In recent years, there’s been a great deal of discussion about how to engage patients in their care. Patient engagement has always been considered a good thing in practices and health care organizations. Today, it is not just important, but vital to the business of providing care.

Why the shift? Patient engagement achieves three goals in health care:

Improving the patient experience. Patients are expecting and demanding greater control over their care. Provisions in the Affordable Care Act now link performance related to patient experience metrics to reimbursement. For the first time, health care organizations—and eventually individual providers—will be paid partly based on how they are rated by patients.  

Advancing population health. Today, health care practices must meet new industry standards that emphasize outcomes instead of services delivered. Practices are on the hook for achieving better cost and clinical outcomes with initiatives such as Meaningful Use, Patient-Centered Medical Homes (PCMH), and Accountable Care Organizations (ACOs).

Reducing costs. Focusing on patient engagement can improve efficiency, reduce out-migration and reduce overall costs of patient care.

Our strategy for patient engagement is focused on these five elements: the organization’s vision for patient engagement;  a culture of engagement; the right technology and services; patients acting as collaborators in their care; charting progress and willingness to change and adapt.