Posts Tagged ‘patient loyalty’

Patient care and the bottom line aren’t so far apart in a medical organization – be it physician practice, specialty clinic or hospital. In this instance, when a multi-provider Pediatric Oncology and Hematology Clinic engaged us, improvements within workflow and patient flow, plus (re)training in coding and documentation practices, meant the medical practice could enjoy happier patients and increased revenue. The clinic’s goals centered on enhancing their young patients’ clinic time and optimizing processes to increase revenue. We conducted an analysis and formulated a clinic improvement with active participation from both staff and leadership, focusing on:

• Patient flow and workflow processes
• Coding and documentation practices
• Staff satisfaction and communication needs

Phase I
Through chart audits and facilitated staff work sessions, we documented current processes and gathered clinic team input. Additionally, Derry, Nolan developed documentation and clinical templates to support coding best practices, then trained clinic staff on use.

Phase II
Our aim:

• Decrease patient wait time
• Decrease patient’s overall length of stay
• Increase staff satisfaction

The action plan continued the teamwork sessions, which revealed where new processes would provide the most benefit. Derry, Nolan developed clinic workflow recommendations that furthered a “Patient-driven Model” for optimal patient access. Team functions re-aligned to support the model, and re-arranged workspace promoted use of the newly implemented workflow.

A daily communication forum ensured the clinic team better anticipated patient needs and prioritized accordingly. Additionally, the newly developed Lead RN role was integral in implementing the changed processes, keeping communication channels open and upholding established standards within the nursing team. Physicians used compressed schedules to maximize both clinic time and patient “face time.”

Project Results

• Improved revenue by 30% per year
• Increased patient encounters/productivity up to 3 visits per day
• Decreased patient wait time by an average of 28 minutes

“Derry, Nolan & Associates helped us modify patient flow, scheduling efficiency, coding capture and staff members’ roles, improving both our care and our bottom line.”
Dr. Ronald Louie, Medical Director
Mary Bridge Children’s Pediatric Hematology/Oncology Clinic

Contact Derry, Nolan & Associates to learn how we can help your medical practice improve satisfaction metrics and the bottom line.

Have you been thinking about a Patient or Employee Survey for your medical practice? Great idea! But be sure you’re measuring what counts and why. Just logging a score of 5 out of 5 isn’t enough.

In If Disney Ran Your Hospital, author Fred Lee points out that competing for the best numbers because there are bonuses tied to their rankings is a recipe for disaster. Why? Because it sends managers the message that a high score is more important than honest feedback. Even if a healthcare organization pushes patients to tell staff how to improve enough to earn the high marks, they’re still not getting the real picture.

What a medical practice or any healthcare-related business needs to know is the percentage of loyal patients who will promote the business. As we’ve said before, meeting expectations isn’t enough – it’s the unique, the special, experience that generates feelings of loyalty.

Yes, world class organizations like Disney count only the “5s” but they don’t make those numbers say anything other than “very satisfied” on a scale that has two other numbers for those who are merely “satisfied.” That’s because they do not want to combine loyal customers with satisfied but not loyal customers – after all, satisfied customers still defect! Instead, Disney genuinely tries to measure loyalty, not satisfaction.

Customer loyalty authority Frederick Reichheld purports to have found the ideal yardstick with which to determine customer and employee loyalty after researching 14 companies across six industries. What do you think it is?

Well, in this brave new world of social media, the answer should come as no surprise – “How would you recommend [our medical practice, our company] to a friend or colleague?” His scale says 10 means “extremely likely” to recommend (Promoter), 5 means neutral and 0 means “not at all likely” (Passive and Detractor ranges).

Simple, intuitive and reliable as a predictor – the personal recommendation. We all want to have Promoters in our corner, right? Plus, frontline managers (practice managers, administrators) gain a clear goal to increase the number of Promoters and reduce Detractors. So when developing that upcoming survey, think “loyalty” not “satisfaction.”

Remember, Facebook, Yelp, RateMDs, PhysicianReports, and a plethora of other free, online sources already let your patients (and employees) speak up – are you ready to listen?

