Marketing Execs Among Lowest Paid

Those responsible for revenue generation are among the lowest paid healthcare system executives, according to a study by Sullivan, Cotter and Associates, published in Modern Healthcare (http://www.modernhealthcare.com) and available for purchase here (http://bit.ly/9ErrlE).  Among marketing executive types (the study references Communications, Marketing, Fund Development, Managed Care, Business Development, but not Physician Relations), the marketing category is the lowest paid, according to the median.

Healthcare system marketing executives need to show results! According to several benchmarking studies we’ve conducted for national healthcare associations, we see this trend emerge as most critical.  You might find this informative presentation developed with MD Anderson Cancer Center helpful.

Filed under: Uncategorized Tagged: academic medical center, customer experience, experience management, experience mapping, gelb consulting, john mckeever, patients as customers

Optimal Healing Environments

One thing I have learned through interviewing patients is that sometimes the "little things" make the biggest difference. Bonuses like receiving valet parking vouchers for their first appointment or listening to a volunteer play a musical instrument in the waiting room add significant value for patients. This is especially true given that most patients can't initially determine if a healthcare facility is using the newest technology but immediately notice if they feel welcome and cared for.  

At the recent Health Forum and American Hospital Association Leadership Summit in San Diego, representatives from Grinnell Regional Medical Center and Samnueli Institute talked about their experiences creating an optimal healing environment for patients as a cost-effective way to improve patient satisfaction and experiences. Here are some examples:

1. Physical Environment: A volunteer art advisory committee comprised of members of the community raises money for art work, meditation rooms and other aesthetic elements. They also focus on nature, incorporating a "healing garden" and bird conservatory that patients can watch from the ER waiting room.
2. Compassion: Employees are encouraged to show compassion in unique situations, such as caring for a patient's pet if they have an unexpected and prolonged hospital stay. They also focus on creating a fun environment, through regularly having celebrations or themed dress-up days.
3. Patient-Centered Care: New patients answer questions about their background, and a "patient portrait" containing their basic biography is put in their room so care providers can learn more about them and develop personal connections. Also, a patient and family advisory panel, composed of members of the community, helps provide insight and ideas for new initiatives.
4. Fitness/Wellness: Fitness facilities are provided on-site and in several locations around the community. Also, a separate building offers a wealth of alternative healing services for patients, such as massages, acupuncture, and stress management.
5. "Green" Initiative: Representatives from many departments have come up with ways to "go green" including garage sales, reusable containers, elimination of mercury, purchasing local foods, and energy-saving appliances.

Studies have shown that creating an optimal healing environment can help in pain management, promote long-term healthy living, and ultimately decrease mortality. These are just some examples of ways to promote a healing environment, many of which do not require a large budget. Click here  to learn more about understanding your patient's functional and emotional needs.

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Creative Cross-Functional Solutions

I recently attended the Health Forum and American Hospital Association Leadership Summit in San Diego. One theme that I noticed was hospitals improving efficiency by using creative cross-functional solutions. A few specific ideas that I found particularly interesting and inspiring:

1. To better support employees, SSM Healthcare – St. Louis developed a HR Consultant role. Instead of waiting for employees to notify HR of problems, the HR Consultant proactively works with departments to determine if they have the tools they need, how they are implementing service improvement plans, and other organizational issues that may be hindering the department. The HR Consultant serves as a partner for improvement and develops relationships with each department coordinator.
2. SSM Healthcare – St. Louis also created a new nursing position to solve the problem of the head nurse regularly being away from the clinic for administrative meetings/duties. They created a new position, a clinical support nurse, who is in charge of managing the clinic flow and mentoring struggling nurses. Clinical staff are also able to change a nurse's name from green to red, which indicates they have noticed them struggling in some way, and the clinical support nurse then works with the particular nurse on any necessary issues.
3. Baylor Health Care System implemented the Naylor Model, in which an advance practice nurse helps high-risk patients by streamlining hospital care and transiting them to home care. They visit patients within 24-48 hours of hospital admission, then provide up to 8 home visits. Baylor Health Care has seen a decrease in mortality rates after implementing this model.
4. University Hospitals recognized a problem in their ICU, as nurses were in charge of several patients, but had to leave those patients to assist in "code blue" emergency situations. They created a new nursing position, an advanced nurse who is in charge of proactively rotating throughout the ICU to identify patients who are likely to be in "code blue" emergency situations. The result of this proactive care has been fewer "code blue" situations, as well as decreased resource restraints and better patient care when they do occur.
5. Barnes Jewish Hospital piloted using mid-level providers, under the attending physician, to focus on transitioning patients from one stage of their journey to the next. This mid-level provider serves as the "glue" that pulls all of the pieces together, even after discharge. Not only has this improved patient care, but referring physician satisfaction has improved because they have a single point of contact to obtain updates on their patients. Additionally, new nurses perceive this newly formed position as a goal in their career path.

