4 Tips for Creating an Extraordinary Patient Experience to Increase Referrals and Profitability

As healthcare reform increases transparency and allows patients to become more savvy consumers, healthcare providers will need to be creative when it comes to attracting patients to their facilities. Essential to this process is transforming your facility's patient experience from good to extraordinary. "In healthcare, we all tend to work in our own silos. Nobody owns the whole patient experience. We may own our own little piece, but this leads to fragmented care, and a less than optimal experience," says Marshall Steele, MD, a board-certified orthopedic surgeon and founder and CEO of Marshall | Steele, a physician-led healthcare firm that develops destination centers in orthopedics and spine.

Here he discusses for tips for creating an extraordinary patient experience and how it can help healthcare providers respond positively to changes brought about by healthcare reform.

1. Reduce the "FUD factor." One of Dr. Steele's patients described the leading cause of a less-than-stellar patient experience as the FUD factor: fear, uncertainty and doubt. "Providers need to truly think about reducing the FUD factor. Something as simple as worrying about finding the hospital and a parking space can increase a patient's anxiety," Dr. Steele says. "To reduce the FUD factor we need to put ourselves in their shoes. We can easily forget to be clear on what seems to be a minor thing such as where to park, which door to come in or where to sign in. We need to think of everything, such as the registration process, as part of the continuum of care."

2. Create realistic expectations, then exceed them. The most important thing you can do is set expectations that are realistic. An extraordinary patient experience requires you to exceed expectations. Unrealistic expectations that are not or cannot be met may be the biggest barrier to patient satisfaction. Expectation setting is crucial to the patient's experience the day of surgery.

Including the family in pre-op discussions is also crucial, according to Dr. Steele. "The family will become the caregiver once the patient leaves your facility," he says. "For this reason it is important to include them in the process early."

Unexpected requests and inconsistent messages from a variety of providers both before and on the day of surgery can raise a patient's anxiety level as well, according to Dr. Steele. "It can be unsettling to get three different answers to the same question. Patients will worry why this is happening," he says.

For this reason, the education and messages coming from all the providers need to be consistent. Providers also need to address the different ways in which people learn to make sure that the correct information is being understood. "People in stressful situations tend to remember just 10 percent of what you tell them, so it is important that you provide them with education in a variety of ways so as to create the right expectations," Dr. Steele says.

Even the primary care physician [or the first point of contact], who is usually not involved in the surgery, needs to know the right message to provide so that consistency can be ensured from the beginning of the patient's medical encounter.

3. Get personal. Nurse navigators are often used in long-term treatment situations, such as cancer care. According to Dr. Steele, the nurse navigator serves a valuable purpose as a single liaison between the patient and the healthcare provider and facility. By having one contact, the risk of inconsistency is reduced.

An ASC in Baltimore employs a similar approach. "The ASC has the same nurse do the pre-op call before surgery, perform the pre- and post-op care the day of surgery. After surgery this same nurse follows up with a post-op phone call. The patient feels like they have a personal connection at the center and that the center truly cares about them," Dr. Steele says.

Perceived indifference from healthcare providers can also heighten the FUD factor, according to Dr. Steele. "The patient puts so much trust into the healthcare provider, and sometimes we act like we are doing them a favor by taking care of them.  We need to make sure we take the time to thank them for their trust in us. They are the ones who are doing us a favor," he says.

Knowing at least one personal detail about a patient can enhance this experience as well, according to Dr. Steele. "Reminding every nurse and physician to learn at least one personal detail about who they are treating helps the patient to feel like these people know me, not just my condition, and they care about me as well," he says.

4. Get meaningful feedback, not just complaints, from patients. Surgeons tend to feel that if a surgery goes well, they have done their job and the entire experience should be positive. Unfortunately, this is not always the case, but you'll never know if you don't ask, according to Dr. Steele. "The concept that 'no news is good news' isn't true here. Many healthcare providers respond only to patient complaints rather than soliciting what I call 'patient insights.' An insight is not really a complaint but telling you where you can be better," he says.

Before Dr. Steele retired from his practice, he invited total joint replacement patients with their families to a luncheon. "I asked them for at least three ideas for improvement. If they failed to provide us this, they would have to pay for lunch," he says. "This gives them permission to speak. We may get a list of five to 20 areas of improvement, and rarely do they have anything to do with the procedure."

"Surgery is the only time when a patient isn't actively involved in the process," he adds. "A successful procedure does not equal an extraordinary experience. In order to get the most out of patient feedback, facilities need to focus on service improvements rather than service recovery. We need to look at the entire system's performance as well as an individual performance."

To illustrate this point, Dr. Steele shares an example from the airline industry. Due to the systems in place, "airlines rightfully pride themselves on great levels of safety. However, even though the plane landed safely, if they lost our baggage or we missed our connecting flight we are not happy. If you avoid an airline it usually has something to do with your experience," he says.

Asking the right questions is also critical to receiving helpful insights. Dr. Steele notes that it is not asking a patient, "Are you satisfied?" Rather, it is asking, "What can we do to get better?" He says, "I ask them to imagine that a neighbor or friend is coming in for surgery next week or next month. What can we do to improve their experience? Just as in product development, the user of the product creates the best improvements to it, and their suggestions can be very powerful."

Learn more about Marshall | Steele.