You can’t fail to have noticed the growing emphasis on patient-centered care in the media, at your workplace, and at conferences. The phrase has become ubiquitous over recent years. But what does it actually mean and what is the evidence that it works? What is patient-centered care, and what is it good for? The answers are a lot; and an awful lot. To be clear, there are many definitions of patient-centered care floating around.
Here we will focus on two types: Primary Care-based Patient-Centered Care (PC-PCC), and Secondary Care-Based Patient-Centered Care (SC-PCC). What follows is a brief overview of these two different kinds of Patient Centered Care, their pros and cons, examples of implementation, and where we go from here.
Primary Care-Based Patient-Centered Care
PC-PCC is the idea of organizing primary care around the needs and preferences of patients. This includes both the convenience of being able to access care when and where you want along with the quality of the care you receive. In practice, PC-PCC means moving away from the traditional model of primary care, where patients visit their family doctor once every few months, to a model where patients use their primary care provider as a one-stop shop. PC-PCC can also mean that patients are given greater responsibility for managing their own health and given the tools to enable them to do so. This might include giving patients online access to their health records and even providing patients with online tools to enable them to monitor their own health.
Secondary Care-Based Patient-Centered Care
SC-PCC is the idea of organizing secondary care around the needs and preferences of patients. It includes the convenience of being able to seamlessly access specialty care when you need it along with the quality of the specialty care you receive. In practice, SC-PCC means moving away from the traditional model of specialist care, where a patient sees a specialist once and then their care is closed off to them until the next visit, to a model where specialists take a more open-door approach. Just like in primary care person-centered care, SC-PCC can also mean that patients are given greater responsibility for managing their own health and given the tools to enable them to do so.
Four Major Points of Patient-Centered Care
1- Easy to Access
It is very important to find the right healthcare provider at the right place and at the right time when you need it. Normally patients seek healthcare providers, just like they want to search for a good restaurant, good food, staff service, and overall ambiance.
It could be hard to accommodate patients or schedule their appointments after office timings or in the weekends. Complications can arise when a patient requests for non-traditional work hour appointments as per the patient’s preference. Just imagine how happy they would be to hear that your office is offering appointments in the evening or on the weekend. Moreover, you need to see their reaction if they find out that they can conduct their appointment and virtual visits via Secure Messaging App or Secure Video Conference on Hucu.ai. Now it becomes very easy to manage their medical visits whenever and wherever they want at their convenience
2- Respect for the patient and their family preferences
Dealing or interacting with different types of personalities and their preferences is an integral part of being an effective healthcare professional. These may be because of cultural norms, social factors, economic status, education level, and various other factors. To show you care about your patients is to give respect and carry out these preferences.
Always remember that patients and their family members are an important part of the care team. In many cases, the presence of family members in a care setting can be encouraged. Part of respecting familial preferences requires allowing family members to help the patient make the right decision for them.
3- Coordination of care
In a perfect world, patients would like to take care of all of their medical needs in one place, i.e. one operating window, such as a single visit. Although every time it is not possible, being able to coordinate care at your practice will make all the difference in the patient experience and likely improve patient satisfaction.
For example, a patient who needs a routine blood pressure check-up as well as bandaging a wounded hand. It would be incredibly convenient for that patient to be able to have both of those needs met in one visit. Although this may not be the easiest appointment to coordinate, the satisfaction of this patient will do wonders for your practice. You may gain new patients through word of mouth or positive online reviews, all thanks to this type of patient-centered approach.
4- Emphasize physical and emotional well-being
It is obvious that in these appointments things like vital signs are measured. However, what is often overlooked during these appointments in relation to the social and emotional relationship with society. If you are looking to implement patient-centered care at your practice, then preventative care appointments need to attend to both the physical and emotional aspects of wellness.
Advanced technology play role in patient-centered care
Patient-centered care means putting the patient and their needs in the first place. This is generally the first priority concept for most healthcare providers. The difficulty lies in having the time and healthcare provider capacity to carry out this level of patient care. Here advanced technology can become a huge asset to you as a clinician.
Using the Most Secure Messaging App- Hucu AI enables you to track things like chronic illnesses, patient preferences, active medications, and availability. Reaching patients in their preferred manner using Secure Messaging and Secure Video Conferencing, Phone calls, or email can save time and offer great convenience. Not only are these solutions more convenient for you, but they are also overwhelmingly preferred by patients. There are many ways to put patients at the forefront of your practice, and technology like that offered by Hucu.ai can help.
The Benefits of Patient-Centered Care
PC-PCC and SC-PCC can be transformative for healthcare systems. Here are some of the most important benefits: –
Improved patient outcomes – By bringing patients into the center of the health system, and by giving them greater responsibility for their own health, patient-centered care has the potential to improve patient outcomes by helping patients address their health conditions earlier and more effectively. –
Reduced costs – Patient-centered care can also help reduce costs by preventing and mitigating unnecessary health complications and associated costs. –
Improved patient engagement and satisfaction – By bringing patients into the center of the health system and giving them greater responsibility for their own health, patient-centered care has the potential to increase patient engagement and satisfaction.
Bottom line
Patient-centered care is an approach that brings patients into the center of the health system and empowers them to be an active part of managing their own health. It can improve the outcomes of care, reduce costs, and increase the engagement and satisfaction of patients. To be successful, health systems will need to make significant cultural and organizational changes. These include shifting the focus of care from the provider to the patient, changing payment models to be more patient-centric, and making significant investments in technology and training.
