associates.
HIPAA Standards for
Securing ePHI Data Secure on Mobile Devices
The HIPAA in 1996 mandated
the Secretary of the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services to come up
with regulations that would protect the security and privacy of certain health
information in the year 1996. In compliance with this requirement, HHS
published the HIPAA Security Rule and the HIPAA Privacy Rule.
The HIPAA Privacy
Rule establishes national standards for the protection of individually
identifiable health information that can be linked to a particular person. The
HIPAA Security Rule, on the other hand, establishes national standards for
protecting ePHI, particularly how it’s transmitted, maintained, or stored.
For your healthcare
facility to be HIPAA-compliant, you must fulfill specific requirements. For the most part, you must ensure that
physical, administration, and technical safeguards are put in place and adhered
to, as follows:
Technical
Safeguards
Require User Authentication
User authentication
is the process of verifying the identity of a user before accessing a mobile
device and the information stored in it. One of the ways to secure ePHI is to
ensure that mobile devices are configured to require user passwords, passcodes,
or personal identification number (PIN) to gain access. Doing so can help to
prevent unauthorized users from gaining access to devices, which can help to
restrict access to ePHI.
Enable Encryption
It’s vital that you
buy and install an encryption tool for mobile devices that are used to access
ePHI. In the event that any of the devices is stolen or lost, encryption makes
it impossible to read the information stored on the device. With some devices,
it is recommended to enable encryption on device backups as well.
Update Your Security
Software Regularly
Hackers usually
take advantage of vulnerabilities in common applications such as browsers and
operating systems. To keep your network safe, it’s vital that you keep your
security software and operating systems up to date. By doing so, you’ll also
prevent unauthorized access to ePHI on or through your mobile devices.
You must implement facility access controls to limit access to facilities where ePHI is stored.
You must implement policies that restrict the use of workstations.
You must implement policies and procedures o manage how ePHI is removed from mobile devices after a user leaves the organization.
You must maintain an inventory of all hardware before its relocated, and a retrievable precise copy of ePHI must be made before the move.
Administrative Safeguards
You must conduct risk assessments to establish ways in which breaches of ePHI can occur.
You must introduce a risk management policy to ensure employees comply with HIPAA regulations.
You must train employees to raise awareness of the policies and procedures governing ePHI.
You must develop a contingency plan that can be rolled out in case of an emergency.
You must restrict 3rd-party access to ePHI.
You must report any security incidents once they occur.
Besides adhering to
the above HIPAA requirements for compliance, there are various other best
practices for keeping ePHI data secure on mobile devices. They include:
Install and activate remote disabling and/or remote wiping to ensure that all ePHI is removed from the device in case it is stolen or lost.
Avoid using file-sharing applications and make use of MDM software that helps to containerize ePHI and prevents data copy.
Research mobile applications thoroughly before downloading.
Avoid using public Wi-Fi network when sending and receiving ePHI and only use a Virtual Private Network instead.
The implementation
of mobile devices will undoubtedly add a lot of value to your organization on
the condition that the proper balance between usability and security is
achieved. Taking the right measures to keep ePHI data secure shouldn’t be a
matter of meeting compliance only. It should also be a matter of safeguarding
the integrity of your patients and your organization at large.
The role of mobile wayfinding solutions for hospital systems has quickly evolved from a novel service offered to an essential component of a patient-centric approach. The catalyst has been the growing importance of patient experience to meet both care and competitive standards. A wayfinding platform not only improves patient’s easy access to care, but also provides the experience that patients have come to expect from their healthcare system.
A modern wayfinding platform does more than fulfill its fundamental mission of helping patients find their way around facilities. It is a valuable channel for health systems to engage their patients before, during and after each encounter. All the services a provider offers can be embedded in their wayfinding platform providing opportunities to engage patients and build new avenues for business development.
Health systems have recognized this, and are making extensible mobile wayfinding platforms an important element of their efforts to improve patient experience. An extensible wayfinding platform aligns health care providers with the best aspects of consumerism, serving patients when and how they want to be served, using their smartphones.
Wayfinding Contributes to Positive Patient Experience
Digital, experiential wayfinding not only puts patients and visitors on the best path to their destination, but also gives the healthcare organization an important pathway to keep patients in their system for follow up care.
Patients typically need help finding the right area within a hospital and prefer a self-service navigation using their own smartphone instead of having to ask for directions. A wayfinding platform provides a hand holding experience for patients initial visit and extends to any subsequent visits.
Wayfinding Improves Continuity of Care
Apps that go beyond basic navigation and support physician lookup, messaging and other functions help develop ongoing, rather than episodic, interaction between the patient and provider and improve continuity of care.
Patients can receive an appointment reminder message, guidance to the closest parking followed by step-by-step directions in real time to their destination indoors. When they are seeking follow up care, they can make an appointment, view wait-times access their medical records, pay their bill and much more.
Wayfinding to Navigate the Health Journey
Today, navigation provides the opening to a platform the provider can use to offer different services to the user and to interact at different points in the care journey. Gartner notes this evolution in its recent report that, “Wayfinding has evolved to encompass an ecosystem of technologies that combine in a way that assists a patient to conveniently locate and navigate the health care provider facility and space. Experiential wayfinding helps patients navigate an episode of care or navigate their health journey. Wayfinding of all forms is becoming a requirement as the complexity of care delivery continues in increase.”
It is hard to achieve a top-level patient experience when an encounter begins with the patient becoming lost, delayed and anxious. Those problems are preventable by offering mobile wayfinding, the value of which will continue to rise in tandem with the growing importance of patient experience.
Modern wayfinding produces a positive experience that serves as a platform for continued communication, giving providers the flexibility to create strategies, and easy access to care that supports their patient engagement goals. Wayfinding solutions therefore need to support those capabilities to help providers support their patients with excellent experiences throughout the continuum of care.
