The Client

This Philadelphia metropolitan area healthcare system serves thousands of patients every day through its acute care hospitals and a 40+ location physician practice network. The majority of patient interactions begin with a phone call placed by the patient to the physician network.

The Challenge

The physician network is faced with having to promptly and efficiently answer and field thousands of incoming patient telephone calls each day, and most new and existing patient appointments are scheduled via phone. These calls are integral to patient care and patient satisfaction, and thus affect the system’s effectiveness in attracting and retaining patients.

In addition, staff must also efficiently process thousands of patients physically coming into the facilities, creating constant conflicts between answering the phone and speaking with the patient in front of them. This led to unanswered calls, callers left on hold, inefficiencies and delays in routing calls, and patient complaints.

Given the large number of employees involved in the physician network and the inability to gain statistics, the system had no way to identify and correct problems or to measure staff performance. As a result, the healthcare system suffered from loss of revenue because of low patient satisfaction scores, patient erosion, patient complaints, and low staff morale.

The Solution

In consultation with the client, ComTec designed and implemented a customized iConnectRX voice communications platform and training program to solve the issues.

The healthcare system immediately saw increases in staff efficiency, patient satisfaction, and revenues through more efficient handling of patient phone calls. The healthcare system also leveraged ComTec’s technology and training program to create a change in staff habits, resulting in a shift to a culture that is patient-centric and aligned with the financial goals of the health system.

No CapEx was needed for the platform, equipment and training; ComTec project managed, implemented, and provided a comprehensive and customized training program budgeted as an operating expense, which was 8% lower than their previous costs.

The Benefits

The healthcare system has experienced the following immediate benefits:

• Increased revenues
• Reduced costs
• More patient appointments per inbound call
• Improved communication engagement among patients, staff, and doctors
• Increased patient satisfaction and loyalty
• Higher staff morale

Result

ComTec’s customized reporting now lets management measure financial success as well as staff performance, enabling easy identification of individual and group weaknesses for continued staff optimization.