by Joan Trezek “I changed doctors because we just weren’t communicating.” “I really like my doctor; I feel like I’m important and being listened to.” While phrases like patient engagement and shared decision making weren’t much in evidence a few years ago, they are very popular in today’s healthcare environment, where comments from both ends Read More
// By Joan Trezek // While healthcare managers, consultants, and physicians may differ on a number of healthcare issues, it’s a safe bet they agree on how consumers generally begin the search for a physician: They ask a trusted source—family, friend, or frequently their primary care physician if they need a specialist. Once a few Read More
by Corinna Underwood A patient portal—an online hub that allows patients to log on to the Internet and have full access to their health information through a secure website—is an essential means for a practice to achieve maximum patient engagement. It also offers an easy way for patients to stay in touch with caregivers, make Read More
by Ted Balowski Having an effective Web presence is critically important for a hospital or healthcare organization, but how should that presence appear for a brand with more than one location? Is it a good idea for a brand with multiple locations or offerings to consolidate efforts? In the past decade, there have been profound Read More
by Jennifer Busick Here’s the problem: You need a way to get critical healthcare information about a patient to a healthcare professional—or a group of healthcare professionals. Maybe a nurse needs to know that vital test results are ready. Perhaps an emergency room physician needs a neurosurgery consult. Or, perhaps the need is as simple Read More
by Richard ‘RJ’ Kedziora How do you define project failure? Is it when the project costs more than the original budget? Is it when the delivery date is long past and the project is still incomplete? Or is failure defined by a completed project that does not fulfill the agreed-on requirements? Maybe it’s all three. Read More
// By Dan Dunlop // It has been said that the patient is the most underutilized resource in health- care. With the rise of the “connected patient,” clinicians, administrators, and marketers have started to place greater emphasis on patient insights and desires. Hospitals and health systems, how- ever, have been slow to address the changing Read More
by Sheryl S. Jackson Automating Process Reduces Need for Staff and Saves Advertising Dollars When the University of Utah Health Care added physician ratings to its website (as detailed in the May 2013 issue of eHST) to combat the less reliable results found on rating sites such as Yelp, Healthgrades, or RateMDs, Matt Gove was Read More
by Jane Weber Brubaker Cleveland Clinic was an early adopter of Epic’s electronic health record (EHR) beginning in 2000. In 2012, Cleveland Clinic launched MyPractice Healthcare Solutions, a branded version of the Epic EHR platform, to share best practices with other organizations. “Part of Cleveland Clinic’s mission is to share its experience and model of Read More
by Mark S. Gothberg A hackathon, where different groups of software designers and developers collaborate on specific projects for one day or up to a couple of weeks, has been around for many years. This past March, NewYork-Presbyterian sponsored the first hospital-focused hackathon in New York—and one of the few centered on healthcare anywhere. The Read More
Ask The Expert with Mark S. Gothberg There is no more important feature on a healthcare organization’s website than its doctor directory. This directory is often the critical first step for consumers to begin a relationship with a physician and develop a long-term association with a health system. For the millions of newly insured Americans Read More
by Cheryl L. Serra This month Intermountain Healthcare will begin promoting Intermountain Health Hub, a container application and nine applications that launch from within it. The apps and a mobile responsive patient portal also included in the container will allow users to learn about health-related issues and complete tasks related to their healthcare on their Read More
by Kris Rusch Scheduling medical and dental appointments can be a source of frustration for patients and providers alike. Patients often complain of long lags between the time they realize they need to see a practitioner and the date of the next available appointment. For people wanting to see specialty care providers, the next available Read More
Ask The Expert with Daniel Fell Recently, my 91-year-old father voiced considerable frustration about changes in his insurance plan. Rather than presenting changes in a clear, concise manner, the plan used language that only confused him more and forced him to spend hours on the phone talking to customer service representatives. At the time, I Read More
by Neal Linkon When they visited, my parents were always surprised at how much my kids had changed. I hardly noticed because I saw them every day. Now that I’m back in healthcare, I feel like my parents. I was away for more than three years. When I came back a year ago, it felt Read More
by Cheryl L. Serra Diagnosis: Cancer. Reaction: Disbelief and fear. Fear of your prognosis, the treatment, reaction of family and friends, and your financial future. How will you possibly be able to undergo treatment—or care for a loved one with cancer—and work? A new employee benefit will soon be available to help support cancer patients Read More
by Mark S. Gothberg “This is the story of taking an off-the-shelf, out-of-the-box tool – the Epic patient portal – and making it a branded, differentiated, and best-of-class portal experience,” says Cindy Moon-Mogush, senior vice president of communications at Aurora Health Care, an integrated system that serves eastern Wisconsin and northern Illinois. Although the organization Read More
by Mark S. Gothberg “People always talk about how great Amazon.com is and how all websites should be like it. But a healthcare site shouldn’t be like Amazon, where a consumer buys a book and then browses the site for other things of interest to buy. People have very specific interests in healthcare, and a Read More
Ask The Expert with Mark S. Gothberg Winners of the 2013 eHealthcare Leadership Awards, the competition’s 14th year, were recognized in November in New Orleans during a presentation at a healthcare Internet conference sponsored by Atlanta-based Greystone.Net. The November issue of eHealthcare Strategy & Trends listed the winners. Last month’s “Ask the Expert” column discussed Read More
by Theresa Jacobellis As the American healthcare system is reformed, greater emphasis is being placed on wellness and prevention. Savvy providers are harnessing mobile technology to empower patients to be more engaged in their own healthcare, with the potential to improve treatment compliance, enhance outcomes, and even maximize reimbursements by reducing readmissions. Earlier this year, Read More
by Mark S. Gothberg “I began actively helping my elderly parents a number of years ago. Every time I took them to a doctor’s appointment, we would be asked for the same information over and over again, especially about what medications were being taken,” says Jim Rattray, until recently vice president of marketing and public Read More