CASE STUDY

Hospital System Uses Proactive Voice Notifications to Personalize Patient Experiences, Reduce Readmission Rates

COMPANY
The Public Hospital System (PHS) is a large public hospital facility that caters to a broad patient base. It has multiple patient-facing facilities and clinics that utilize a wide array of communications channels to interact with and meet the needs of patients and employees alike.

INDUSTRY
Healthcare

PRODUCT
Plum Fuse

APPLICATION
Reminders

Executive Summary

A large Public Hospital System (PHS) was trying to follow up with discharged patients in an effort to reduce readmission rates. The hospital turned to Plum Voice to automate personalized patient notifications that inquired about potential symptoms and could connect patients to a nurse, if necessary, all within the same call. Automating this process enabled the hospital to reach a larger number of patients in a shorter period of time. It helped to accelerate post-discharge symptom triage and reduce hospital readmit rates.

The Problem

Hospitals face all kinds of challenges when it comes to communicating with patients. For facilities that have high patient volumes that challenge is even greater. Maintaining communications with patients is one way to ensure that they’re not experiencing any problematic symptoms after being discharged.

When providers are unaware of patient problems it can result in re-admitting the patient to the hospital. Not only does this eat up additional resources at the facility, but this public hospital system (PHS) had an additional incentive to reduce re-admittance rates: fines.

PHS sought a way to automate and personalize patient communications to improve patient experiences and to reduce the likelihood of being fined.

The Solution

PHS opted for a voice-based solution for their problem. Initially, they investigated a wide range of voice communications providers, but decided to go with Plum Voice’s Fuse platform for a number of reasons:

  • They found Fuse’s visual application builder easy-to-use;
  • The Fuse platform is HIPAA-compliant, a security measure many competitors lacked;
  • They liked the VoiceTrends analytics toolkit and the data it provided;
  • Fuse could integrate with Epic.

PHS used Fuse to develop a proactive outbound notification application. The app presents patients with a list of personalized symptoms, based on their medical history, and gives them a means to contact a nurse from within the same call if they’re experiencing any of those symptoms.

The Results

After rolling out the notification application, PHS was able to control patient dialogs and deliver a useful, user-friendly patient experience. The app helped identify and resolve patient issues in a timely manner, which corresponded to reduction in the number of patient readmissions.

The success of the notification app proved to PHS the value and utility of their voice channel. The facility is in the process of developing and launching additional voice applications to serve a wider range of patient needs.

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