Biomedical subjects
Publications and source records attributed to R S MacStravic.
This study was designed to test whether factors associated with customer and employee loyalty are linked to hospital loyalty, and to measure the relative strength of the associations between traditional patient satisfaction factors and loyalty as compared to non-traditional factors.
Over the past four years, Provenant Health Partners (PHP), Denver, has been developing and implementing a management information system to meet the organization's current needs. The system consists of the following information networks: Internal management; Electronic claims processing; Purchasing; Physician communications; Clinic communications; Physician practices; Other hospitals,offnaged health. In the past, PHP used the system primarily for traditional management and control purposes. Recently, however, the organization has extended the use of its data outputs to include internal and external marketing purposes as well. Clinical, service, and management quality data are now tracked and shared with internal and external constituents. PHP is also working to develop a health information system for the future. Such a system will include all the components of the current management information system, but will also facilitate effective health management of populations enrolled in the organization's integrated delivery network.
In 1991 KUSA Channel 9Health Fair Foundation asked Provenant Health Partners--a Catholic multi-institutional healthcare system in the Denver area--to become a sponsor of its annual fairs. Provenant viewed this invitation as an excellent opportunity to extend its mission and increase its focus on health and community service. Since January 1992, Provenant and 9Health Fair have conducted more than 45 fairs at 28 different work sites. At many sites, more than one employer participates, so approximately 90 companies have actually been served. Health fair volunteers and healthcare professionals check attendees' weight, blood pressure, lung function, body fat composition, foot conditions, vision, and hearing. Attendees may be screened for peripheral vascular disease, glaucoma, and a variety of cancers. In addition, a comprehensive blood chemistry test and a prostate-specific antigen blood test are offered for a small fee. For conditions requiring further evaluation, attendees are referred for medical follow-up. The fairs have been successful in identifying pathological conditions, enabling many people to seek early treatment. The early detection has resulted in significant healthcare cost savings. Health fairs have also promoted higher familiarity and favorability ratings of Provenant Health Partners and constituent institutions. Perhaps more important, the health fairs have enabled hundreds of Provenant employees and staff physicians to devote thousands of hours volunteering to promote better health in the community.
As results are used to measure hospital performance, administrators must learn to recognize the interrelation of various outcomes measurements and balance their priorities. But most managers and marketers prefer being held accountable for measurable effort rather than for measurable results.
For more than five years hospitals have been developing computer communications networks as a physician bonding strategy because of their success in promoting hospital admissions and additional referrals to the sponsoring hospitals' specialists. An alternative, nonproprietary network may also be worthy of consideration because of the services and benefits it delivers to the total health care delivery system and to society as a whole--in addition to the advantages it offers the sponsoring hospital. An example of such a network is offered as an illustration.
There are many voices urging health care organizations to adopt aggressive competitive warfare, but a careful look at the dynamics affecting health care suggests that partnership may be at least as promising a strategy as warfare to promote mission and survival.
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Explore the source record for details and available documents.
Keeping tabs on the competition is a necessity, not a luxury, for organizations operating in today's health-care marketplace. This article, the second of two, explores various strategies for using competitive intelligence and suggests ways to ensure organization-wide commitment to gathering and using this information as part of an overall strategic plan.
The real challenge in healthcare marketing today is managing markets, focusing on selected groups of customers rather than on the organization or its services. Market management includes three distinct but related levels: Strategic market management assesses current and potential markets and chooses those the organization can serve best; segment management focuses on the needs and wants of subsets of chosen customers; and customer management reinforces long-term commitments to the organization. The patient care experience can be broken down into specific contacts with each staff member. The key to managing the experience is to identify and achieve standards of performance for each contact by examining what each event means to the patients and how patients judge each staff member, as well as the overall care experience. Regular feedback helps. An unavoidable risk in market management is that a given segment may decline in size, in need for services, or in cohesiveness as a segment. Yet those organizations which can identify the right segments and "manage" them effectively will have an advantage in a competitive market.
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Explore the source record for details and available documents.
Explore the source record for details and available documents.
Often associated with marketing warfare, competitive intelligence has become an essential part of health-care organizations' strategic planning efforts. Without overstepping ethical boundaries, providers can gather a vast array of "intelligence" about their competition from public sources, from the marketplace and from competitors themselves.
Unfortunately, most patient satisfaction surveys do little more than confirm current practices. But they have the potential to do much more. In this article, the author offers numerous suggestions for crafting patient satisfaction surveys that go beyond "yes" and "no" answers and get to the heart of what patients liked and disliked about their hospital stays.
Marketing may have contributed to malpractice litigation by elevating public expectations. If all of the four basic functions of marketing--intelligence, strategy, operations, and communications--are applied well, then marketing may have a significant impact on malpractice risks and costs.
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Explore the source record for details and available documents.