M2SYS Healthcare Solutions

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Brad Tritle

Patient Engagement in Healthcare How is it defined, does it have a significant on improving health and reducing the cost of care, what engagement initiatives are providers using, and what will future engagement look like?
Podcast length 52:39

Topics Covered in Podcast:

Definition of patient engagement and how it manifested as a Stage 2 Meaningful Use Requirement Patient engagement federal mandate parameters The essential elements of a practical and feasible patient engagement initiative beyond patient portals The relationship between patient centered care and patient engagement Healthcare provider patient engagement performance and examples of successes and failures

Topics Covered in Podcast (continued):

Healthcare provider patient engagement obstacles The future of patient engagement

Patient Engagement Defined & Why Its a Part of Meaningful Use Stage 2
The industry has yet to agree what the definition of patient engagement is The Center for Advancing Health Behaviors provides the best framework: Actions individuals must take to obtain the greatest benefit from the healthcare services available to them. The patient engagement movement originated from the convergence of three sources: #1 - Institute for Healthcare Improvements (IHI) triple aim which is: To improve the health of populations To decrease the per capita cost of care To improve the patient experience (which includes satisfaction) #2 - National Quality Forum Established National Priorities Partnership Provided input into the National Quality Strategy

Patient Engagement Defined & Why Its a Part of Meaningful Use Stage 2 (continued)
Specifically, Patients and families need to be involved in their own care. #3 - The Office of the National Coordinator for Health Information Technology (ONC) Released a National Health IT Strategic Plan Goal #4 states, Empower individuals through Health IT to improve their health in the healthcare system Ultimately the Congress appointed Federal Advisory Committee established a Health IT Rules Committee that added engagement as part of Meaningful Use Stage 2

Patient engagement goals requires that patient action will be more than 5% of a practices patients sending secure messages to the provider and more than 5% of the patients accessing their health information online

Patient Engagement Defined & Why Its a Part of Meaningful Use Stage 2 (continued)
Core objective #7 requires the healthcare provider to provide patients the ability to view online, download and transmit their health information within four business days of the information being available

Did you know?

Communication continues to be a basic hindrance to healthcare relationships. 50% of seniors do not bring a list of questions to cover during appointments with their doctors and more than 60% of seniors do not regularly bring a list of medications to their physician appointments. One-quarter of seniors never bring a list of medications.

Patient Engagement Federal Core Objective Parameters

Core Objective #7 Healthcare providers must allow patients to view, download, and transmit their health information within four days of their visit Measurement: The provider must make the information available to 50% of all the unique patients seen while in turn, more than 5%* of all unique patients seen must view, download, or transmit their health information Core Objective #17 Requires the use of secure electronic messaging to communicate with patients on relevant health information. This will be measured by more than 5% of unique patients sending secure messages using the messaging function of your Certified EHR. Measurement: More than 5% of unique patients must send secure messages using the messaging function of your Certified EHR
*Originally discussed that the threshold should be 10% before it was changed to 5%

Patient Engagement Federal Core Objective Parameters

The question becomes: 100% of patients can access their medical information electronically, but how many actually will?

Did you know? Stage 2 of the CMS EHR Incentive Programs will begin in 2014 for those Eligible Professionals (EPs) who have completed two stage 1 reporting periods. Stage 2 includes new objectives to improve patient care through better clinical decision support, care coordination, and patient engagement.

Essential elements of a practical and feasible patient engagement initiative beyond patient portals
Most people look to patient portals as the first step of engagement Some providers are offering patients the ability to download their information and store in in a data repository like Microsoft HealthVault allows patients to combine health information from multiple providers and medical devices Social media provides an interactive platform to engage patients Examples: Blogging (knowledge sharing) gather a list of commonly asked questions by patients and dedicate a blog post to each (e.g. The Top 5 health concerns for a 2 year old.) Facebook, Twitter Establishing a page/tweet stream for healthcare organizations can help build communities and trust through quality engagement Videos developing short clips that answer common patient questions and creating v-logs (video blogging), a YouTube channel or both!

Essential elements of a practical and feasible patient engagement initiative beyond patient portals (cont.)
Key tip - Healthcare providers unsure of whether social media is relevant should start by identifying where their patients are and then listening before developing a strategy

Did you know? The Journal of Internet Medical research reports that 60% of adults use the Internet to find desired health information.*

*Social media sites are emerging as a potential source for online health information. However, little is known about how people use social media for such purposes. via The Journal of Medical Internet Research)

Essential elements of a practical and feasible patient engagement initiative beyond patient portals (cont.)
As more patients turn to peers for advice about healthcare, social media will become more prominent in provider communications strategy Social media is evolving into a competitive advantage for healthcare providers who understand how to effectively use it it helps attract and retain patients Patients will communicate with or without your presence on social media
Did you know? A recent report by Nielsen revealed that 92% of participants recognize that the greatest source of influence comes from the people closest to us.

