Embracing consumerism in healthcare

Health Technology, Digital Healthcare

Article | July 14, 2023

As consumers, we crave convenience and simplicity, and across an array of industries, technology has made it increasingly easy to search for and purchase products and services. From getting a pizza delivered to buying a car online, the process often involves entering a few pieces of information, hitting send, and waiting for a confirmation email. A Changing Landscape Unsurprisingly, people want this same level of convenience and simplicitywhen they're seeking care. This change in consumer demand for convenience is further compounded by fundamental shifts in the healthcare ecosystem. Among these shifts are cost-sharing models that have increased patient out-of-pocket expenses, healthcare systems that are increasingly shifting toward delivering value-based care, and innovations in digital health solutions. While patients want to play an active role in managing their well-being, that is often easier said than done in a system that uses a combination of manual processes and non-integrated point solutions to try and meet consumer demand. Disparate and burdensome methods of managing patient engagement often lead to inefficiencies within provider organizations, resulting in missed appointments, increased registration and eligibility-based denials, incomplete payments, higher collections and write-offs, and low patient satisfaction. Consumer Dissatisfaction Healthcare consumers today feel like they're fighting an uphill battle. According to Change Healthcare's 2020 Harris Poll Consumer Experience Index, 67% of respondents agreed that it “feels like every step of the healthcare process is a chore.” A similar percentage, 62%, agreed that “the healthcare system feels like it is set up to be confusing.” Furthermore, if consumers don’t receive the level of convenience and digitization they want from their current provider, they’re more than willing to seek it out elsewhere. In a recent Black Book survey, 80% of respondents indicated they would be willing to change providers for more convenience even if they were receiving good care from their current provider. An even higher percentage of patients,90%, do not think they have to continue seeing a provider if that provider does not “deliver an overall satisfactory digital experience.” A Patient-Centric Approach Improving the patient experiencestarts with humanizing revenue cycle management(RCM) —the administrative process that takes the patient from registration and appointment scheduling to the final payment of a balance. Simply making administrative touchpoints self-service and easy to understand throughout the patient’s financial journey can help humanize revenue cycle management for providers. How is that possible? By thinking about the patients’ side of the administrative process and leveraging innovative technologies like artificial intelligence, robotic process automation (RPA), natural language processing (NLP), and machine learning. The more that providers’ staffs are able to automate repetitive tasks, the more time they're able to spend helping provide a seamless patient engagement journey that is focused on a patient’s specific needs. In other words, reducing human intervention throughout our technologies allows providers to infuse more human interaction with each patient as they navigate their healthcare journey. According to Change Healthcare’s 2020 Harris Poll Consumer Experience Index, what patients really want is a retail-like shopping experience with modern, streamlined communication, as thevast majority (81%) agreed that “shopping for healthcare should be as easy as shopping for other common services” via a streamlined access point online. A clear majority (71%) also said they want their health insurance and healthcare providers (68%) to communicate with them using more-modern platforms. Simplified Scheduling and Payment The entire clinical-care journey is focused on the specific needs of the patient rather than the provider, so why shouldn’t the patient’s financial journey be handled the exact same way? From a patient-satisfaction perspective, patients are not separating their clinical journey from their financial journey, so providers should start viewing it the same way. It should be easy to schedule an appointment and modify that appointment if needed. Patients should have to (securely) provide their personal and insurance information only once (digitally and in advance), then be squared away when they show up for their appointment with their provider. In addition, because of COVID-19 and the heightened awareness surrounding personal interaction, it’s important to provide patients with no-contact check-in and waiting room options. By humanizing RCM, providers can achieve a cohesive end-to-end journey that allows patients to quickly and easily get the care they need complete with clear communication, price transparency , and a provider who truly takes the time to understand their unique situations. By putting the patient back at the center of their care journey, providers can improve care outcomes while also driving maximized business outcomes for their organizations.

