The healthcare system was turned upside down when the pandemic hit, transforming the overall communication structure throughout healthcare facilities. As a result, contact centers became a critical beacon of hope to connect patients to their providers efficiently.
Many people shifted to using digital channels of communication as patients and their families sought to engage with their care providers in any way possible. However, with significant demand comes the inevitable challenges such as longer wait times, higher call volumes, and an increased need for enhanced customer service to ensure streamlined connections between patients and providers.
Having to check on the status of one’s health is stressful enough; patients shouldn’t have to deal with communication barriers, especially during these trying times. The time to make a digital transformation is now. The modern-day patient experience begins online or over the phone, not in person. Even though the way patients interact with healthcare teams has changed, the quality of service and care they receive shouldn’t have to. Contact center agents are still expected to handle high call volumes and provide patients with seamless service. With patients engaging with their providers through various sources, it is vital to have actionable insights and siloed data sources consolidated into an omnichannel platform.
Why is data so crucial for contact centers in the healthcare sector? According to statistics, businesses with robust omnichannel customer engagement strategies can retain 89% of their customers. This shows how important it is for healthcare leaders and contact center managers to utilize their data effectively to create better interactions for the patient, agent, and provider. During the current unprecedented health crisis, contact center agents are no longer simply liaisons between the patient and provider – they are lifelines.
As many contact centers continue to use outdated technology, providing quality service to patients is becoming increasingly more difficult. So, how do contact centers in the healthcare sector advance communication efforts and connect patients to their providers? By utilizing a technology management solution that uses real-time data reporting dashboards to leverage the power of contact center data. This allows healthcare providers to enhance daily workflows, customer and agent interactions, and real-time decision-making. The right technology and tools help contact centers create more positive experiences for people struggling to get answers on their health while saving healthcare facilities money and time through efficient communication.
Just like other segments of the financial industry, insurance services providers have been severely shaken by the COVID-19 pandemic. The increasing rate of unemployment in many places and the rise in claims have contributed to a significant misalignment of premiums collected and claims paid. In addition to the lingering level of uncertainty surrounding premium collectability, the current disruptions are also making it difficult for companies to calculate premiums for years to come.
On the other hand, the ongoing crisis has also served as a wake-up call for many insurance companies. It’s a must for insurance providers to fully make use of the latest health insurance technology at their disposal if they want to minimize the negative impacts of the pandemic on their business. Access to real-time information and making data-driven and timely business decisions are keys to ensuring that the company will remain afloat despite the currently unstable business environment.
One of the resources that many health insurance companies underutilize is patient data. This valuable resource, when managed by digital solutions and used properly, can assist health insurance providers in many ways, including:
Delivering Better Outcomes for Individual Patients
Consolidating information gathered from different medical facilities and practitioners has always been a challenge for more traditional health insurers. The lack of both a unified information repository and open yet secure channels for exchanging data prevents medical care providers from consolidating patient information. In turn, this makes it more difficult for medical professionals and insurance companies to ascertain the patient’s condition and the treatments they need to effectively and quickly address or manage their health issues.
Smile CDR, a leading health data storage and integration company, today announced the successful implementation of its clinical data repository (CDR) platform across 20 U.S. payer databases.
The platform updates allowed customers to effectively meet the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid (CMS) Interoperability and Patient Access Final Rule (CMS-9115-F) compliance enforcement deadline of July 1, 2021. The new CMS rule addresses barriers to the secure exchange of health information that limit the ability of patients to access essential health information.
“We are grateful for the opportunity to help customers standardize data capabilities that improve patient access to their own health information,” said Duncan Weatherston, chief executive officer at Smile CDR. “It is critical that we keep our customers at the center of what we do as we move one step closer to creating a common information exchange playing field.”
In June, Smile CDR became the first company to receive the Drummond Certification of Compliance, certifying interoperability and compliance with CMS Final Rule standards and reducing the risk payers, providers, developers, and applications may not be truly interoperable or only partially interoperable in real-world settings.
Under the CMS Final Rule, U.S. government health plans must have an interoperable Patient Access Fast Healthcare Interoperability Resource (FHIR) API to provide patients easy and secure access to their records.
While technology is constantly evolving, most laboratories continue to use outdated equipment and manual processes for routine tasks. If you are using obsolete equipment, it may result in problems with precision, accuracy, and output, which can ultimately prove to be costly. If your lab equipment has become obsolete, here are five benefits of upgrading them.
1. It enables you to automate some processes
Your lab processes require a high degree of accuracy and precision, and you may not achieve this with manual processes. Upgrade of lab equipment allows you to enjoy technological advantages by automating routine processes and delivering at more efficient rates than employees would. Automated lab equipment allows for the fast delivery of results through electronic means where one can access them remotely.