Relationship Between Patient Centered Care and Patient Engagement

What is patient centered care?
Patient centered care supports active involvement of patients and their families in the design of new care models and decision making about individual options for treatment The Institute of Medicine defines patient centered care as, providing care that is respectful and responsive to individual patient preferences, needs, and values and ensuring that patient values guide all clinical decisions.

How does patient centered care work with patient engagement?

In some medical facilities, patient engagement facilitates patient centered care There is a definite need to have informed, activated, and engaged patients

Relationship Between Patient Centered Care and Patient Engagement

Patient engagement tools help prime active and engaged patients basic care questions can be answered via tools so physicians can concentrate on deeper issues Health Information Exchanges (HIEs) were created for providers but patient has become central steward of information exchange engagement enhances patient role as information liaison In order for patients to take action they need: To be informed To have tools Patient engagement tools help facilitate collaborative healthcare decisions between provider and patient and fosters a patient centric environment

Patient Engagement Performance and Examples of Successes and Failures

Meaningful Use Stage 1 saw over 11,000 providers offering patients timely access to electronic information (e.g. lab results, allergies, medications) providing access seems to be a success The ability to download, view and transmit data is still a work in progress Direct transfer of information from a provider to a patient vis a vis an account like Microsoft HealthVault is on the rise Secure messaging has proved to be an effective and efficient tool Medicare experimenting with providing access to personal health records (PHRs) through patient portals Traditional PHRs are on the decline because of their inability to store real clinical data

Industry Benchmarks

Kaiser Health is seen as an healthcare industry patient engagement benchmark over 2 million patients actively use their portal

Patient Engagement Performance and Examples of Successes and Failures (continued)

Industry Benchmarks (continued)

Mayo Clinic and their work with patient portals is another example of a patient engagement industry benchmark provider
In a Healthcare Information and Management Systems Society (HIMSS) 2013 Leadership survey asking: What are your priorities for health IT? 28% of respondents said Meaningful Use 20% of respondents said optimizing their current system 2% said consumer related healthcare issues Effective patient engagement is evolving into a tool to attract patients It is in a healthcare providers best interest to make consumer engagement a priority Providers can place themselves at a competitive advantage & increase the quality of their services through patient engagement

Patient Engagement Performance and Examples of Successes and Failures (continued)

Successful patient engagement is also found to lower accounts receivable

Did you know? 83% of Americans dont follow treatment plans given by their doctors exactly as prescribed. 42% of Americans feel they would be more likely to follow their prescribed treatment plans if they received encouragement and coaching from their doctors between visits.

Healthcare Provider Patient Engagement Obstacles

Patient portal costs can be prohibitive Remaining reactive vs. being proactive Failure to shift to a more patient centric data model (e.g. not providing patients with the opportunity to accumulate data from multiple providers) Paradigm shift failure to evolve into a collaborative patient care model Reimbursement structure how engaged can you be with patients in a fee for service model?
Did you know? Patients who had access to their online records and who may have taken advantage of other features on a patient portal used the healthcare system more than those who didn't participate in the portal, according to a study by researchers at Kaiser Permanente.

New Book on Patient Engagement: Engage! Transforming Healthcare Through Digital Patient Engagement
Available at HIMSS Web site: http://bit.ly/19V4Czb Collaborative effort between several healthcare professionals Wide range of provider viewpoints represented from small town practices to provider behemoths Contains case studies and recommendations in each chapter that can implemented by even small, private physicians Contains information on what Payors, Pharma, and patients themselves are doing around patient engagement Possible missing pieces of patient engagement outlined in book: A single, longitudinal, interoperable medical record under the patients control that crosses providers in order for providers to make the right decision, they need access to the right information Patients should proactively set up their own online medical records that aggregate health data into one single repository (e.g. Microsoft HealthVault)

The Future of Patient Engagement

Clinical data flowing to patient personal health platforms will spur growth and use must be deployed by entities that the public trusts (insurers, providers, etc.) We will continue to see healthcare apps flourish as patient engagement shifts to mhealth platforms apps that physicians prescribe and may be reimbursable under insurance Medical monitoring devices will become smaller, cheaper, and more interactive and passive to spur more patient engagement More social media functions will be built into medical applications

Thank you to Brad for his time and knowledge for this podcast! To learn more about Brads current project, please visit: www.vitaphone.com

Contact Information
John Trader PR and Marketing Manager M2SYS Healthcare Solutions 1050 Crown Pointe Pkwy. Suite 850 Atlanta, GA 30338 jtrader@m2sys.com 770-821-1734 www.m2sys.com : twitter.com/rightpatient : facebook.com/rightpatient : linkedin.com/company/m2sys-technology