Improve Patient Service with P.A.I.R.

We hear a lot about patient satisfaction, servicing the patients’ needs, and being patient centric. But what we are finding out, these terms mean different things to different people. Without a clear understanding of what service means, all parties involved can/will be disappointed.

When we discuss service in our company, we focus on P.A.I.R., realizing that the patient and provider need to be coupled in order to achieve success.

Proactive- the key to being a star in the service world is to anticipate what your client is going to need. This is no different in healthcare. Informing patients about flu shots is a simple example of this. You are letting patients know to get vaccinated well before the season hits. Calling patients before their appointments to discuss their ailments, concerns, and medications is a great way to make their appointment more productive. Your staff has everything it needs to take a proactive approach with the patient before they even meet.

Attentive- paying attention to your clients’ needs is another important skill to establish a culture of good service. In the health and wellness world, this includes greeting the patients upon arrival, seeing them promptly, asking key questions about their health that will unlock the keys to getting them back to good health, and humanizing them throughout.

Interactive- the best companies know that the client experience needs to be interactive. You need to take the time to talk with (not at) your patients to help them understand the ramifications of their diet, how to improve their health, and the gravity of their situation. You also need to provide tools to help them learn about ways to live healthier, mend faster, ease loved ones pain- frankly whatever the situation, there needs to be ways for them to learn about it.

Responsive- reacting to a situation and turning it into a positive experience is another key service feature. In health care, this could be as simple as returning a phone call promptly to emergency surgery. The key is that the patient receives a response. Too many times, patients wait by the phone for days to get results of labs, MRIs, etc. only to be told in confusing clinical terms that their issue is. Call promptly within an established timeframe in layman’s terms to help the patient understand.

Halo Health uses the P.A.I.R. method in its HDTV based waiting room patient education systems. We work with you to provide customized, ad-free health and wellness information that helps spur your conversation with your patient by introducing topics on pertinent diseases states. We allow you to provide personalized messages to welcome patients to your office and give them information on wait times, insurance and other paperwork, and more. The information is always presented to help the patient approach you for help. The segments are never intended to diagnose or treat- that is your job. And we can change the content on demand, so we change as your practice does.

To learn more, contact us at jim@haloheals.com, www.haloheals.com or 856-520-8655.