On 3/23/2010
president Obama signed the healthcare reform bill into law. While
there are still differences that need to be reconciled between the
various versions of the healthcare bill here is the timeline for
healthcare reform changes and how Obama's health plan (ObamaCare) and
healthcare reform affects you and your health insurance:
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Thursday, December 25, 2014
Tuesday, December 9, 2014
10 Patient Communications Tips For Hospital and Clinic
Hospital systems and
hospital-owned clinics have an opportunity to connect with patients,
potential patients and those who influence them like never before.
Below is a list of 10 ways to do it, and please note none of these
include spending more on traditional advertising.
1. Create and
locally promote your physician locator.
2. Make sure your
physician locator includes maps, directions, parking
instructions/validation information, and links out to area services
for patients’ family members, such as pharmacies, restaurants,
shopping.
3. Create and
locally promote a searchable patient ambassador network tied to
physicians, clinic locations and conditions, so your patients can
read about others “like them.”
4. Encourage
patients and their “care guiders” to provide satisfaction or “How
Are We Doing?” information at every stop along your system’s
health care path.
5. Leverage
technology to communicate with patients where they are — mobile,
online, your waiting room, Facebook, email.
6. Any time your
clinic is going to make a referral to a specialist, provide printed
materials that cover information on that specialist from the
physician locator.
7. Create two-way
communications opportunities for patients to build a community of
care with them.
8. Ensure every
patient-facing messaging effort accomplishes the following
objectives:
- Sets appropriate expectations
- Guides through your system’s healthcare maze
- Educates patients and care guiders
- Improves satisfaction, from general practitioner to hospital to recovery to rehab
9. Always provide
quality, custom and easy-to-understand patient education materials on
conditions and treatments options.
10. Finally: Always,
always, always connect with patients! Use images, words and methods
your patients will understand.
Source - healthcarecommunication
Thursday, November 13, 2014
Ebola Risk Management Tips For Healthcare & Hospitals
Ebola is a critical
virus that is affecting people thousands of miles away in West Africa
and its arrived in the United States. Ebola is a severe, often fatal
illness in humans, which is transmitted to people from wild animals.
There are currently no licensed Ebola vaccines but, it does not mean
Ebola patients can't be saved.
If you take care of
your healthcare and hospitals than you can stop to spread this
dangerous Virus. Here are some considerable tips for Hospitals and
Healthcare Facility that should keep in mind when considering its
internal risk management strategy in relation to Ebola and infectious
disease in general.
1. Set up Policies,
Demonstrate Compliance
Establish
an organized, multidisciplinary framework that demonstrates
compliance with best practices and available guidance by putting in
place policies and procedures specific to infection control and
particularly for those who contemplate caring for patients with
potentially highly infectious conditions.
You should keep in
mind various essential factors while considering policies like-
- Care protocols for Ebola suspected,
- Environment care,
- Treatment of infectious waste,
- Transportation of patients,
- Use of isolation rooms and systems,
- Staff follow-up and monitoring post-exposure
2. Educate Staff,
Demonstrate Due Diligence
Staff should be
trained to -
- Identify the signs and symptoms
- Correlating factors in diagnosing Ebola
- Reduce risk of transmission
- Provide necessary clinical care
3. Maintain Vigilance
Maintain vigilance
with the policies and procedures above to ensure staff compliance.
Audit behavior to ensure that best practices that take into account
CDC guidance, as well as real-time experience from those in the
field, are diligently followed, where applicable. Intervene
immediately where any lapse in policy, procedure or process is
identified, and share lessons learned.
4. Cut down Error Risk
Keep attention high
and staff focused to reduce risk of errors. Ensure that the
framework developed and educational efforts are collaborative among
medical staff, nursing staff, and other clinical and non-clinical
team members.
5. Know Your Capacity
Avoid getting in
over your head—identify what your facility can and cannot handle.
Consider a SWOT analysis by evaluating Strengths, Weaknesses,
Opportunities and Threats of both physical and human resources.
Consider also undertaking a process of confirmation and documentation
of facility capabilities to help guide patient care and potential
transport if a suspected case is identified in your facility or
another facility nearby.
6. Address Staff
Concerns
Consider employee
matters. Be prepared to deal with concerns of staff. Support of and
care for staff does not stop at the end of a shift or with the
recovery or demise of a patient with an infectious disease like
Ebola.
The
original article published - mwe
Wednesday, October 29, 2014
Causes & Management of Stress for Healthcare Workers
Employers should provide a stress-free work environment, recognize where stress is becoming a problem for staff, and take action to reduce stress. Stress in the workplace reduces productivity, increases management pressures, and makes people ill in many ways, evidence of which is still increasing.
Stress and stress management are directly related to personal well-being and specifically to workplace well-being.
Causes of stress at work
Stress and stress management are directly related to personal well-being and specifically to workplace well-being.
Causes of stress at work
- Lack of effective communication and conflict resolution
- Office politics and conflict among staff
- Bullying or harassment, by anyone, not necessarily a person's manager
- Excessive time away from home and family
- Lack of job security
- Feeling powerless and uninvolved in determining one's own responsibilities
- Long working hours
- Continuous unreasonable performance demands
- A feeling that one's reward reward is not commensurate with one's responsibility
- Working hours, responsibilities and pressures disrupting life-balance (diet, exercise, sleep and rest, play, family-time, etc)
Stress Management Ideas-
Here are some tips you can apply to reduce stress-
1. Brisk Walk and Self-Talk
Go for a short quick really brisk walk outside.Change your environment & breathe in some fresh air and smell the atmosphere. Trees, rain, flowers, traffic fumes - doesn't matter - stimulate your senses with new things.