Digital Healthcare

Article | November 29, 2023

Tempted to throw in the towel on your New Year’s resolutions? It’s a natural reaction during this unprecedented year. I’m here to tell you it’s okay—and you probably don’t need them anyway. You’re in good company if you’ve given up on the big shifts. According to widely-cited research study, only 19% of people keep their New Year’s resolutions. In addition, this may not have been the best time to make changes, given all that’s going on with the pandemic. Also, worthwhile to consider the following insights on the unease with making big changes these days. According to research published in Molecular Psychiatry, when you go through prolonged challenging times (and the pandemic certainly qualifies), chronic stress can change the architecture of your brain and make you feel worn out, anxious, fearful, or depressed. These aren’t the best conditions for making major changes. You may also face “change saturation,” or in other words, you’ve had to make so many transitions, you just can’t make any more. To prevent yourself from becoming overwhelmed, focus on attainable aspirations. Here are a few recommendations. DREAM ON A SMALLER SCALE Success for the next 12 months may be closely tied to a less-is-more approach. Instead of seeking a whole new career, maybe you can set your sights on getting assigned to a new project at your current company. In other words, consider how you can tweak your behaviors rather than overhauling them. Cultivate gratitude. Appreciate the little things. When you’re more tuned into what you have, you’re less focused on what you still want. This “enough mentality” can be helpful to your mental health. You don’t have to make big changes to achieve satisfaction or happiness. Contentment starts with gratitude. Avoid perfectionism. Often, the fuel for big changes is a feeling you or your situation are not perfect. Remind yourself that perfection is a myth and focus on what’s working. This will help you find fulfillment with your present reality (even if it’s not all you aspire to). Make a list, then edit down. Another great way to keep your ambitions reasonable is to make a list of all you want to accomplish and then eliminate everything but the top three items. A surefire route to frustration is to expect too much and put unrealistic pressures on yourself. Instead, focus on just a few vital things you want to accomplish, rather than a long list that does not empower you. After you’ve accomplished the first three goals on your list, you can always come back to the others, but give yourself a fighting chance to achieve the most integral top three, first. MONITOR YOURSELF Keep yourself accountable through specific techniques—and pay attention to events that may cause you to slide backwards. Research in the Personality and Social Psychology Bulletin explains that 40% of your behaviors occur in similar situations, which is to say familiar circumstances encourage the repetition of choices. Therefore, if you’re able to adjust one potentially repeated behavior, it can make a difference. Create routines and conveniences. When you want to nurture a behavior, make it a default so you’re not thinking consciously about it. Research published in the European Journal of Social Psychology found when you repeat behaviors in a consistent context, it helps with habit formation and these take hold much more effectively. You can use this to your advantage. Instead of making a conscious choice each morning whether you want the donut or the smoothie, have the sliced fruit ready to go and the blender on the counter so when you arrive bleary-eyed to the kitchen in the morning, you’re just doing what’s already laid out. Start each day with the routine of responding to quick-hit emails. Rather than deciding what to work on first, just create a routine where you’re repeating behavior that works without as much conscious thought. Plan ahead. When you can plan for things, you can usually control them more effectively. If you’re going to be in a situation that might create challenges for your new behaviors, make a plan. Perhaps you’re going to the grocery store and you can make a plan to avoid the cookie aisle. Or if you’re back in the office, avoid the calorie-tempting socially distanced happy hour with colleagues by leaving right on time and get a head start on the big project you’re working on. Anticipating what might present challenges will help you overcome them. FIND SUPPORT Support can be the difference between making small changes and not succeeding at all. Find a source that works for you. Find friends. Create a virtual group of people also trying to make changes. Perhaps there’s an online group where you can exchange healthy recipes or provide mutual encouragement for regular trips to the gym. Also tap into your existing network and ask your friend to check in with you to see if you’ve had your workout for the day. Seek out colleagues who can nurture the writing skills you want to develop. Find people who encourage you, provide feedback, and remind you about your ability to succeed. Use technology thoughtfully. There are a wide variety of virtual solutions to help you shift your behavior. Download the app that allows you to track your water intake or the app that will send you notifications if you haven’t moved enough in the last hour. Look for apps that can help you learn the new language you’ve been wanting to add to your skill set or that can connect you with colleagues who have like-minded ambitions. Behavior shifts are most likely to occur with planning, reminders, and feedback. So, find apps that provide these three kinds of support. Give yourself permission to do less for now and know you can always do more later. In the meantime, stay strong and be satisfied with a little progress for now.

