Multiple studies show that quality communication is a key factor in improving patient outcomes. That highlights just one important reason for health organizations to implement healthcare contact center best practices.
Additionally, enhancing your contact center also leads to lower costs, greater patient satisfaction, and business growth. Which standards should your team be following?
Consider the guidelines that should be commonplace among your service and support teams.
Key Takeaways:
- Top healthcare contact centers prioritize empathy and the patient experience.
- Cloud-based contact centers make it easier to implement and sustain best practices.
- Continual training is also vital for effective healthcare contact centers.
- Routing calls by skills and integrating productivity software boosts efficiency and engagement.
- HIPAA compliance is an essential element of any healthcare contact center.
6 Healthcare Contact Center Best Practices To Follow
When you apply the following healthcare center best practices, your agents, patients, and organization as a whole will thrive.
1. Put Empathy and the Patient Experience First
Success in the healthcare market requires being more patient-focused than ever and with good reason. For too long, the demands on healthcare practitioners and institutions meant that many folks typically experienced long wait times, late appointments, and rushed visits.
The digital era and access to remote care have given patients a greater level of choice for medical assistance. Therefore, they will stick with the care team that displays understanding and offers a better patient experience.
Let empathy guide all of your other healthcare contact center best practices. This ensures you deliver on your brand promise. When you preach putting the patient experience first and practice it, you’ll get greater patient engagement and adherence for improved outcomes.
2. Opt for a Virtual Contact Center
Modern technology allows you to provide rapid and personalized attention. Take advantage of the best in communications with a virtual cloud-based contact center, which far outperforms an on-premise setup.
Case in point: This solution allows you to easily offer patients multiple communication channels. Letting patients use their preferred method of interaction puts them at ease and leads to better discussions.
For instance, some may prefer video for face-to-face conversations while others would rather text about sensitive information. Both channels are available in your cloud contact center.
Plus, your communications records stay organized in one convenient and secure online location. That means agents and supervisors can access essential data wherever they can get online with your communications platform. This is an advantage that facilitates following healthcare contact center best practices with remote and hybrid teams.
Cloud-based services are also more scalable and flexible, allowing you to meet surging demands. For example, you may need more staff on hand during Healthcare.gov open enrollment or in seasons when accidents spike. A virtual contact center lets you bring on more lines and remote staff easily without the restrictions onsite call centers have.
3. Set a Good Foundation With Excellent Onboarding and Training
Contact center supervisors have to deal with a higher attrition rate than most industries. Still, just because you have to do more onboarding than others doesn’t mean you should give it short shrift.
Ensuring new staff understand the importance of seemingly minor details can go a long way. Solid training helps your team appear knowledgeable and meet the high bar of healthcare contact center best practices.
A good example of this is helping them understand how to properly pronounce key technical terms and doctors’ names. Agents who continually stumble over their words could cause a caller to lose confidence in your team.
Likewise, make sure each agent has adequate comprehension of your contact center software before sending them on their own. Teach them how to access vital information quickly to serve callers efficiently and confidently.
Then, continue to monitor and evaluate agents to maintain your high standards. With advanced reporting and analytics features, you can review their progress and pivot your training quickly.
4. Segment Your Staff by Skills
Where possible, allow agents to specialize in different areas of your contact center. For example, some team members can focus on new patients while others deal with specific demographics or health conditions.
This can make a considerable difference in your first-contact resolution rates. That’s because callers always reach agents who know how to serve them best. However, you must be sure your contact center offers skills-based routing to forward callers to the appropriate agent the first time.
5. Integrate Your CRM and EHR Software
Another aspect of healthcare contact center best practices is making it as easy as possible for your agents to access patient information. You can do this with a virtual contact center that connects directly with your customer relationship management software and electronic health records.
Along with a screen pop feature, agents will have pertinent details on their screens right when a patient calls. This allows them to offer prompt and personalized service.
6. Ensure You’re Maintaining HIPAA Compliance
Since 1996, the Health Insurance Portability and Accountability Act has been in place to protect patient data. A HIPAA-compliant contact center helps you avoid costly fines and penalties, besides protecting your clients.
Intermedia’s HIPAA-compliant cloud-based solution gives you a worry-free setup. No matter the channel, you can rely on enhanced security. This protects you from unauthorized access and gives full encryption for all communications.
A Top-Rated Platform Makes Following Healthcare Contact Center Best Practices Much Easier
With a robust communications platform, you’ll find it much easier to achieve these healthcare contact center best practices. Talk to one of our experts today to discover why Intermedia Contact Center has everything a modern healthcare team needs to offer smarter patient engagement.
Rob Oscanyan
Robert Oscanyan is a Senior Director of Product Marketing at Intermedia, where he focuses on helping businesses improve their customer experience using Intermedia's award-winning cloud communications solutions. Rob has over a decade of experience spanning market research, messaging, and elevating the voice of the customer. In his free time, he constantly creating new adventures with his wife, seven kids, and a small army of pets.
June 11, 2024
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