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HLTH 2020 takeaways

November 5, 2020


HLTH 2020 takeaways

This October, during the HLTH 2020 conference, the Fabric executive team (myself included) hosted a discussion on ‘Designing Care Around the End User.’ Our round-table discussions with HLTH attendees focused on ways in which we can improve the care experience for the most important healthcare users—the patients.

We wanted to hear it all: the good, the bad, and especially the ugly. Conversations like these, with professionals from across the healthcare ecosystem, are pivotal to all of our abilities to evolve how healthcare is delivered.

Below are a few takeaways from the discussion that I found to be particularly insightful and thought provoking, I hope you will too. 

The patient is FINALLY being seen as a consumer

The patient being the most prominent consumer used to just be an idea, something the industry would get to ‘someday’. Well, that day is here and it’s quickly becoming less of an aspirational idea and more of a reality. Patients ARE consumers. And as a consumer-focused approach gains traction in healthcare, it’s time to reevaluate the goals of the work that’s being done. The question we need to start asking ourselves now is: what does it mean to truly deliver on the needs of the patients—and how can health systems get in the process of thinking like this? This new way of thinking will not only keep patients from seeking care elsewhere, but also from avoiding seeking care entirely.  

We must consider the whole cost to patients—time matters too

In a time when financial despair is so prominent, price transparency in healthcare has become critical to health systems looking to earn patients’ trust. But there’s a cost that is continuously overlooked—the patient’s time. The value of a patient’s time is becoming increasingly important to the overall value and experience in healthcare. When a patient needs care they don’t want to be put on hold when scheduling an appointment, drive across town to the clinic, and then sit in a waiting room to get it—they want to be connected with answers and treatment as quickly as possible. If the entire process of getting care takes too much time it becomes inherently more costly to the patient. Which matters precisely because…

A shift in patient values = more competition 

Patients are using benchmarks from other digital experiences—like Amazon, or their online banking platform—as a measure of what to expect in healthcare. Patients today value convenience, different channels of access, and self service—the success of virtual care offerings like Roman and HIMS/HERS proves that. The health systems that can deliver on these wants and needs will develop loyalty with their patients. While the ones who can’t, will be passed over for another solution that does. And you better believe those other solutions will be, and are, on the rise. 

So there you have it. Hopefully this gave you food for thought, and a little inspiration, as it did for me during HLTH. We’d love to keep this conversation going, what ideas do you have to improve the healthcare experience for patients and providers? How can Fabric help make those ideas come to life? We’d love to hear from you.

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