Insights

How to choose the right patient engagement platform for your organization

Making sense of the new PX paradigm

Susan Protos, Head of HealthTech, UST

Why patient engagement is important

Patient engagement has evolved. In a world constantly reshaped by rapidly growing digital technologies, interacting with and engaging consumers looks almost nothing like it did a few short years ago.

People are more digitally immersed in virtual interactions in all aspects of their lives, from work and school to shopping and banking. Consumers naturally default to mobile ordering for everyday ventures like grocery shopping or restaurant take-out. Digital technology is also the go-to for entertainment, as consumers stream audio and visual content at their convenience. These consumer engagements are simple, fast and often controlled in the user’s hands with an everyday device: their phone.

Why is that? Today’s consumers seek convenient and personalized digital interactions throughout their daily lives. The New England Journal of Medicine reports that 90 percent of patients surveyed want a more digitally enabled healthcare experience, from pharmacy refills to insurance benefits and billing to virtual doctor visits.

With the maturity of big data analytics, FHIR/open APIs, artificial intelligence and machine learning, digital health is close to realizing the true patient-centered experiences that mirror consumer-centered experiences—and all of them at scale.

As a result, today’s new patient experience (PX) has rapidly evolved to be more dynamic and personal. The benefits of digital patient engagement platforms are many - they improve clinical staff efficiency and productivity while optimizing the patient experience, improving outcomes at every level—from satisfaction and loyalty to adherence and health.

Understanding patient engagement platforms: features and benefits

Digital health applications are improving patient engagement where it matters most:

• Chronic care management
• Patient/member portals
• Preventative health and wellness
• Delivering care to underserved and hard-to-reach communities

Engaged patients are informed and involved in their healthcare. They actively follow provider treatment plans, care recommendations, and feel empowered to take control of their health. Engaged patients interact with their providers through regular communication and decision-making, building patient-provider trust that allows patients to feel heard.

Technology—namely, a patient engagement platform—is key to increased levels of engagement. Meeting patients where they already sit in the digital world means quick and easy adoption of unique features that improve their overall patient experience.

When your clinical communication empowers people to take charge of their health, the end result is better health for everyone.

Some of the most effective features of patient engagement platforms include:

• Remote patient monitoring (RPM) integrations
• Mobile wellness management
• Virtual assistants
• Omni-channel engagement
• Appointment self-scheduling and automated reminders

Benefits of strong patient engagement platforms:

• Better patient outcomes
• Reduced no-shows
• Improved staff efficiency
• Decreased healthcare costs
• Increased portal adoption
• Improved digital billing
• Early detection
• Increased adherence
• Reduced readmission

Why your organization needs a patient engagement platform

Healthcare organizations that want to meet the demands of today’s patients have a lot to consider when choosing a patient engagement platform. Ideally, seek an option that seamlessly integrates with all your existing platforms and vendors that work with your EMR, billing and more. You will want to focus on streamlined ease of use for patients; in other words, patients should never even know they are dealing with multiple platforms.

As the market for patient engagement software continues to grow (in fact, this market is expected to grow to $25.37 billion by 2028), the number of available solutions can be overwhelming. Here are a few easy suggestions to guide your decision process:

Why does your organization need a digital patient engagement platform?

Can you identify your priority use case? No doubt, this technology will blossom within your organization, finding itself embedded in many diverse areas of your operations (like preventative health or sales and marketing efforts). But first, find the starting line. Whether it is appointment reminders or chronic care management, identifying your primary usage needs is the primary step in selecting the ideal solution.

How do you integrate digital patient engagement with your current workflow?

Next, take a serious look at your current workflow, creating a complete inventory of the data sources that make it work. From EHR to IoMT (and everything in between), the data you are already working with is the engine that will make your new patient experience work for you.

What do your users want?

A strong digital patient engagement experience aims to make it easier—not more confusing. Avoid asking your providers, patients and members to become familiar with another app or dashboard. Instead, find ways to streamline by improving or adding to your existing interfaces.

Factors to consider when choosing a patient engagement platform

Once you know a digital patient engagement platform is key for guiding your healthcare organization into the future—and you know which components are a priority—it is time to seriously consider finding a technology partner to join you on the patient engagement journey.

Several key considerations should be at play in this decision, including:

What type of industry expertise do they have?

A health tech vendor who has demonstrated an ability to keep up with today’s quick-changing technology and regulation changes is key. Consider the company’s client list, case studies and proposals, and ask questions about their experiences.

Are they an equitable partner?

When planning involves diverse points of view, patient experience initiatives can dramatically impact how a healthcare organization reaches tech equity goals.

What have they done before?

Find a provider with a proven track record of success with large-scale digital transformation initiatives. An exceptional patient experience incorporates all aspects of care—from front lines to business operations and more. A health tech partner who can connect dots across the entire ecosystem will design a strong platform.

Making the right choice for your organization’s patient engagement needs

With a market that’s growing at lightning-fast speed, patient engagement software is the way of the future. Now is the time to build trust between your patients and providers by building a platform designed to empower them. Consider diverse viewpoints from multiple end-users and stakeholders: patients, doctors, nurses, IT administrators and more.

When you know how to help your people, make sure the partner you select will do them justice by giving you the platform they desire. Not all partners are mature; the right partner and the right expertise are required to bring it all together.

How UST can help

As noted, provider options for digital patient experience platforms are plentiful. Healthcare organizations have the monumental task of selecting the partner to best meet their needs for improving the patient experience.

At UST, we offer a first-of-its-kind engagement solution for some of healthcare’s biggest challenges. UST Engage, together with Well-Beat, is a new digital patient engagement solution that adapts to members’ behavioral challenges. We bring together the best of artificial intelligence with behavioral science to deliver a solution that makes health and care better for everyone.

Dynamically personalized patient engagement adapts to the motivation, behavior and health of your members, driving individualized content to care seekers and easy-to-follow conversational guidelines to care providers.

Read more about our digital patient engagement platform benefits or reach out to our team today to find out how we can help.