Healthtech Security

Article | November 29, 2023

Combating stress and anxiety can be a major challenge these days, but there are certain behaviors that contribute to those feelings, and you can take action right now to stop them and focus on your wellbeing. By taking a look at the way you react to others, how you practice self-care, and what kind of attitude you approach new tasks with, you can make some positive changes to your lifestyle that affect both your personal and professional lives. Stop stressing over your current job Almost everyone experiences job-related stress at some point in their lives, but when those feelings become overwhelming, it may be time to consider your options, according to Zenbusiness.com. Those in corporate positions and high-level management often cope with the most stress or anxiety due to the number of people they have working under them. If you find yourself bringing home feelings of irritability, or if you suffer from insomnia or a lack of focus during the day, take a look at open positions elsewhere and think about how much moving on could help you maintain a higher level of mental health. It can be scary to think about making such a major life change, but you’ll never know what possibilities lie out there if you don’t take a leap. Stop competing with others While some competition in the business world is a healthy motivator, other types can leave you feeling terrible about yourself. Rather than comparing your lifestyle or achievements to someone else’s, try to practice gratitude each day by using mindfulness techniques that allow you to focus on your own actions. Focus on your strengths and remind yourself that you’re doing the absolute best you can each day. Make it a point to congratulate others on their achievements, especially your coworkers, and do what you can to build others up. When it comes to social media, remember that the things we share only give a glimpse into the whole story, and that comparing your life to another’s can be detrimental to your mental wellbeing. Stop ignoring your physical needs While your mental wellbeing is obviously an important focus, it’s also crucial to think about how you can make sure your body is getting everything it needs. Working a corporate job often means sitting stationary at a desk for long hours, working through lunch hours, or working at home even after you’ve clocked out for the day. Allow yourself to rest by setting boundaries once you’re home, and give yourself the tools to get better sleep by creating an end-of-day routine that will help you relax and prepare to let the workday go. Eat plenty of lean protein and leafy greens to keep your energy up, and make it a point to get up and move around at work. You might also invest in a standing desk, as those come with multiple health advantages for individuals who spend much of the day sitting. Stop dreading the new week It can be helpful to set some boundaries where work is concerned, but it’s also important to get organized in order to banish that dread you feel on Monday morning. Facing a busy week can bring on stress and anxiety that leaves you feeling unprepared, but if you take the time to write out a to-do list on Friday, you can jump right in at the beginning of the week without feeling frazzled. It can also help to have something to look forward to, such as promising yourself a little treat once you get a certain amount of work done. Staying productive can be a big help, so if you have time left toward the end of the day and there’s a small task still to be done, don’t let your desire to leave early on a Friday afternoon take over. Finishing up can give you a sense of satisfaction and will keep you from feeling overwhelmed once the new week starts. Stop saying yes to everything Another behavior that leads to feeling overwhelmed is saying “yes” to anyone who asks for your time or energy. You may feel that doing so contributes to a helpful, team-oriented atmosphere at work, but it becomes a problem when you take on too much without focusing on your own needs at least part of the time. Learning how to diplomatically say no when you can’t take on any more responsibilities is a form of self-care that can banish stress and allow you to focus on your own needs without feeling guilty. Letting go of stress, anxiety, and poor health habits can take some time, but by creating some new routines you can learn new habits that help you tackle anything life throws your way. Write down a strategy that encompasses your daily schedule, and get organized both at work and at home for maximum mental health benefits.

