I’ve said this a thousand times: trust is a fragile thing when it comes to the patient experience. I recently had some minor surgery that I’d been planning for some time. Because of my rigorous travel schedule, taking the time out for surgery is no small feat. So I had gone through all the pre-operative steps, including teaching, history, and physical, and was all set except for knowing the time of surgery. I was told that I would be contacted the day before my surgery and given the schedule. Of course, I had to have someone drive me to and from the hospital, so that meant that neither of us knew how much of our day would be required. Read more...
This is the third entry as I follow along with a patient undergoing a 6-week cancer treatment.
Managing expectations is crucial to creating a positive patient experience. Patients are often feeling scared and vulnerable and need to know what to expect in order to prepare physically and psychologically for what will be taking place. In this case, Elizabeth is a veteran of the medical system and typically asks questions to understand what to expect. In the following scenario, there were at least two missed opportunities for effectively managing the patient experience.
Elizabeth: Read more...
This is my second blog chronicling one patient’s experience during her 6-week journey with a health care organization. In my last blog post, I talked about words that wound, words that work, and words that WOW. Even the most well-intentioned caregivers can say things that leave a patient feeling uneasy if not frightened. Elizabeth’s next encounter reinforces just how important it is for health care workers at all levels of the organization to filter their statements through the ears of their patients.
Elizabeth: Read more...
In the era of transparency, when HCAHPS scores are publicly reported, healthcare leaders have a vested interest in improving patient satisfaction. But I think there is some confusion out there about what the ultimate goal is. Is it to create a more positive patient experience or to just get better scores? At face value, you might think that the two are one and the same. Not so. I find that when the pressure is on to improve the scores, people start to strategize more about how to influence the patient rather than focusing on a better experience that will earn them the top scores. Somehow, people have managed to separate the patient’s experience from the scores. Read more...
Everywhere I go, people are talking about improving the patient experience. But in order to make that a reality, we need to have a clear definition of what constitutes the experience. I recently read a press release from the Beryl Institute that shares an excellent definition of the patient experience. They define it as,
Patient Experience: The sum of all interactions, shaped by an organization’s culture, that influence patient perceptions across a continuum of care. Read more...
The term, “never events” strikes fear in the hearts of anyone in health care. High quality, safe care means that certain things should never occur on our watch. The never events that we have determined in health care are all clinically based. But imagine if we could apply the same concept to customer service and the patient experience. What if reimbursement was tied to certain events? What would we identify as the "e;never events"e; in the patient experience? I have pondered this a bit and come up with the Baird top 10 list of “never events” in the patient experience. Could these events be happening without your knowledge? What you don’t know, could be hurting you.
Like the Letterman top 10, the Baird list goes from least offensive to most offensive. Read more...
I have a lot of respect for what electronic medical records can, and will do, for continuity of care, safety and quality, but I sometimes feel that computers detracts from both the patient experience and the provider’s ability to think critically. There is an art and science to providing the ideal patient experience and both must be respected and balanced. While the computer provides an important part of the science for us, the art lies in making the human connection and using critical thinking despite the temptation to let a series of questions blinking on a 15 inch screen dictate the flow of the encounter. Read more...
