Part 1: Make Sure You Achieve These 5 Strategic Goals // By Noel Coleman // How do your customers identify providers in your network? Your answer could be very important to your organization’s success. Here’s why: Today, Find-a-Doctor tools (such as a physician directory on your website that is optimized to meet your patients’ needs 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
From small operations to large-scale providers, human-first is the key to a successful chatbot platform // By Melanie Graham // 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 Read More
// By Jane Weber Brubaker // Hospitals and health systems think of their websites as the digital “front door” to their organizations, but before consumers get there, search engine results could steer them away to competitors with higher star ratings and more positive reviews. Reputation is everything. The sheer number of places consumers post information Read More
Ask the Expert, with Kathy Divis // By Jane Weber Brubaker // What keeps chief marketing officers up at night? We asked Kathy Divis, president and co-founder of Greystone.Net, to weigh in on the top concerns of marketing executives in healthcare organizations. While acknowledging that there are many and diverse challenges in today’s complex environment, Read More
Your brand is the sum of the experiences a customer has with you, says Matt Gove, chief consumer officer at Piedmont Healthcare in Georgia. This definition goes beyond the conventional scope of patient experience, or as Gove consistently refers to it: customer experience. While patient experience historically has been a clinical initiative, with the bulk of Read More
#HCMKTG Short Takes // By Samantha Drake // As questions and confusion surrounding the need for childhood vaccines persist, healthcare organizations are creating easy-to-use digital resources to convey reliable vaccine information to parents. Mobile apps are a popular way to reinforce recommendations, dispel misconceptions, and build trust. The Children’s Hospital of Philadelphia’s Vaccine Education Center Read More
// By Jane Weber Brubaker // Your brand is the sum of the experiences a customer has with you, says Matt Gove, chief consumer officer at Piedmont Healthcare in Georgia. This definition goes beyond the conventional scope of patient experience, or as Gove consistently refers to it: customer experience. Patient experience historically has been a 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
// By Shawn Gross // 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. With an estimated 11 million devices sold, the Amazon Echo 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
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
// By Jane Weber Brubaker // Lean business practices have been around ever since Toyota devised the “Toyota Production System” to transform its manufacturing processes. The idea was further refined in the book Lean Thinking, and distilled down to five core ideas¹: Value—specify the value desired by the customer Value Stream—identify the value stream for Read More
Insights from New Study of Healthcare Consumers’ Digital Experience // By Becky Barney-Villano // Retail has done it for years. Restaurants have, too. Even the banking industry is now meeting consumer expectations for on-demand services with such capabilities as mobile deposits, and complicated mortgages are being closed with a few clicks from a smartphone. Healthcare Read More
“Reputation management has never been more important for healthcare providers and organizations that are actively seeking new patients. Why? The increase in high-deductible health plans has created a new breed of healthcare shopper,” says Becky Barney-Villano, healthcare writer and marketing specialist. “The rise of insurance exchanges where consumers pick their plans has resulted in more Read More
“As we continue to travel down the path of healthcare transformation, there are key individuals—healthcare leaders and innovators—whose ideas and actions are helping to shape the new look of healthcare delivery in America. Tony Slonim, MD, DrPH, is one such individual,” says Dan Dunlop, president and CEO of Jennings and member of the eHealthcare Strategy & Read More
“Outside of healthcare, customer experience drives business,” notes Kyra Hagan, senior vice president and general manager, marketing & communications at Influence Health. “Retailers and hospitality providers have realized explosive revenue growth and brand loyalty by deploying best practices in customer engagement. Unfortunately, the healthcare industry has fallen behind by not truly treating prospects and patients Read More
// By Becky Barney-Villano // Reputation management has never been more important for healthcare providers and organizations that are actively seeking new patients. Why? The increase in high-deductible health plans has created a new breed of healthcare shopper. The rise of insurance exchanges where consumers pick their plans has resulted in more robust and careful Read More
// By Dan Dunlop // As we continue to travel down the path of healthcare transformation, there are key individuals—healthcare leaders and innovators—whose ideas and actions are helping to shape the new look of healthcare delivery in America. Tony Slonim, MD, DrPH, is one such individual. Dr. Slonim is president and chief executive officer of Read More
// By Kyra Hagan // Outside of healthcare, customer experience drives business. Retailers and hospitality providers have realized explosive revenue growth and brand loyalty by deploying best practices in customer engagement. What are those best practices? World-class customer experience requires tightly integrating cross-channel data to bridge digital and in-person encounters. Unfortunately, the healthcare industry has 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
Lack of access to reliable non-emergency medical transportation (NEMT) is more than an annoyance for patients who need care. It can prevent them from getting proper treatment and result in poor outcomes. The current system is rife with inefficiencies that negatively impact providers and patients. “If you have an unreliable healthcare transportation system, that disrupts Read More