1. Proper Communications for
Specialized Healthcare Services
Part I Session of:
“Managing Relationships – Connecting With Your
Patients”
presented by: Dawn Marie Yankeelov
President, ASPectx
dawny@aspectx.com
www.aspectx.com
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2. Information Overload
"Most people have the attention span of a ferret on
two cappuccinos.“--Talk show host Dennis Miller
….so
Avoid Extraneous Communications
• Warning: do not use if you have prostate
problems. -Actual early packaging, Midol PMS
relief tablets
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3. Building Patient Awareness
of Services
• Problematic healthcare communication
issues leading to lawsuits:
– Devaluation of the patient or family views 29%
– Poor delivery of information, including
insensitivity in the manner of information
delivery 26%
– Physician failure to understand the patient or
family perspective 13%
Study/University of
Alberta, Canada
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4. Reaching Out/Outreach:Why?
• Branding—Answering Qs:What is your facility
doing for patients? Where are you located?
Professionals at the center?
• Establishing Referrals—New patient feeder
system
• Patient Education—Treatment guidelines;
Explaining conditions and the what happens next
• Patient Support—Meeting emotional needs
• Patient Followup—Tracking health and risks
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5. Branding/Expert Status
• Basic Paths for New Facilities:
– Hot Topic Seminars/Webcasts
– Image Advertising
– Specialty advertising items
– Targeted Direct Mail/Call to Action
– Niche “Be Healthy” Newsletters—electronic
vs. print
– Blogs
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6. Case Study: The Newsletter
• Somerset Medical Center, Central New
Jersey w/medical/surgical rehab
– In 2003 added free, timely use care tips
monthly by email
– Two targets: General Wellness and Wellness
for Women
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7. Topical and Timely
• Wellness for Women topics (Q1 2003)
– Carrots cut risk of ovarian cancer
– Fatty fish catches on as a healthy pregnancy
food
– Another migraine? Check your calendar
– Sunshine Suite Helps Working Parents Survive
Flu Season
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8. The Blogger: Immediate Expert
• What does “Blog" mean?
"Blog" is short for "web log" or "weblog." A
weblog is a simple web page publishing
system so that anyone, with virtually no
knowledge of HTML, can create and
maintain a section of a web site with
frequently updated and archived content.
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9. Blog Tools
• Blogger.com
• Moveable Type
• Most are free or cost relatively little and
automate all the key functions of
maintaining this kind of self-publishing.
• Blogs are a great way for people to simply
keep site content fresh and relevant.
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10. Role of Corporate Blog
• Spark informal conversations about an
organization
• Address medical news in popular press
coming up in patient care
• Differentiate from other competitors
• Position physicians or healthcare execs as
thought leaders
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11. Practical Considerations
• Who are the authors? Recommended: 2 or 3
• What topics will they write about?
• How often will they post? Policies.
• Will posts need to go through an approval
process?
• What technology will we use?
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12. What to Say?
• by Dr. Bradley Krueger, Cedar Rapids IA
• Ask Dr. Brad
•
• Thursday, January 22, 2004
• So how do you know if a supplement is worth taking. Try looking for
ones with the US Pharmacopeia's Dietary Supplement Verification
Program (DSVP). To earn their "USP verified" seal the product has to
actually contain the ingredients listed on the label in the declared
amount and/or strength, it must break down easily in stomach fluids so
it can actually be absorbed, has been screened for contaminants such as
heavy metals, microbes, and pesticides, and has been manufactured in
safe, sanitary, and controlled conditions.
• Posted by Dr Brad @ 02:37 PM CST [Link]
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13. Blog Publicity
• Add a link to your blog in your email
signature
• On your website
• Comment on other blogs and enter URL
• Register your blog in blog directories
– www.feedster.com;
– www.bloghop.com;
– www.globeofblogs.com
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14. Establishing Referrals
• Pricing Discounts—for patient and new one
• Patient Appreciation Day—Open House
• Go Where There Are Patients—Student
program sponsorships
• Referral hotlines
• Print Advertising—even church bulletins
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15. Establishing Referrals
• Virtual Communities
• Good Will—Charity Tie-in
– Extreme Makeover
---Local opportunity untapped: Metro Tv
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16. Charity Spreads the Word
• Nearly two out of three doctors provided
charity care, up slightly from 1988,
according to a recent AMA report.
• The number of charity hours per doctor a
week rose from 6.6 to 8.8 hours between
1988 and 1999, figures show.
» AMA's Socioeconomic Monitoring System, a national
survey of nonfederal physicians who have completed
their graduate medical education
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18. Healthcare VCs Categories
*Pharmaceuticals *Social Support Extranets
*Physician Portals *Disease Awareness
*Compliance Portals
*Plug ‘n Play VC Builds with Emarketing
*Payment Communities for Insurance
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19. 1. Social Support and
Intervention
• Smokeclinic.com—fee-based
– Cofounded by Daniel Seidman of the tobacco-cessation
clinic at Columbia University
– Detailed questionnaire on smoking and drinking habits
– 10 Day Weblog to determine smoke triggers
– Intuitive interface—smoke on the clock
– Daily “quit” schedule/42% of last year’s users actually
quit
• QuitNet.com—Quitter Support Online free
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20. Social Support—A Top Ten
Healthcare Destination
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22. Healthyplace.com
• In Top 50 of health sites by Traffic
• 475,000 visitors per month/began Sept. 1999
• Viewers stop at 7-10 pages
• Average time: 25 minutes; 3 times a week
• 80 percent of visitors go straight into a chat
• Targeted by disorder newsletters
• 70 percent are female visitors
• Online radio programming
• 861 Links on the web
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25. Webcasts and Web Demos
• Autodemo—Web Demos of Processes
• MShow--Webcasts
– Rehearsals
– Leader Support for multiple auditoriums
– Charged per connection
– Online scheduling and surveying
– www.mshow.com
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26. Relationship Management
• Specific company example:
– Softwatch (began 1994)
– Online Physician Promotion and Management
Solutions
– Manage your on-line Physician community without the
hassle of coordinating with multiple groups. SoftWatch
takes care of all the details to launch and maintain your
Physician community, launch campaigns and generate
tailored reports.
