Power Your Practice

Despite the vital significance of health and wellness in patients’ lives, evidence is proving that in the modern economic environment, one of the biggest decision-making factors people face regarding healthcare and treatment is not medically motivated – it’s financial.

Research from the IMS Institute for Healthcare Informatics found that visits to the doctor by U.S. patients fell 4.7 percent from 2010 to 2011. The number of prescriptions issued declined by 1.1 percent. The reason? Patients are cutting back on healthcare spending due to financial hardship.

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If a patient calls your practice asking for directions to your office, the receptionist can provide them. If he has a concern about his medication, your nurse is almost always able to resolve it. If he shows up asking if his pesky cough is a symptom of strep throat, the doctor can give him an answer.

But what happens if that patient telephones to ask about the charges on his last statement? In many a practice, that call ends unresolved.

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Most clinicians already know that it’s helpful, when explaining a medical condition or diagnosis to patient, to be able to hand over some informative education material. But how much thought have you given those little brochures over the past few years?

Nice as it is to have a stock portfolio of accessible handouts, it’s detrimental to your patient’s experience to be handed an outdated one-sheeter that reads like an afterthought.

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According to research from the Pew Internet & American Life Project, 80 percent of Internet users (making up 59 percent of U.S. adults), look online for health information.

Sure, the ubiquity of Internet access in modern society has changed the way Americans seek out information, in general. But in the case of healthcare, the widespread online availability of medical information is both helpful and troubling.

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