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Category Archives: Consumer Engagement
Will Telemedicine Be the Blockbuster or Netflix of Healthcare?
New approaches need to recognize patients’ wants and needs
One component of Blockbuster’s financial model was the late fees it charged to customers who did not return a video tape to the store in time. These fees accounted for up to 16% of its revenue. In 1997, Reed Hastings was one of the customers affected by these fees. After one late rental, he was charged a hefty $40 late fee. His frustration inspired him to help create a company that would have no late charges. This new company also had the audacious idea to send DVDs straight to the customer’s home for a flat monthly fee. The company that Reed Hastings co-founded was Netflix.
Over time, Netflix changed and adapted with new technology and shifting consumer preferences. It moved on from mailing DVDs to using a streaming platform. It developed an algorithm to help make personalized video recommendations to Netflix users. It started producing its own video content. Over time, the company planted itself firmly within many homes and routines. Conversely, Blockbuster adapted to new platforms too slowly and too late. After its peak in 2004, Blockbuster started losing market share and relevance. Today, there is only one Blockbuster store left, a curious tourist attraction in Bend, Oregon.
Markets and industries change all the time. Distinguishing these important changes from temporary fads is essential. History has many examples of companies and organizations that did not sense important changes, did not change their approach, and as a result, ended up obsolete and irrelevant. A similar shift is happening today in healthcare, but there is more at stake than a late fee. Like Netflix, the healthcare industry needs to shift and adapt to consumer preferences.
The COVID-19 pandemic has had an immediate impact on the health of our country and has also indelibly changed how patients interact with the healthcare system. Hospitals and providers around the country have had to quickly develop new strategies to connect with patients – to comply with social distancing guidelines, in an effort to slow down the spread of the virus. Consistent communication and accessibility is vital, especially given the disturbing trends in decreased preventive care visits and delayed emergency care. One solution is telehealth.
During this pandemic, we have seen that remote patient monitoring is valuable for patients with a wide variety of needs: certainly, those quarantined with coronavirus, but for healthy patients too – children in need of regularly scheduled well-child visits and adults who need routine care. Many patients have experienced telehealth for the first time and many have positive impressions, with nearly three quarters of patients who had a recent telehealth visit describing it as good or very good, according to a recent survey.
Even after the COVID-19 pandemic settles, these “temporary” approaches will permanently change patient attitudes towards technology and force healthcare providers to reexamine their approach to care. Telehealth will remain a convenient option and, in some cases, a necessary way to receive care. Embedding telehealth into standard practice of care enables providers to expand the access to people who otherwise might forgo care, and to people who may face barriers getting to a clinic, for example patients with inflexible job schedules or limited transportation.
Patients and providers are not the only people recognizing the benefits; government officials are too. While reimbursement rules were temporarily expanded to include telehealth, some states, such as Colorado and Idaho, are making COVID-19 telehealth expansions permanent.
There are many parallels to borrow from the Blockbuster example. As healthcare providers, we cannot be complacent and stick with old business models because they are what we are used to. We cannot wait for people to come to us. We cannot ignore these changing times and consumers’ changing preferences. In fact, if we adapt and provide care in ways that patients prefer, we could improve health outcomes.
The healthcare institutions that will grow and be successful during this time are those who are more like Netflix. Instead of waiting for patients to decide to seek healthcare when it may be too late (e.g., just like a Blockbuster “late fee”), we will actively reach out and remind our patients about the importance of timely healthcare services. Instead of ignoring changes in patient preferences and new technology, we will adapt quickly to new platforms for healthcare visits. Instead of waiting for patients to feel comfortable to return to a healthcare facility, we will show patients what our healthcare system is doing to ensure patient safety and protection from COVID-19. Most importantly, instead of being complacent, we will accept and develop new ways of providing care.
There was once a time that we thought that getting in a car, driving to a strip mall, and walking through aisles with thousands of video tapes was the only option to watch a movie at home. Now, many of us can get thousands of titles on our televisions, computers, and phones through several movie streaming platforms. The COVID-19 pandemic has forced healthcare systems to quickly adapt to new constraints; however, it may really be an opportunity to develop new models of care, to engage with our patients, and to make healthcare more accessible. As healthcare providers, we need to make the choice to be more like Netflix, and less like Blockbuster.
Get ready for the “Yolds”
https://mailchi.mp/f3434dd2ba5d/the-weekly-gist-december-20-2019?e=d1e747d2d8
In a recent discussion on consumer strategy, a health system executive relayed a surprising data point: the system’s most “digitally activated” market was a local retirement community. The residents of this over-55, master-planned community, designed for active seniors, had the system’s highest rates of patient portal activation and online appointment scheduling.
Growth of this cohort of “young old” consumers (YOLDS) —over 65 but still active—will explode as the peak of the Baby Boom joins their ranks. And with a median wealth of $210,000, they’ll have tremendous spending power, so much so that the Economist recently dubbed the next ten years “The Decade of the Yold”. Many “Yolds” will keep working well into their 70s, and those that do will experience slower rates of health and cognitive decline.