Article | September 4, 2020

A digital twin is a digital representation of a real-world entity or system. The implementation of a digital twin is a model that mirrors a unique physical object, process, organization, person or other abstraction. For healthcare providers, digital twins provide an abstraction of the healthcare ecosystem’s component characteristics and behaviors. These are used in combination with other real-time health system (RTHS) capabilities to provide real-time monitoring, process simulation for efficiency improvements, population health and long-term, cross-functional statistical analyses. Digital twins have the potential to transform and accelerate decision making, reduce clinical risk, improve operational efficiencies and lower cost of care, resulting in better competitive advantage for HDOs. However, digital twins will only be as valuable as the quality of the data utilized to create them. The digital twin of a real-world entity is a method to create relevance for descriptive data about its modeled entity. How that digital twin is built and used can lead to better-informed care pathways and organizational decisions, but it can also lead clinicians and executives down a path of frustration if they get the source data wrong. The underlying systems that gather and process data are key to the success for digital twin creation. Get those systems right and digital twins can accelerate care delivery and operational efficiencies. Twins in Healthcare Delivery The fact is that HDOs have been using digital twins for years. Although rudimentary in function, digital representations of patients, workflow processes and hospital operations have already been applied by caregivers and administrators across the HDO. For example, a physician uses a digital medical record to develop a treatment plan for a patient. The information in the medical record (a rudimentary digital twin) along with the physician’s experience, training and education combine to provide a diagnostic or treatment plan. Any gaps in information must be compensated through additional data gathering, trial-and-error treatments, intuitive leaps informed through experience or simply guessing. The CIO’s task now is to remove as many of those gaps as possible using available technology to give the physician the greatest opportunity to return their patients to wellness in the most efficient possible manner. Today, one way to close those gaps is to create the technology-based mechanisms to collect accurate data for the various decision contexts within the HDO. These contexts are numerous and include decisioning perspectives for every functional unit within the enterprise. The more accurate the data collected on a specific topic, the higher the value of the downstream digital twin to each decision maker (see Figure 1). Figure 1: Digital Twins Are Only as Good as Their Data Source HDO CIOs and other leaders that base decisions on poor-quality digital twins increase organizational risk and potential patient care risk. Alternatively, high-quality digital twins will accelerate digital business and patient care effectiveness by providing decision makers the best information in the correct context, in the right moment and at the right place — hallmarks of the RTHS. Benefits and Uses Digital Twin Types in Healthcare Delivery Current practices for digital twins take two basic forms: discrete digital twins and composite digital twins. Discrete digital twins are the type that most people think about when approaching the topic. These digital twins are one-dimensional, created from a single set or source of data. An MRI study of a lung, for example, is used to create a digital representation of a patient that can be used by trained analytics processes to detect the subtle image variations that indicate a cancerous tumor. The model of the patient’s lung is a discrete digital twin. There are numerous other examples of discrete digital twins across healthcare delivery, each example tied to data collection technologies for specific clinical diagnostic purposes. Some of these data sources include vitals monitors, imaging technologies for specific conditions, sensors for electroencephalography (EEG) and electrocardiogram (ECG). All these technologies deliver discrete data describing one (or very few) aspects of a patient’s condition. Situational awareness is at the heart of HDO digital twins. They are the culmination of information gathered from IoT and other sources to create an informed, accurate digital model of the real-world healthcare organization. Situational awareness is the engine behind various “hospital of the future,” “digital hospital” and “smart patient room” initiatives. It is at the core of the RTHS. Digital twins, when applied through the RTHS, positively impact these organizational areas (with associated technology examples — the technologies all use one or more types of digital twins to fulfill their capability): Care delivery: Clinical communication and collaboration Next-generation nurse call Alarms and notifications Crisis/emergency management Patient engagement: Experiential wayfinding Integrated patient room Risks Digital Twin Usability Digital twin risk is tied directly to usability. Digital twin usability is another way of looking at the issue created by poor data quality or low data point counts used to create the twins. Decision making is a process that is reliant on inputs from relevant information sources combined with education, experience, risk assessment, defined requirements, criteria and opportunities to reach a plausible conclusion. There is a boundary or threshold that must be reached for each of these inputs before a person or system can derive a decision. When digital twins are used for one or many of these sources, the ability to cross these decision thresholds to create reasonable and actionable conclusions is tied to the accuracy of the twins (see Figure 2). Figure 2: Digital Twin Usability Thresholds For example, the amount of information about a patient room required to decide if the space is too hot or cold is low (due to a single temperature reading from a wall-mounted thermostat). In addition, the accuracy or quality of that data can be low (that is, a few degrees off) and still be effective for deciding to raise or lower the room temperature. To decide if the chiller on the roof of that patient wing needs to be replaced, the decision maker