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27. Patient Support
• Online Choices—follow the pharmas
• Fee-based Online Consultations
• IVR Solutions
• Intranet Efficiency Among Branches
• Appt. Confirmation
“The Big One”: Adhere to Appropriate
Standards
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29. Fee-Based Online Consultations
• Healthcare provider has same obligations
for patient care and followup
– Patient’s informed consent to participate
– Pre-existing relationship must be in place
– Medical records must be maintained related to
transaction
– Fee disclosure
– Identity disclosure
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30. Pivotal Case: 2002
• Illinois Dept. of Professional Regulation
ordered MyDoc.com, an Indianapolis-based
medical consultation company, to stop
prescribing and treating online patients it
had never see
– Site owned by Roche Diagnostics, a pharma
division of Hoffman-La Roche
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31. ERisk Guidelines
• Medem--a Multi-medical Association
consortium
• American College of Physicians Medical
Service Committee, Policy Paper, March
2003
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32. IVR Solutions—Patient Support
(interactive voice response)
• Allow patients to obtain appointment reminders
• Allow patients to refill prescriptions
• Allow patients to enroll online
• Allow patients to retrieve lab results
• Home health monitoring
• Download prescription information
– Available from local office companies, such as Inter-tel,
Appriss
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33. Local companies
• Patient Advocate™ - Appriss is currently
working with the National Institutes of Health to
explore the applications of speech technology in
the management of clinical trials.
• Potential participants call a toll-free number and
answer a series of questions concerning their
health and medical history.
• qualified applicants are delivered to the trial
manager through a secure web site—all at a
fraction of the cost of using human screeners.
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34. Intranet Clinical Portal
• Specific Companies:
– WRQ reflection
– Ex. United Bristol Healthcare Trust
Problem: Difficulty accessing critical information,
including calendars, bed availability, and waiting
lists, across 9 separate hospitals and community
centers
Solution: Reports showing calendars, bed availability,
and waiting lists automatically every half an hour
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35. Appt. Confirmation
• Business Productivity
– Decrease costs by reducing amount of clerical
labor
– Deliver appt. reminders via web or by voice
automation
– Enable rescheduling and reduce no-shows
– Works for HIPAA confidentiality
• Example: Inter-Tel and Teledvance
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36. HONCode: Principles Adherence
Other Principles:
•Attribution—Clear
references to source data
•Justifiability—
commercial products
mentioned will be
supported by balanced
evidence
•Transparency of
Authorship—webmaster
will provide other sources
of support and email access
•Transparency of
Sponsorship—Sponsors
will be known
•Honesty in Advertising
and Editorial policy
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37. The Final Factor in US: HIPAA
• In the US, The Health Insurance Portability
and Accountability Act (HIPAA) mandates
data formats, transaction standards, and
privacy requirements
• Total US market for community-based
administrative and clinical transactions will
hit $4 billion by 2010 up from $713 million
in 2000 –predicted by Merrill Lynch senior analyst David
Risinger
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38. Patient Followup
• Move toward Electronic Medical Record
– Virtual Medical Network (VMN)-June 2003
• By Belcan Corp. in Cincinnati
• Subscription and web-based software
• Buy by the Component by the Month
• www.vmnetwork.com
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39. EMR Future is Today
• VMN Secure Mail—for encrypted,
confidential email on surgeries, test results
• VMN Patient Portal—Patient can place
prescription refills, schedule appts., ask
medical qs
• VMN Patient Center—Allows patient to be
interviewed before appt. takes place
reducing office time
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40. The Final Measure—Survey
Says
• More wireless devices in the healthcare facility to
capture patient data
– Example: Innovated Medical (South Bend, Ind.)
• The People's Advocate™ is a software program utilizing a
wireless touch pad computer.
• Unit is a 12" X 10" mobile computer pad weighing
approximately three pounds.
• The display is in an elementary format that allows ease of use
by patients.
• The system first prompts the desired language.
• Large buttons are used on a touch screen display.
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41. Upcoming Healthcare
Community Trends
• More self-care surveying and patient interaction via
communities for prevention and early diagnosis
• More on-line video capabilities to review patient care
• More online patient support
• Integration of patient records and accessibility for all
doctors treating one patient
• Single portal sign-ons for healthcare freestanding facilities
to handle all transactions and patient entry
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42. Don’t Forget
• Cover the Bases
– Branding
– Establish Referrals
– Patient Education
– Patient Support
– Patient Followup
• USE A MARKETING MIX, Blending Traditional
Communications with Online or Automated Choices
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43. Aspectx
Competitive Intelligence *Marketing *
Public Relations*Business Planning *Event Marketing
*Web Consulting
For more information contact:
Dawn Marie Yankeelov, President
Aspectx
(w) 502-292-2351
(c) 502-548-1304
(f) 502-292-2364
Dawny@aspectx.com
www.aspectx.com
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