Learn how one health system developed a centralized unit to monitor its pediatric patients. // By Lisa D. Ellis // Managing the many events and crises that occur in a major children’s hospital requires a lot of oversight and coordination, not unlike skills used by air traffic controllers who coordinate flight patterns for busy airports. Read More
// By Jane Weber Brubaker // “Sikhona” is a Zulu greeting. It means “I am here to be seen.” The response is “Sawubona” — “I see you.” Few things in life are as personal as our health, yet when we seek care, it can often feel impersonal. How well does a physician really know us? Read More
The Call for Entries for the 2018 eHealthcare Leadership Awards is now open. This leading awards program, which draws some 1,000 entries, exclusively recognizes the very best websites and digital communications of healthcare organizations (both large and small), online health companies, pharmaceutical/medical equipment firms, agencies/suppliers, and business improvement initiatives. These awards highlight the role of Read More
Sometimes a technology solution adopted by healthcare administrators and clinicians produces unexpected benefits for marketers. CHRISTUS Physician Group, with operations in Texas, Louisiana, Arkansas, and New Mexico, wanted to streamline patient check-in during office visits and improve collection of outstanding balances. To achieve these goals, the organization piloted, then implemented, a digital patient check-in solution Read More
// By Jane Weber Brubaker // Sometimes a technology solution adopted by healthcare administrators and clinicians produces unexpected benefits for marketers. CHRISTUS Physician Group, with operations in Texas, Louisiana, Arkansas, and New Mexico, wanted to streamline patient check-in during office visits and improve collection of outstanding balances. To achieve these goals, the organization piloted, then Read More
The media, including social media, are buzzing about AI, or artificial intelligence. As of this writing in late November, the top trending article on Facebook is “Facebook Is Using Artificial Intelligence to Spot Suicidal Tendencies in Its Users.” On LinkedIn, it is “Where Will AI Increase and Decrease Costs in Healthcare?” Is AI just the Read More
Winners of the 2017 eHealthcare Leadership Awards were announced today at a special keynote presentation at the Healthcare Internet Conference in Austin, Texas. Over 200 organizations, representing a broad industry spectrum, received recognition for their outstanding websites and digital communications. A total of 116 individuals familiar with healthcare and the internet judged the entries. See Read More
For Jonno Boyer-Dry, creating a chatbot for cancer patients wasn’t a project based on financial goals or institutional efficiency. It was something that emerged out of personal experience. “Part of what is maddening about being a cancer patient is that resources and information are incredibly disaggregated,” says Boyer-Dry, who was diagnosed with Hodgkin lymphoma three Read More
“The robotic yet charming voice of Alexa can help you find a good movie, make a payment on your credit card, get airline fares for a trip to Dublin, or see how many calories are in the banana you’re eating,” notes Shawn Gross, Chief Digital Strategist at White Rhino. “With an estimated 11 million devices Read More
Printing patient education pamphlets, brochures, and information kits isn’t cheap. It’s one thing if patients actually use them. But do they? Two hospitals thought mobile apps might be a better solution. Luke Poppish is executive director of the OB/GYN service line at South Shore Hospital near Boston, Massachusetts. “Anecdotally, we were hearing that moms would get their Read More
// By Lisa D. Ellis // Imagine that you’re lounging on the beach of a tropical island, listening to the waves lapping at the shore, feeling the breeze wafting over your skin, and hearing the seagulls squawk. With the latest virtual-reality tools that exist today, you—and your patients—can have this type of relaxing experience even Read More
eHealthcare Pulse // By Jane Weber Brubaker // Printing patient education pamphlets, brochures, and information kits isn’t cheap. It’s one thing if patients actually use them. But do they? Two hospitals thought mobile apps might be a better solution. Luke Poppish is executive director of the OB/GYN service line at South Shore Hospital near Boston, Read More