All of these organizations first developed a strategy and vision for improving their hospital, and noted that sticking with this strategy was the foundation that enabled these changes. By thinking outside of the box, these leaders used cross-functional improvements to help clinical staff and ultimately improve patient outcomes.  To learn more about developing a strategic plan to make improvements in your organization, click here:

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More, more, more

The June issue of Hospitals and Health Networks, brought to light an all too familiar issue, the shortage of physicians, but author Bill Santamour’s explanation was particularly gripping.

To share some highlights – according to Santamour, medical school graduates are on the rise, which is definitely good news for the issue at hand, but residency slots unfortunately are not keeping up with the increase of graduates. Only a one percent annual increase of residency slots has been noted. ”And,” as Santamour points out, “with 32 million formerly insured Americans soon to receive health care coverage, the demand for doctors, particularly primary care physicians, will intensify.” As a nation, we need 45,000 additional primary care doctors by 2020, according to the Association of American Medical Colleges.

One bright spot? Texas is one of the leading states in terms of the number of total medical school graduates in 2009!

We’d love to continue the conversation with you about the challenges healthcare organizations are facing and will face in the future. If you’re interested in joining us, take a look at one of our articles, Marketing in the Era of Health Reform. We look forward to hearing what you have to say!

Filed under: Uncategorized Tagged: "health reform", health, health care, healthcare, patients, physicians

Disney Offers Prescriptions for Experience Management

In Fred Lee’s excellent book on translating Disney best practices to hospitals and healthcare systems, I found some insights that align with much of what we talk about in experience mapping, as well as some new ideas. Lee’s use of specific examples from nursing staff to housekeepers make this book a must read.   I highly recommend it for those challenged with translating strategy into employee behaviors. 

Some take-aways:

-Redefining the competition to the patient’s point of reference, not healthcare.  As in experience mapping, there’s a clear need to understand patient expectations which are often not founded in their healthcare experiences.  Many patients do not have direct experience with conditions like cancer, heart disease, and delivering babies. 

-Mandates don’t work.  Almost every organization with which we’ve worked has well documented service standards.  The challenge remains that staff find it difficult to translate those items into behaviors.  As Lee points out, concrete guidelines and the freedom to perform against them are what’s needed.  In experience mapping, we call these the ideal emotion (e.g., I feel empowered).  There are a multitude of actions one could take to meet this expectation, but managers must be willing to allow employees to become part of the solution.

-Focus on dissatisfaction.  If word-of-mouth advocacy is your best advertising (and studies suggest that negative experiences are huge detractors), then the organizational culture should be set up to address the issues of those who share negative feedback.  Our experience dashboards have been doing this for healthcare organizations for years – the most important aspect – identifying dissatisfied patients immediately and putting them in a queue for service recovery.  In fact, one of our clients has mandated that managers have 24 hours to contact patients who express dissatisfaction to resolve the issue.  The result: a significant increase in volume, advocacy and even percentile rankings using national benchmarks.  Fred Lee would be proud.

I want to thank Mark Stinson, a pioneer in the area of process-led design, to share this book with me.  Mark’s group helps translate patient expectations we uncover through experience mapping into facility and process design.

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