Focusing on the Fundamentals
Hospitals and healthcare systems across the country have naturally progressed to providing a more customer service focused culture. As a result, many hospitals are redefining their missions to provide the highest level of patient satisfaction, service excellence and enhance the overall patient experience. With this progression, buzzwords have changed and new ones have come into play. Two buzzwords most commonly questioned as this cultural shift has become more prominent are patient satisfaction and patient experience.
Both patient satisfaction and patient experience are the most valuable tools for receiving information on how to improve patient care. As we have shifted from what we think to what we know, hospitals and health systems are not only focusing on “how are we doing,” but are also taking a more in-depth look at “what are we doing and how are we delivering it.”
Different Definitions
This shift has created the opportunity for a number of people to define patient experience and patient satisfaction differently. Many focus on survey questions or create their own definition based on what works for a specific facility or need. There are several physician services groups, hospitals and health systems that still use the words interchangeably, with the knowledge that the true importance is not the words themselves, but their fundamental practices.
Creative Solutions
At ApolloMD, we believe the importance is the underlying concept of patient experience and patient satisfaction. We take different angles to look at the concepts and offer our partners targeted provider/individual coaching, team coaching, as well as department-wide or hospital-wide coaching. Our Operations Team serves as an internal consulting group addressing all areas of the patient encounter with a number of creative solutions. These include:
AIDET Training
AIDET Training is used as a guide for clinicians to complete the necessary steps for communication throughout the entire patient encounter. AIDET is an acronym for Acknowledge, Introduce, Discuss, Explain, Thank You. This is a Studer Group program that utilizes one-on-one coaching and real-time bedside shadowing to practice the communication and courtesy skills that lead to a great patient experience.
We Care Challenge
The We Care Challenge (WCC) is an internally-built program that focuses on the patient’s experience. It is a large-scale, collaborative 10-week program involving all stakeholders (providers, nurses, ancillary staff, etc.) and the ApolloMD Operations team. The WCC is implemented house-wide or per specific departments (ex. ED only), depending on the partner’s need. Each week introduces a new skill, and builds on the previous, to instill good habits and hardwire being cognizant of the patient experience into the clinician’s daily practice.
FOCUS 5 Maintenace Program
FOCUS 5 Maintenance Program is a deeper dive into five priority skills identified through patient satisfaction surveys. Custom built for each facility, the program is often used as a post-WCC follow up or can completely stand alone.
Patient Experience Boot Camp
Our newest program, Patient Experience Boot Camp, was built in response to our partners’ need for a full-service Patient Satisfaction program. The boot camp is an interactive seminar that utilizes videos and simulation labs conducted in a group setting or on an individual basis and provides a more hands-on approach for our partner facilities.
Additional Resources:
Navicent Health Finds Success with the We Care Challenge
Defining Hospital Service Excellence