For health systems, the next few years are critical for deepening relationships as the Yolds transition into Medicare. What do they want today? Technology-enabled care, and access and communication that works right out of the box, as they have little patience for troubleshooting buggy software. Customized, high-touch services, like they’ve come to expect from everything they consume.
And a focus on helping them maintain their active, productive lifestyle for as long as possible. But they’re not brand switchers: once they join a Medicare Advantage plan, there’s a 90 percent chance they’ll stay. Building loyalty with the Yolds can be the found
5 Things Consumers Want From Healthcare
The healthcare system is not meeting the needs of the people who need it most, according to a new focus group study.
Based on nine focus groups of low-income consumers with complex health and social needs, “In Their Words: Consumers’ Vision for a Person-Centered Primary Care System,” from the Center for Consumer Engagement In Health Innovation (the Center) at Community Catalyst, also reported:
Poll participants reported:
• The primary care system is not meeting the needs of the people who need it most because they do not have the ability to form meaningful primary care relationships and the system does not address the impact that problems like transportation, housing insecurity, mental health issues, and more have on their overall health. “Consumers expressed the desire for a primary care relationship that is not necessarily tied to a credential [e.g., an MD], but rather one that is rooted in empathy for the significant challenges and barriers this population faces in their day to day life,” says Ann Hwang, MD, director of the Center for Consumer Engagement in Health Innovation, a national, non-profit consumer health advocacy organization based in Boston. “These consumers don’t feel that doctors have the time to listen to them, that their stuck on a profit-driven treadmill, regardless of if the institution is for- or not-for-profit.”
• Unhappiness at a system they see as profit-driven.
• Strong desire for supportive services they do not get now, such as:
- An ongoing relationship with a trusted provider;
- Help navigating the complex health and social services system;
- Providers with greater cultural sensitivity and empathy; and
- A centralized place which would include mental healthcare and supportive services in addition to primary care (a “one-stop shop”).
“The healthcare system has been going through major changes that are too often designed without meaningful input from the very people it exists to serve,” Hwang says. “Because primary care is often the first point of entry for a consumer into the larger healthcare system, these focus groups were conducted to capture the perspective of consumers with complex health and social needs about what they need and want from their primary care relationship.”
This reflects the mission of the Center for Consumer Engagement in Health Innovation which is to bring the consumer experience to the forefront of health system transformation to deliver better care, better value, and better health for every community, particularly vulnerable and historically underserved populations, according to Hwang.
“The voices in this report belong to people with complex health and social needs—a group that tends to include some of the highest-need and highest-cost patients.,” she says. “As systems shift toward value-based payment and try to understand and address non-medical drivers of good health (i.e., social determinants of health), this kind of insight is critical to designing and delivering care that actually meets the needs of the people it serves.”
Based on the poll, there are five takeaways for healthcare executives, according to Hwang:
- Consumers want a long-term, trusting relationship with their primary care provider.
- Consumers value a coordinator or navigator who can help them manage their care, connect them to social services and advocate for them when needed.
- Consumers welcome a broader conversation with their primary care provider, not just focused on their medical treatment, but exploring the needs of the whole person.
- Consumers want a “one-stop shop” where they could receive a wide variety of services under one roof, including medical services, mental health treatment and counseling, and social services.
- Consumers hope for a provider who is culturally sensitive, able to relate to their life experience and struggle, and who uses language they can understand.
CVS announces aggressive expansion plans
https://cvshealth.com/newsroom/press-releases/cvs-health-outlines-strategy-accelerate-growth
In a presentation to investors this week, retail pharmacy giant CVS Health announced plans to expand its “HealthHUB” store concept, first launched at three store locations in Houston, to 1,500 stores in the next three years.
The new store concept, built to take advantage of CVS’s 2018 acquisition of health insurer Aetna, is centered around providing more extensive care management and wellness services than traditionally available at the chain’s Minute Clinics. In addition to Houston, the company is targeting Atlanta, Philadelphia, and Tampa, all in states where Aetna’s existing insurance footprint and the new care offerings can be combined to create new benefit designs and consumer engagement approaches.
In a wide-ranging discussion of the company’s future strategies, CVS executives also outlined plans for delivering home-based dialysis, expanded in-store primary care services, and further expansion of virtual care. In sum, CVS is banking on its ability to lower care costs for health plan enrollees and increase use of its clinic services to grow incremental revenue by $850M in the next three years, and $2.5B longer term.
We continue to view CVS as an entirely new kind of healthcare delivery company, bringing together convenient, lower-acuity care services and a risk model that will allow it to prosper by reducing the cost of care and building consumer loyalty. The speed of CVS’s rollout of this new value proposition should be a wake-up call to traditional healthcare providers everywhere.
HENRY KOTULA 