needs much more information. That data may represent all thermostat readings in the wing over a long period of time with some level of verification on temperature accuracy. The data may also include energy load information over the same period consumed by the associated chiller. If viewed in terms of a digital twin, the complexity level and accuracy level of the source data must pass an accuracy threshold that allows users to form accurate decisions. There are multiple thresholds for each digital twin — based on twin quality — whether that twin is a patient, a revenue cycle workflow or hospital wing. These thresholds create a limit of decision impact; the lower the twin quality the less important the available decision for the real-world entity the twin represents. Trusting Digital Twins for HDOs The concept of a limit of detail required to make certain decisions raises certain questions. First, “how does a decision maker know they have enough detail in their digital twin to take action based on what the model is describing about its real-world counterpart?” The answer lies in measurement and monitoring of specific aspects of a digital twin, whether it be a discrete twin, composite twin or organization twin. Users must understand the inputs required for decisions and where twins will provide one or more of the components of that input. They need to examine the required decision criteria in order to reach the appropriate level of expected outcome from the decision itself. These feed into the measurements that users will have to monitor for each twin. These criteria will be unique to each twin. Composite twins will have unique measurements that may be independent from the underlying discrete twin measurement. The monitoring of these key twin characteristics must be as current as the target twin’s data flow or update process. Digital twins that are updated once can have a single measurement to gauge its appropriateness for decisioning. A twin that is updated every second based on event stream data must be measured continuously. This trap is the same for all digital twins regardless of context. The difference is in the potential impact. A facilities decision that leads to cooler-than-desired temperatures in the hallways pales in comparison to a faulty clinical diagnosis that leads to unnecessary testing or negative patient outcomes. All it takes is a single instance of a digital twin used beyond its means with negative results for trust to disappear — erasing the significant investments in time and effort it took to create the twin. That is why it is imperative that twins be considered a technology product that requires constant process improvement. From the IoT edge where data is collected to the data ingestion and analytics processes that consume and mold the data to the digital twin creation routines, all must be under continuous pressure for improvement. Recommendations Include a Concise Digital Twin Vision Within the HDO Digital Transformation Strategy Digital twins are one of the foundational constructs supporting digital transformation efforts by HDO CIOs. They are digital representations of the real-world entities targeted by organizations that benefit from the advances and efficiencies technologies bring to healthcare delivery. Those technology advances and efficiencies will only be delivered successfully if the underlying data and associated digital twins have the appropriate level of precision to sustain the transformation initiatives. To ensure this attention to digital twin worthiness, it is imperative that HDO CIOs include a digital twin vision as part of their organization’s digital transformation strategy. Binding the two within the strategy will reinforce the important role digital twins play in achieving the desired outcomes with all participating stakeholders. Building new capabilities — APIs, artificial intelligence (AI) and other new technologies enable the connections and automation that the platform provides. Leveraging existing systems — Legacy systems that an HDO already owns can be adapted and connected to form part of its digital platform. Applying the platform to the industry — Digital platforms must support specific use cases, and those use cases will reflect the needs of patients, employees and other consumers. Create a Digital Twin Pilot Program Like other advanced technology ideas, a digital twin program is best started as a simple project that can act as a starting point for maturity over time. Begin this by selecting a simple model of a patient, a department or other entity tied to a specific desired business or clinical outcome. The goal is to understand the challenges your organization will face when implementing digital twins. The target for the digital twin should be discrete and easily managed. For example, a digital twin of a blood bank storage facility is a contained entity with a limited number of measurement points, such as temperature, humidity and door activity. The digital twin could be used to simulate the impact of door open time on temperature and humidity within the storage facility. The idea is to pick a project that allows your team to concentrate on data collection and twin creation processes rather than get tied up in specific details of the modeled object. Begin by analyzing the underlying source data required to compose the digital twin, with the understanding that the usability of the twins is directly correlated to its data’s quality. Understand the full data pathway from the IoT devices through to where that data is stored. Think through the data collection type needed for the twin, is discrete data or real-time data required? How much data is needed to form the twin accurately? How accurate is the data generated by the IoT devices? Create a simulation environment to exercise the digital twin through its paces against known operational variables. The twin’s value is tied to how the underlying data represents the response of the modeled entity against external input. Keep this simple to start with — concentrate on the IT mechanisms that create and execute the twin and the simulation environment. Monitor and measure the performance of the digital twin. Use the virtuous cycle to create a constant improvement process for the sample twin. Experience gained through this simple project will create many lessons learned and best practices to follow for complex digital twins that will follow.