In our personal lives, it is likely to hear the phrase, “happy wife, happy life.” We challenge you to flip that into, “happy patients, healthy patients.” When your patients are happy with their quality of care, they become more engaged in their healthcare treatment plans. This leads to greater patient engagement and better health outcomes.
Now, in this blog, we are going to find a way to combine two elements – your EHR and patient engagement. For most providers, the use of EHR is now vital to receiving a positive payment adjustment and all doctors want to heal.
How can you utilize your EHR to boost patient engagement?
Prescription Benefits Manager
Through Surescripts, there is a program called Prescription Benefits Manager that can be integrated directly into your EHR (MicroMD has this available in version 16). Through this program, providers view the cost of a prescription and advise a patient of the financial responsibility at their preferred pharmacy before they leave the exam room. If the cost at one location is too high, the provider then has the capability to look up other pharmacies. If a pharmacy in the area has the prescription at a lower cost, it can be sent their instead. This program provides patients with price transparency and an understanding of cost before they leave the office. This increases the likelihood that they will fill a prescription and not “forget” to pick it up over fear of the ticket price.
Convenient Bill Payment
More than half of Americans pay their bills online… this is just where consumers are now. People want convenient and simple means to pay their bills. Consider providing access to bill payment online through card payment or Apple Pay at your office. This could extremely increase the likelihood of your office receiving payment. This eliminates one financial barrier and provides another way for you and other providers at your practice to get paid.
Secure Messaging
This section will require a patient portal solution. With that being said, secure messaging will allow a patient to message a provider whenever they so choose to ask questions. This alone improves patient communications with providers and allows patients to send messages as needed to their care team. This can ultimately lead to better kept health records and insurance information as patients can review their information.
Digital Check-Ins
One complaint that is heard across the board is always wait times before patients enter the exam room. How do we reduce wait times and improve patient satisfaction in the process? We implement digital check-ins. This way, when a patient arrives, they check themselves in for their appointment, update any pertinent data regarding insurance, where they live, and things of the like. This provides them with something important to do while they wait.
Patient engagement at your practice plays hand in hand with improved healthcare outcomes. Sometimes, your practice needs a bit of help from these types of tools to entice your patients to interact with you and engage with your treatment plans. What tools are your practice using in conjunction with your EHR? Which ones do you hope to incorporate in the future? Let us know!
Are you interested in any of aforementioned tools for your practice? Visit us today at micromd.com or call us at 1-800-624-8832 for more information.
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