Proven Ways to Boost Your Patient Satisfaction Scores

In today's consumer-driven healthcare market, where patients have more choices than ever and reimbursements are tied to satisfaction scores, there's intense pressure to provide a second-to-none patient experience. Whether you're working at an ambulatory surgical center or a hospital, you'll walk away from this presentation with plenty of practical, real-world tips on how to send patients out the door happy, satisfied and eager to spread the word about your facility's superior service.

Callie S. Craig, MS, BSN, RN, CNOR, and Stacey L. Decker, MS, BSN, RN, CPAN, seasoned OR leaders with Integris Health in Oklahoma City, Okla., say healthcare customer choice is dictated by 3 key factors: cost, quality, and patient and family experience. They'll illustrate how these factors impact the patient experience and ensure your facility is a choice destination for care.

• Set the tone. "When it comes to patient safety, one injury is one too many," says Ms. Craig. "It's not enough to tell staff to do better; you need to have systems in place to ensure safety remains the top priority." From tiered escalation huddles to near-miss reviews to regular improvement idea discussions, you're sure to get some strategies to add to your safety toolkit from this presentation.
• Embrace your role. Before patient satisfaction becomes a cornerstone of your facility's culture, you must embrace your instrumental role in the patient experience. Learn how to systematically rank priorities, instantly recognize improvement opportunities, and reward and recognize staff in ways that'll inspire them to go above and beyond.

Practice AIDET. Superior patient communication comes down to 5 elements, which are easy to remember with the aid of the acronym AIDET: Acknowledge (smile, make eye contact and show a positive attitude), Introduce and manage up (share your name and role, and look for opportunities to "manage up" your staff and other departments), Duration (share the expected duration of a test, task or wait time), Explanation (explain what you'll be doing and why) and Thank you (thank patients and let them know "We're here for you.").

• Coach excellence. Patient satisfaction is a team effort, so you must impart staff with the tools needed to bolster those experience scores. Ms. Craig and Ms. Decker will offer detailed advice on everything from providing staff with an actionable next-steps coaching blueprint to delivering the right types of development, tools and resources to help your staff improve the way they care for and connect with patients. OSM