During the COVID-19 pandemic, hospitals were looking for contactless registration solutions that were quick to implement, easy to use, and kept patients and staff safe. Now, as they look forward, hospitals are thinking about how those workflows can position them for success by providing patients with the experience that they want.
Those were some of the topics covered in a Phreesia-sponsored, virtual roundtable discussion on May 14, as part of Becker's Hospital Review 11th Annual Meeting. Danny O'Farrell, a director of market development at Phreesia, discussed the impact of patient-facing intake solutions with and Audrey Pronschinske, director of revenue cycle at Winona Health, discussed the health system’s use of technology to streamline the registration process.
Here are four takeaways from that conversation:
1. Automated registration improves efficiency. "Phreesia's hospital product offering is focused on removing bottlenecks in the pre-registration process," Mr. O'Farrell said. The mobile solution empowers patients to complete registration themselves, giving them the convenience and flexibility that they expect. and freeing up registrars to work on higher-value tasks.
2. Contactless intake became a necessity during the pandemic. Online registration shifted from one of Winona Health’s wish list items to a required solution that minimized patient and registrar contact during the pandemic. As Ms. Pronschinske said, "With COVID-19, we were looking for a contactless solution that kept our registrars and patients socially distanced." The new workflow also meant employees who are quarantined or under the weather but well enough to log in could still work from home on tasks that did not require face-to-face interaction with patients.
3. Patients appreciate online registration and messaging systems. Since implementing Phreesia, Winona Health has seen patient preregistration completion rates upwards of 60 percent. The health system also uses Phreesia’s text messaging solution, which supports two-way communication, so that staff can send out notifications and patients can text back. For instance, when staffing issues caused Winona Health to close their COVID-19 vaccine clinic early, they were able to notify scheduled patients individually. "We got a lot of positive feedback from patients that we can keep them in a communication loop a lot more easily this way," Ms. Pronschinske observed.
4. Patients expect to use technology as part of their healthcare experience. “You can do everything online,” Ms. Pronchinske said, and, “people were looking for that” in their healthcare experience. Because patients have become accustomed to interacting with other sectors’ services on their phones, they are excited about engaging with healthcare digitally. Moving forward, Winona Health will be bringing Phreesia into outpatient settings to ensure that patients have a seamless, tech-enabled experience throughout the health system.
To learn more about the event, click here.