The fact that modern lab equipment is equipped with the latest technology makes it more expensive than older versions, and arranging for initial acquisition costs during the upgrading process can be strenuous for an organization. However, you may decide on the leasing option if financing for lab equipment becomes a challenge.
Artificial intelligence (AI) is already part of our everyday lives. According to research by PwC, 86% of businesses are already reaping the benefits of better customer experience through AI. Further, 25% of companies harnessing AI expect to see the tech pay out in increased revenue during 2021. It’s clear that AI and machine learning (ML) have grown firm roots in the digital landscape.
AI use cases are beginning to filter into healthcare, too, including the optimization of hospital staffing, patient monitoring, screening scans for abnormalities, and supporting clinician decision-making.
Given the huge supply-demand gap in mental healthcare, there is real potential for AI to play a role. However, it is important that it is deployed in the right way.
Customizable technology for a personal approach
There is no-one-size-fits-all in mental health. Every individual has distinctly different needs and goals, and as such, the mental health tools must reflect this. Good clinicians do this instinctively, channelling their training and years of experience. However, there are simply not enough clinicians to meet mental health demand. It’s estimated that more than 26 million individuals experiencing a mental illness are not receiving treatment in the US alone.
Technology can help address this yawning gap in supply, but this won’t help if the solutions provided aren’t tailored to the unique needs of the individual. This is where AI can play a role. Smartphones, and increasingly wearables, are able to capture data from which algorithms can generate insights that can be used to personalize care, leading to better mental health. We’ve invested in technology (protected by more than a dozen patents) and powerful algorithms that can track symptoms, emotions and activities to power a recommender system that gets the right tool to the right person at the right time.
If you or a family member needs oxygen therapy in your daily life, there’s no doubt you’re at least somewhat familiar with the annual favorite, the oxygen concentrator. These devices are designed to collect oxygen and nitrogen in the air and give it to a patient so they can breathe easier.
How exactly do oxygen concentrators work? Ambient air is drawn through a compressor first. Next, nitrogen and oxygen are removed from the atmosphere through various filters. Then oxygen is delivered to the patient via a mask or nose tube after running through a pressure regulator.
Oxygen concentrators have many features and benefits that make them famous. It may seem like a challenge to find the right product to meet your needs. Here is some basic information and help you choose which oxygen concentrator is the best fit for you by telling some of the essential features.
How to Choose
Oxygen concentrators have several different features and benefits which can make them more or less ideal for certain patients. With this in mind, we’ve outlined some of the essential variables to consider; therefore, you can easily choose the best concentrator for your needs.
We, as people, have become more and more aware of the importance of taking care of our own health and wellbeing. This means that we all are looking for the best ways to monitor our health, track our food intake and work out how often we are working out.
Whilst there are old-fashioned ways to do this, digital health apps have become the fundamental way to ensure that you take good care of yourself.
The rise of the digital health app
Apps have definitely become part and parcel of our everyday lives, and it seems that we now have an app available to us for most things that we need to do. Shopping, banking, social media, and so much more, there are apps for everything that you may want to do in your life.
If you work in healthcare, you need to read this book. It is well worth your time and shows quite effectively how one person can create and cause change that can ripple through an industry. All it takes is someone with a passion to serve, and to listen while doing so.
One reason I found this story so compelling is that I’ve spoken with the subject, Sister Anne Brooks of the Tutwiler Clinic, several times. She was a force while there — powerful, sincere and so engaging. What a blessing to the people she served!
The following information on the University Press of Mississippi website is taken from the description of “The Power of One: Sister Anne Brooks and the Tutwiler Clinic,” a book written about the longtime Delta physician.
For 34 years Sister Anne Brooks, a Catholic nun and doctor of osteopathy, served one of the nation’s most impoverished towns and regions, Tutwiler, in Tallahatchie County in the Mississippi Delta.
In 1983, she reopened the Tutwiler Clinic, which had remained closed for five years, as no other physician was willing to serve in Tallahatchie County.
Starting with only two other nuns and regularly working 12-hour days, Brooks’s patient load — in a region where seven out of 10 patients that walked in her door had no way to pay for care — grew from 30 to 40 individuals per month her first year to more than 8,500 annually.
Sally Palmer Thomason tells the powerful story of Sister Anne Brooks, beginning with her tumultuous childhood, the contracting and overcoming of crippling arthritis in early adulthood, and her near-unprecedented decision to attend medical school at the age of 40.
If you work in healthcare, you need to read this book. It is well worth your time and shows quite effectively how one person can create and cause change that can ripple through an industry. All it takes is someone with a passion to serve, and to listen while doing so.