Appointuit Blog Using Technology in General Practice

General Practice has got on the technology bandwagon, using it to affect behaviour change, expand healthcare access, and improve health education. Technology, once the bastion of the "tech heads" is now being used daily in General Practice to improve patients health outcomes, as they increasingly adopt electronic and mobile technology (eHealth and mHealth) to reach their patients to achieve impressive health outcomes.Imagine if you had a fire at your surgery and needed to redirect your patients to an alternative location. How would you do this quickly and easily? This was the unfortunate position David Bailey from the National Health Co-op in Canberra found himself in a short time ago. Using Appointuit Engage! his staff were able to quickly and cost effectively contact this patients and give them the relocation details.Likewise, healthcare providers often struggle with the challenge of getting patients to change their behaviours and be more pro-active about their health. While online appointment systems are a good start in opening up access and reducing non-attendances, they are just the tip of the patient engagement iceberg. Emails, SMS and other forms of mobile technology are proving very effective in the uptake of better health behaviours.How can Appointuit help?Appointuit, provides you with an easy to use, cost-effective way to contact and engage with your patient base. Made by practice managers for practice managers, Appointuit Engage! and Appointuit SMS provide a fully integrated suite of products that make sending out email and SMS campaigns simple. Both of these products are included* in your Appointuit appointment management software. As an added bonus the patients can book directly into your practice via the SMS or email, resulting in even more cost and time savings. Nifty features include the ability to filter your patient database to create a targeted patient list, and a reporting system that shows you exactly who read your communications and when- providing you with a full audit trail.eHealth is not necessarily a new concept, and many practices are most familiar with this in relation to the PCEHR. However, with desktop computer sales on the decline and mobile device sales on the increase[1], consumers are dictating the way they want to receive information.The 'anywhere, anytime' desire for information is supported by the staggering stats that show that 84% of Australians own a smartphone. In contrast to other forms of communication, 99% of texts are opened, the majority within 3 minutes of receipt. [2] Emails likewise have a high proportion of opening rates, especially when the sender is a trusted source.mHealth can be an extremely effective option when you consider how General Practice traditionally notifies patients. While posters in the practice are informative, but they rely on patients actually being in your practice to see them. Meanwhile, with a letter costed at about $3.50 when materials and labour costs are factored in, sending reminder letters is expensive when sending to multiple patients, not to mention the fact that you never know if they actually get into the hands of the intended recipient unless you extend the cost to registered post. Emails and SMS to multiple patients provides a very time and cost effective option, especially when you can track the response rate. What about privacy?While providing effective solutions, this environment also poses new challenges and opportunities for protecting individually identifiable health information. Federal policies and regulations are in place to help protect patient privacy and guide the nation's adoption of health information technology.Consumers have shown they are comfortable with mobile-enabled shopping, travel, and banking, and significant research from the US and UK shows this same level of comfort when it comes to health care. Privacy and security concerns, and skepticism about the accuracy of apps, is what some healthcare providers see as limiting factors. Interestingly, research in the Journal of American Medicine suggests that consumers whose physicians use EHR are twice as likely as consumers whose physicians do not use EHR.[3]Healthcare providers should take comfort in the fact that just like everyone else, technology has to comply with the new privacy laws coming into place in March 2014. In fact, the Office of the Australian Information Commissioner (OIAC) has set out guidelines for mobile app device developers that embed better privacy practices in their products and services, to ensure they comply with Australian privacy law and best practice.Practice communicationsMany practice currently have newsletters for their patients, however often these are paper - based on only seen by the patients if they come into the practice. Practices are using Appointuit Engage! to send our practice updates and information relevant to their patients, such as doctors going on leave or special clinics they may be running. Email and SMS notifications can reach patients quickly and cost effectively. Medication and other remindersAnother challenge getting real results from the use of mHealth is medication reminders. WHO reports that upwards of 50% of people do not take the medication they are prescribed. One of the most common reasons is "I forgot".A 2012 study showed that SMS reminders significantly aided in medication adherence, with 95% of recipients stating the text messages helped them "very much" and 81% stating that they wanted to continue to receive the reminders[4]. Quit smoking studies have also noted significantly better outcomes from those who get reminders than those who do not.Text and email reminders for other issues such as "Have you had your flu shot yet?" and "Your pap smear is now due" are also being used with great effect.St Lucia Medical, a small General Practice in Brisbane received a highly commended award in the AGPAL Excellence in Consumer Engagement Awards at the International Health Care Conference held in Sydney last September for their work in increasing flu vaccine uptake in their patient base and the resulting reduction in cases of flu seen in their community.How can my practice get started?While many practices already use SMS for appointment reminders, these same systems can be used to send out other customised messages. Products like Mailchimp, Aweber and Mailjet allow you to customise emails and create templates. However these are not integrated into your practice management software. Appointuit is the only product on the market that goes beyond appointments for patients to providing these real solutions for practices. We fully comply with the Privacy APPs and of course, your patients can opt out at any time.For an obligation-free demonstration on how your practice can start engaging proactively with your patient base, contact us at support@appointuit.com[1] Gartner Research http://www.gartner.com/newsroom/id/2525515[2] Australian Mobile Phone Lifestyle Index 2013 http://www.aimia.com.au/ampli[3] J Am Med Inform Assoc doi:10.1136/amiajnl-2012-001062[4] Journal of Medical Internet Research, http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC3376506/*SMS costs apply