In the evolving landscape of healthcare, providing personalized and efficient patient care has become more important than ever. Patients are placing higher-than-ever priority on their personal wellness, yet expressing frustration with today’s service system.1 Healthcare organizations face the pressing challenge of balancing high call volumes, employee burnout, and outdated call center systems with growing patient expectations. But how exactly do you transform your healthcare organization to meet service expectations? Let's explore three innovative strategies to help solve these common healthcare challenges and transform patient experiences (PX) for good.
-
How to deliver personalization at scale
-
How to retain your healthcare employees
-
How to overcome information gaps
High call volumes:
How to deliver personalization at scale
Patients, often seeking urgent information or assistance, expect prompt and personalized responses. In addition to seeking fast service, 82% of patients report they prefer to receive medical advice from a human, making it the highest number across industries!2 They want that additional layer of care, empathy, and comfort that only a human-to-human interaction can provide versus its digital counterpart, which is often best suited for repetitive and more transactional needs.
82% of patients report they prefer to receive medical advice from a human, making it the highest number across industries!
While every interaction should be tailored to meet individual service expectations, not all engagements demand advanced specialist support. Take an appointment rescheduling request as an example. While it still requires information to be personalized based on who the caller is, it might not necessarily need to be handled by a more expensive and operationally valuable agent. With today's technological advancements, healthcare organizations can strategically invest in modern contact center capabilities to automate interactions and deliver personalized care at scale. Gartner explains organizations should “align technology investments to specific goals and objectives in the enterprise strategy.”3 In the same research, healthcare leaders confirm that AI and machine learning are two technologies that are most likely to be implemented by 2025 to effectively deliver on digital initiatives. This comes as no surprise as AI and machine learning have already proven to be a successful strategy to handle spikes in call volumes and provide personalized experiences at scale. For example, one strategy is to leverage AI-powered call routing to automatically deflect incoming calls to self-service or live agents depending on an individual's profile, previous history, or identified needs. Powered by Natural Language Processing (NLU), Conversational AI enables callers to describe their issues using more human-like, natural-sounding language. This accelerates the speed of service and first-time resolutions by improving call deflection and avoiding complex “press 1, press 2” prompt flow or live re-routing requirements.
Healthcare leaders confirm that AI and machine learning are two technologies that are most likely to be implemented by 2025 to effectively deliver on digital initiatives.
However, AI and machine learning technologies are only as good as the data they have access to. To achieve the most out of the investment, it’s crucial to connect back-office workflows with front-office interactions to create an end-to-end connection and workflow across systems. This allows the AI to access past tickets, knowledge bases, and relevant patient information to resolve issues efficiently and, more importantly, accurately. Without this access, the AI would have insufficient data to answer different types of inquiries, likely resulting in the need for live agents to intervene or participate. Research by Gartner confirms the importance of leveraging streamlined and connected experiences for digital optimization, stating healthcare leaders are prioritizing investing in multi- and total-experience platforms.4 With streamlined data and readily available access to relevant information, AI (and also live agents) can quickly provide tailored patient experiences while lowering overall operational costs.
How Cleveland Clinic enhanced its service desk operations to optimize the patient and employee experience
Burnout and turnover:
How to retain your healthcare employees
Employee burnout is a constant battle for many customer service organizations, where the average turnover rate is reported to have reached 60%.5 Hiring and training new employees can quickly become a black hole of operational costs, with one study suggesting it can cost up to four times the position’s salary.6 To achieve long-term operational efficiency, healthcare leaders must establish a unified experience strategy that not only considers the patient experience but also optimizes digital transformation initiatives to drive better employee experiences and improved retention rates.
Healthcare organizations must implement modern technology and automated workflows that streamline these processes, taking the burden of manual tasks off employees’ shoulders and eliminating unnecessary friction
Per a recent Deloitte report, organizations with a strong learning culture are 52% more productive and have 30-50% higher engagement and retention rates than those that don’t invest in professional development.7 Collecting and analyzing data to create personalized learning and training programs for each healthcare service desk agent can be a time-consuming and often manual effort. However, with the scaling and computing power of AI tools, such as speech analytics or advanced coaching, healthcare organizations can auto-generate deep performance insights for 100% of patient engagements, providing agents with personalized and real-time training and feedback to boost performance, engagement, and retention rates. In addition, investing in a more streamlined workplace can further decrease the risks of burnout and turnover. Research from Qualtrics explains, “Healthcare organizations must implement modern technology and automated workflows that streamline these processes, taking the burden of manual tasks off employees’ shoulders and eliminating unnecessary friction.”8 A unified platform and automation of tasks help reduce workloads and create more creative and engaging work. Instead of searching cross-platforms to find relevant information or spending hours answering repetitive patient requests, the healthcare call center team can focus their time on more complex assignments. The impact often results in a more engaged and experienced employee workforce, driven by a reduction in turnover and burnout rates.
Disjointed systems:
How to overcome information gaps
Disjointed platforms and siloed systems quickly limit the ability to deliver a seamless experience. Information stored in different systems creates challenges where neither the AI nor the agent will have the data readily available to seamlessly answer a patient's questions, providing the quick and effective care they seek. To address these challenges, healthcare providers are embracing digital transformation initiatives where cloud call center technology is integrated with existing systems of record (such as SAP or ServiceNow) to create a single source of truth.
This unified experience derives from consolidating engagements and record-keeping into a single platform. When back-office workflows and front-office interactions are conveniently stored and managed in one place, it becomes easy for live agents — or self-service voice workflows powered by Conversational AI — to deliver personalized care to each patient based on their profile, historical contact information, and real-time interaction data. Gartner calls this a “connected rep” strategy.9 This strategy helps drive high-performing agents and quality service at scale and is expected to improve contact center efficiency by 30% by 2026. Per Gartner, “It bridges technology and talent, using context, guidance, and design to reduce rep effort and increase consistency across interactions.” This helps quickly eliminate information gaps, streamline workflows, and provide agents with the contextual information and guidance they need to deliver the care patients want.
Conclusion
The journey to a connected and optimized healthcare contact center experience requires a strategic blend of advanced technology, a personalized care strategy, and a unified patient care system. By strategically leveraging AI and automation, each patient can receive the personalized care they need while healthcare employee workloads are effectively reduced. Explore the stories from Cleveland Clinic and Wellstar Health to learn the true impact of leveraging digital transformation strategies for optimized patient experiences.