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“Measure to improve, not to impress.” — Fred Lee, author

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You expect complaints in any business, healthcare related or not. But how you handle the complaints, which are really about service breakdowns, can make or break a medical practice’s relationship with its patients. Just because complaint rates are low doesn’t mean it’s time to celebrate. Medical practice employees then become tempted to send dissatisfied patients away, rather than admitting to a service failure.

Rewarding exceptional solutions to problems is the way to ensure a long-lasting patient/practice relationship. “Service Recovery” means fixing service breakdowns. For instance:

• When patients have a billing or business problem, they want you to help them fix it. They do not want to be transferred to someone else to explain their problem all over again. They want you to take responsibility.
• When a patient has a non-practice problem, such as a flat tire in your parking lot, they expect you to do something to help, like call a tow truck.

How a medical practice handles the problem is the first thing judged. Next, patients judge practices on the willingness to be sure the problem doesn’t reoccur. Look at Service Recovery as a mission involving three stakeholders:

1. Patients who want their complaint resolved
2. Employees who interact with the patient
3. Managers in charge of the process

Any “fix” should be an integrated one. Patients provide information, which managers and staff share throughout the practice. New structures and processes need to then be put into practice, and those new processes should make it easier to spot and fix problems.

If practice management is assuring the tools are there to deliver successful Service Recovery, then employees feel reassured, and achieve greater job satisfaction. Everyone in the medical practice is learning from the service failure, and making sure it doesn’t repeat itself. Remember that patients, like all customers, have more tolerance for poor service experienced once than for poor service recovery. If you repeat the failure, you’ll likely lose the patient because they feel you aren’t paying attention and the system won’t change.

Also, make it easy for patients to give feedback – positive and negative – it’s all important! Use:

• Surveys (keep them short and sweet)
• Interviews (impromptu during visits)
• Patient “hot lines”
• Critical incident surveys
• Suggestion leaflets (an anonymous drop-box)

Happily, studies have shown that if you recover well, you often find your patient (customer) is even more loyal than before!

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“Customers don’t expect you to be perfect. They do expect you to fix things when they go wrong.” — Donald Porter, VP, British Airways

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@t medical practice, patient loyalty, healthcare medical practice consulting, oncology consulting, cardiology consulting, asc development, interim executive practice management

Other consumer-dependent businesses, such as retail, hotels and airlines, drive loyalty through courtesy (or they could and should) but how does a medical practice do so? The same way, with a healthy dose of empathy and compassion to acknowledge people’s feelings. A medical practice that wants to invite patient loyalty must have staff that understands those values and puts them into daily practice.

Making courtesy and service excellence the drivers for your medical practice means you place those values in line with what patients indicate are the key drivers of their satisfaction and loyalty. As in the old corollary where when everything goes right, no one mentions it, in healthcare, no one notices a safe experience. Only when things do not seem safe, or “right” do patients notice. And patients do notice when processes are broken and staff are unhappy. It’s revealed through the service, or lack thereof.

Think about it: No organization ever became a great service organization with managers who place service and courtesy at the bottom of the priority list. There is no such thing as a sacred department or an untouchable staff member. If you want to attract and retain patients, you need to attract and retain the best and brightest staff for your medical practice.

Too, if the value of a happy customer (patient) is an invisible number – because how can you put a number on loyalty – then so is improved employee morale, as well as the subsequent productivity, that comes from cooperation and process improvement. There are two frequent barriers to service excellence:

1. Lack of communication between departments (the right hand doesn’t know what the left is doing)
2. Lack of cross-functional teamwork (the absence of one person halts an entire process because no one else understands how they contribute)

Both of these barriers lead to frustration and broken processes, and are often revealed not only in the bottom line, but also in employee attitude. If courtesy is in short supply within your medical practice, it’s a sign of a larger issue and should be explored more deeply.

Also, take notice of how all employees interact with each other, as well as with patients. Common courtesy shouldn’t be uncommon – “Please,” “Thank you,” “If you don’t mind” – all go a long way toward smoothing waters and soothing ruffled feelings. Management and physicians are not above the fray and should set the example to emphasize its importance.

Remember: People do not do what their organizations expect; they do what their managers pay attention to!

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“Life is not so short but there is always time for courtesy.” — Ralph Waldo Emerson

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