Patient Experience
Patient Experience
Engaged patients lead to improved clinical outcomes and business outcomes. For example:
- Patients who feel comfortable to effectively communicate with their doctors are more likely to acknowledge health problems, understand their treatment options, modify their behavior accordingly and follow their medication schedules.¹
- Patient-centered communication has a positive impact on important outcomes, including patient satisfaction, adherence to recommended treatment and self-management of chronic disease.²
- Patient communication improves clinical outcomes in the management of diabetes, hypertension and cancer.³
- Engaged patients lead to increased retention.
Survey Measures Background: What Is CAHPS?
- CAHPS surveys patients about aspects of quality, such as provider communication skills and ease of healthcare services.
- These survey results impact the perception of the plan and medical groups, which influence the patient’s decisions.
- CAHPS is typically mailed each year to patients between March and June.
- The survey asks patients about aspects of quality, such as provider communication skills and ease of healthcare services.
- The survey is overseen by the Agency for Healthcare Research and Quality.
Group Best Practices
Everything we do leading up to the survey can impact the results we receive. As a provider you can:
- Encourage patients to respond to the survey by explaining the value of their voice.
- Incorporate a new patient onboarding program that covers important access-to-care issues, including urgent care and referrals.
- Increase the rate of approved authorizations for routine procedures by automating the process. These may include mammograms.
- Explain the benefit of telehealth services (i.e. SCAN’s MDLive benefit) to receive in the moment care.
- Have an after-hour on-call system available (nurse advice line, physician on call).
- Provide non-traditional care access options, such as an e-portal with self-service capabilities and a 24-hour nurse advice line.
- Provide the closest urgent care in after-hours voicemail. Within CAHPS, our key measures are:
- Care Coordination
- Getting Appointments and Care Quickly
- Ease of Getting Needed Care & Seeing a Specialist
¹Stewart MA. Effective physician-patient communication and health outcomes: a review. CMAJ. 1995;15(9):1423-1433.
²S, Kaplan S, Ware JE Jr.. Expanding patient involvement in care: effects on patient outcomes. Ann Intern Med. 1985;102(4):520–8.
³Doctor-patient communication and satisfaction with care in oncology. Curr Opin Oncol. 2005;17(4):351–4
