Patient Engagement: Better Data, Better Health
When it comes to health care, being proactive is an excellent way to forge deeper relationships with patients and the best way to do that is through active patient engagement. Patient engagement is the act of following up with patients regularly, even after they have left your office or facility. Regular communication and aftercare, along with check-ups and appointments help to provide valuable insights and promote positive behavior, and it all starts with reliable data.
What Patient Engagement Means for Providers
Continued engagement is beneficial not only for the overall health and recovery of patients, but for providers themselves.
For Your Patients: After treatment, it is easy for patients and families to get lost in the day to day and forget to keep track of necessary follow-up appointments or practices. Regular discussions help to make patients feel that they are valued and cared for. It also means a greater probability of proper self-care when patients are considered and consulted in treatment plans.
For Your Practice: Patient profiles contain a vast amount of data, but most of that is useless without proper contact information. Without knowing how to get ahold of your patients, engagement becomes impossible. High quality data allows you to take full advantage of engagement benefits, such as reducing no-shows, limiting the number of necessary visits per patient, allowing clinics to take on new clients, and encouraging overall patient retention.
One of the major deterrents for providers to perform data verification is the time commitment. Yes, data verification and data validation can be time consuming, but with the right help it doesn’t have to strain your resources and is sure to become an invaluable part of your ability to provide quality care.
Patient Engagement Requirements for Meaningful Use
Optimized patient engagement is also a requirement for Meaningful Use, where those who meet a 25 percent patient engagement threshold on their electronic health record software can receive a variety of benefits from Federal incentive programs. Namely, incentive payments that will more than cover the costs of proper data validation. Additional benefits include:
- Complete and accurate patient info
- Improved care coordination
- Improved patient safety
- Healthier patient populations and communities
One of the keys to hitting your patient engagement threshold is to utilize the best available phone number, email, and mailing address for each of your patients. Contact data goes stale at an alarming rate. PacificEast is here to help ensure your engagement process stays on target.
For more information on patient engagement solutions, visit https://www.pacificeast.com/health/patient-engagement/ or give us a call at 800-665-8400.