eHealthcare Pulse // By Susan Solomon // Programmatic advertising. Demand-side platforms. Private marketplace auctions.* It seems that there’s a “new next thing” in marketing every day. How does a savvy healthcare marketer keep up with it all? While it may appear that staying informed could be a full-time job, here are a few shortcuts and Read More
A growing percentage of consumers with employer-sponsored health insurance are choosing high-deductible health plans that have lower premiums. Citing data from the Kaiser Family Foundation, Becker’s reported that 24 percent of employees enrolled in high-deductible health plans in 2015, up from just 4 percent in 2006. The downside of HDHPs is that out-of-pocket costs are Read More
This leading awards program, which drew over 900 entries last year, recognizes the very best websites and digital communications efforts of healthcare organizations, online health companies, pharmaceutical/medical equipment firms, suppliers, and business improvement initiatives. Now in its 18th year, the awards program is presented by Plain-English Health Care, publisher of eHealthcare Strategy & Trends and Read More
// By Jane Weber Brubaker // The nature of our health system in the U.S. is that it is massively complicated, with many variables that impact price. It’s extremely challenging for health systems to give an answer to a patient who asks a seemingly simple question: How much will this cost me? First a provider Read More
eHealthcare Pulse // By Jane Weber Brubaker // “One in four Americans experiences a mental illness or substance abuse disorder each year, and the majority also has a comorbid physical health condition,” says the American Hospital Association (AHA). Treating mental illness contributes significantly to overall healthcare costs. Health Affairs reported last year that Americans spent Read More
Recently, eHST Editor Jane Weber Brubaker spoke with Patrick de la Roza, CEO of EASE Applications, to learn more about an application credited with raising patient satisfaction scores from 80 percent to 97.5 percent at Nationwide Children’s Hospital in Ohio. “EASE” is an acronym for Electronic Access to Surgical Events. The EASE app is essentially a secure Read More
// By Jane Weber Brubaker // After Ashley Hodge finished the book, If Disney Ran Your Hospital: 9 ½ Things You Would Do Differently, she was thinking about ways to make the experience of the families at Nationwide Children’s Hospital even better. But how do you improve on an 80 percent patient satisfaction score? The Read More
eHealthcare Pulse An Interview with Patrick de la Roza, CEO, EASE Applications // By Jane Weber Brubaker // In this interview eHST Editor Jane Weber Brubaker speaks with de la Roza to learn more about the EASE application that is credited with raising patient satisfaction scores from 80 percent to 97.5 percent at Nationwide Children’s. (“EASE” Read More
“When you think of using social media to conduct groundbreaking customer research, a hospital probably isn’t the first place you’d look,” says James A. Gardner of Connective DX. But, he points out, “Your patients are talking about you and their experience with your hospital! If you’re ready to listen to these conversations and learn from Read More
// By James A. Gardner // When you think of using social media to conduct groundbreaking customer research, a hospital probably isn’t the first place you’d look. But the Computational Epidemiology Group in the Boston Children’s Hospital’s Computational Health Informatics Program (CHIP) is a leader in mining social channels for health-related insights. It is now Read More
// By Jane Weber Brubaker // Hospitals today are coping with severe financial pressures driven by cuts in reimbursement, penalties, and the shift from fee-for-service to value-based models. One company is helping health systems drive out waste and improve efficiency by applying operations management and quality improvement principles developed and refined in manufacturing. “There’s a Read More
We at Plain-English Media extend our congratulations to the winners of the 2015 eHealthcare Leadership Awards. Presented by Health Care Communications, Rye, NY, the eHealthcare Leadership Awards program recognizes the very best websites and digital communications efforts of a wide range of healthcare organizations. The winners were announced today at a special presentation in Orlando, Read More
// By Jane Weber Brubaker // In June, Aurora Health Care in Wisconsin announced its investment in StartUp Health, a global entrepreneurship development company. “Aurora Health Care is taking a lead investor role in StartUp Health to help expedite the review and adoption of innovations designed to transform the delivery of care,” says Rick Klein, Executive Read More