2. Make a Cuppa
Any tea will do, but a flavored cup of tea is even better.Experiment with different natural flavorings using herbs and spices and fruit.
3. Humour
Humour is one of the greatest and quickest devices for reducing stress. Humour works because laughter produces helpful chemicals in the brain. Keep taking the laughter medicine until you feel suitably relaxed and re-charged.
4. Rehydrate
Go get a big cup or a bottle of water. Most of us fail to drink enough water - that's water - not tea, coffee, coke, 'sports' drinks, Red Bull or fruit juice. If you starve your body of water you will function below your best - and you will get stressed. Physically and mentally. You will drink more water if you keep some on your desk at all times - it's human nature to drink it if it's there - so go get some now.
5. Catnap or Powernap
Take a quick nap. It is nature's way of recharging and re-energising. A quick 10-30 minutes' sleep is very helpful to reduce stress.
Source - businessballs
Thursday, October 9, 2014
Effective Tips For Better Revenue Cycle Management
To keep bottom lines
healthy, organizations are turning to a process called lean revenue
cycle management.
Here, Gallagher
provides six tips on lean revenue cycle management.
1.
Focused on the mission
In order to maximize the
benefits of lean management, everyone involved in the improvement
process must be aligned
2.
Keep an eye on Changes
It is more important now than
ever to keep up to date with latest legislative decisions,”
Gallagher said.
3.
Understand payer contracts
Gallagher says it’s crucial
for those involved in the revenue cycle to fully understand payer
contracts.
4.
Scope value stream
In lean management, a value
stream defines all the activities — both value-added and non-value
added — required within an organization to deliver a specific
service
5.
Information technology is not everything
Going out and purchasing what
Gallagher calls a “magic” software package is not going solve the
problem, revenue cycle management or otherwise.
6.
Internal transparency
Gallagher said, “it is
important to be transparent internally and to not point fingers or
play the blame game, but rather to focus on what you can do to fix
the process.”
Source: medicalpracticeinsider
Wednesday, September 17, 2014
How to Improve Patient Satisfaction - Best Hospital Marketing Techniques
Remember when you first consulted Expedia or TripAdvisor to read reviews on hotels? It probably drastically changed the way you shopped for a place to stay. Now hospitals are facing the same world of transparency and competition, and they would do well to consult the marketing playbook hotels and other service businesses use to enhance their customers’ experience.
How can hospitals be sure they are providing a good patient experience? Through the RATER model for customer satisfaction, a marketing framework used in all kinds of service contexts, from hospitality to customer support in technology firms.
RATER stands for Reliability, Assurance, Tangibles, Empathy, and Responsiveness. Here’s how these metrics fit in to the health care context:
Reliability : Like any other service, health care is supremely human-oriented. That’s a good thing—I can’t imagine a robot giving me a physical examination—but humans are, well, human. They are moody, inconsistent and can get tired. But patients want their health care provider to be reliable.
Assurance : In health care, probably more than any other area, people want to feel confident that they’re getting the right service. Doctors can give assurance by talking openly with their patients.
Tangibles : Patients would benefit from something tangible after their treatment, like instructions for home care, tips to stay healthy, or glow-caps on prescription bottles to remind you to take your medicine.
Empathy : When doctors have empathy, it helps them communicate recommendations in a way that’s sensitive to the patient’s values and aspirations.
Responsiveness : How long should you wait to see a doctor? When can you expect the results of your mammogram? These are questions of responsiveness, and they are based in large part on patient expectations.
I recommend using the RATER scale to see where businesses stand with customers on each of the five dimensions. Then share the findings with service providers and brainstorm ways to improve the score.
Original Article - Forbes
RATER stands for Reliability, Assurance, Tangibles, Empathy, and Responsiveness. Here’s how these metrics fit in to the health care context:
Reliability : Like any other service, health care is supremely human-oriented. That’s a good thing—I can’t imagine a robot giving me a physical examination—but humans are, well, human. They are moody, inconsistent and can get tired. But patients want their health care provider to be reliable.
Assurance : In health care, probably more than any other area, people want to feel confident that they’re getting the right service. Doctors can give assurance by talking openly with their patients.
Tangibles : Patients would benefit from something tangible after their treatment, like instructions for home care, tips to stay healthy, or glow-caps on prescription bottles to remind you to take your medicine.
Empathy : When doctors have empathy, it helps them communicate recommendations in a way that’s sensitive to the patient’s values and aspirations.
Responsiveness : How long should you wait to see a doctor? When can you expect the results of your mammogram? These are questions of responsiveness, and they are based in large part on patient expectations.
I recommend using the RATER scale to see where businesses stand with customers on each of the five dimensions. Then share the findings with service providers and brainstorm ways to improve the score.
Original Article - Forbes
Wednesday, September 3, 2014
4 Healthcare Tips That Can Save Your Life
Thousands of people contact our organization with medical questions, and most of them--no matter how smart they are--contact us because they don't know how to get the medical information they need to stay well or to recover from illness. Going online can be very helpful, very confusing, or even dangerous.
Here are some simple tips to help:
Here are some simple tips to help:
1. Don't wait.
2. Be thoughtful about treatment decisions.
3. Research doctors and medical facilities.
4. Stick to reputable websites.
Read Full Article - huffington post
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