Quantifying Qualitative Data to Drive Performance
Performance. Quality. Compliance. Read any healthcare blog or website and it’s clear that these initiatives are intended to be the driving forces behind delivering exemplary patient care experiences for healthcare organizations across the U.S. Of course, the measurements and processes for collecting, analyzing and reporting data related to these objectives vary greatly between the clinical and non-clinical departments in a hospital.
Clinical data metrics, like those developed by the Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services (CMS), involve outcome measurements of specific conditions and are generally reliant on data that is available from reporting tools within many electronic health record (EHR) systems. Non-clinical data like profit/loss, patient payments and payer ratios can be assembled using various software tools as well. The challenge of measuring the less tangible, qualitative aspects of non-clinical data resulting from phone conversations and face-to-face interactions in the revenue cycle can be harder to overcome.
Call recording technology is used by some hospital call centers, but the missing link for measuring the quality and process compliance of these interactions goes beyond simply recording calls. In order for call recording data to be impactful for an organization, one must be able to audit, index and report on the data contained in the recorded conversations.
The customer service team at Sarasota Memorial Health Care System (SMHCS) recognized this challenge and addressed it head-on. “Healthcare is so much about metrics and benchmarks. You can listen to calls, but how do you really compare performance without an objective measure?” said Alexander Wemyss, MBA, CHAA, Manager of Collection Services.
As part of an initiative to expand its ability to monitor employee performance, SMHCS partnered with Vyne Medical to conduct an assessment of departmental processes and as a result, implemented the Trace® Quality Assurance (QA) quality scoring module. Patient Access leaders at SMHCS implemented Vyne’s online QA scorecards to review and assess a random sampling of recordings and chart staff performance by individual, team and key measures.
The scorecards quantify qualitative factors such as employee tone and empathy, providing an objective measure to compare and track performance over time. According to Wemyss, the QA scorecards enable SMHCS to “track quality just as we do key measures such as collections, call duration and hold time.”
Additionally, SMHCS began performing individual and team audits of the QA data on a monthly basis. Agents are able to see their performance trends and where they stand in comparison to other team members – a motivational benefit to team leaders and individuals.
Another Vyne Medical client, Moffitt Cancer Center, began using the recently expanded QA functionality to conduct screen recording along with audio recording for their team’s quality program. According to Rebecca Ashe, Revenue Cycle Quality & Training Manager, “Screen recording allows us to monitor our team members’ navigation while on the phone with the patient. It has helped us not only enhance our quality program, but also expanded the feedback we’re able to provide our new hires in their 90-day introductory period.”
Seeing how team members navigate through workflows plus having the ability to score factors that may not be visible in their notes, like tone of voice, attitude, responsiveness, and compassion, can prove to be an invaluable tool for measuring the effectiveness of training programs meant to optimize the patient experience.
Contact us to schedule a call with one of our Vyne Medical healthcare solution experts today and ask us how our Quality Assurance and Screen Recording products can help drive performance, quality and compliance for your organization.