Competition among providers is offering professional referral sources increasing choices, so you should anticipate the concerns of case managers, social workers and continuing care coordinators who are looking for the ideal place to send patients. By helping these sources make appropriate decisions for their clients, you will attract and keep their attention.
Ask yourself, for instance, why a social worker should call you. What difference do you make in the lives of particular clients with specific medical problems? Can you qualify your difference from all others in your community?
Hospitals, rehab centers and pharmaceutical companies are becoming involved in understanding and tracking outcomes. Now it is our turn to develop outcome information that can be used as a selling and marketing tool, surpassing those mugs and pads you have come to cherish as door openers!
Where Should You Begin?
Begin thinking about what you can study that will provide valuable results. This can be anything from the frequency of repairs for your particular line of wheelchairs to your ability to reduce the number of hospitalizations for your respiratory clients. Have you been able to reduce the severity of wounds by using particular seating cushions? Are you providing good patient and family education that has reduced the number of emergency calls or physician visits?
Regardless of what you decide to study, your subject will require a comprehensive assessment during the initial phase of working with a client. For example, when you first admit a respiratory patient to your service, ask about the number of days they were in the hospital during the past 12 months. Maintain this information in your patient record. At the end of the year, look back to see if you were able to reduce the number of hospital admissions through ongoing contact with your client and home visits or calls.
Through the development of a patient compliance program, for example, you play an important role in assisting your client to adhere to a treatment plan that ultimately reduces his or her overall health care costs. Not only will information like this impress the case manager but the managed care company as well.
Another example would be keeping track of wheelchair repair. Customers with a wheelchair that is not working can be forced to miss work or become frustrated and depressed because of their suspended mobility. Track the repairs, how many customers are affected and how rapidly you are able to replace a chair needing adjustment or fix one needing repair.
Good Data, Good Results
Remember, though, that the key to showing good outcomes is always going to be good income data. You cannot review the progress a customer has made unless you have a clear, comprehensive assessment of where they are when you first meet them. Review your assessment forms and the data you collect, and think about the information that will prove your products, your people and your programs provide quality outcomes and set standards for care.
Once you have done your homework, you are ready to create a report that will indicate your effect, your difference and the value a customer receives by investing in what you provide. While your message should let people know what you have to sell — sell the outcomes.
Outcomes are what make us all feel better about what we do. They are the reason we celebrate our work and the feeling we get when we have provided the right product for the patient. This is the message that lets your professional referral sources and patients know they have made the right choice in selecting you as their home care provider.
Louis Feuer is president of Dynamic Seminars & Consulting Inc. and the founder and director of the DSC Teleconference Series, a teleconference training program. He can be reached at www.DynamicSeminars.com or by phone at 954/435-8182.
