How IVAs is helping caregivers and patients cope with the Delta variant

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How AI is helping caregivers and patients cope with the Delta variant
Callan Schebella, EVP, Product, Five9

Communicating clearly and effectively with patients is a hallmark of good patient care. However, as defined by the Delta variant the next phase of COVID, many healthcare organizations are experiencing a massive increase in patient communication volume. Not only do they have to communicate important updates about the virus, testing, appointments, and vaccinations; but they are also still dealing with a lot of incoming questions from patients who need answers to current health concerns they may have set in motion during the earlier phases of the pandemic. Traditionally, the only way to scale to meet this demand would be to add more agents to your support centers. But critical health care lack of staff, which existed before the virus and is now getting worse, have vendors struggling to keep up.

In response to the pandemic and as part of its ongoing digital transformations, many healthcare organizations have implemented cloud-based contact center software to facilitate work from home and maintain connectivity with patients through online channels. . This change has given us the opportunity to take advantage of it artificial intelligence (AI) technologies to quickly scale communication with patients, offer self-service and assisted support options without having to incorporate new staff, equip additional workstations, or outsource operations. These technologies include “smart virtual agents” or VAT, for short, AI-based, and help healthcare meet extraordinary demands.

VAT serves as a “digital workforce” to fill gaps and support patients

VAT offers an automated self-service to help manage the increase in workloads. As a “digital team,” they work side-by-side with human agents and are easy to increase and decrease as needed. VAT uses AI and natural language processing technology to communicate with patients in a conversational manner, for example, answering and choosing calls and resolving many transactional issues (such as prescription refills, appointment setups, etc.). .). They have the intelligence to complete common tasks without human intervention and can deploy quickly, which means health organizations can scale up to uncertainties.

While VAT can be customized, many come preconfigured with tasks that easily integrate with background systems and patient databases, making it easy to launch and update quickly as needed. Healthcare organizations are using VAT to cope with their growing volumes, and common use cases include:

– Exit notifications: Outgoing calls and messages can be automated to keep patients informed about new services or information. This can be done for individual disclosure or to share an alert with thousands of patients. By integrating with patient contact lists, this app helps streamline communication about everything from vaccine dosing schedules to pre-appointment screening questions.

Quotes: A VAT can access the organization’s calendar system to book, cancel, or reschedule appointments. You can also automate outgoing reminders via telephone and text channels.

Office / internship locator: By leveraging mapping data, IVAs can provide patients with the address or directions to get to the nearest clinic or vaccination center or test. Patients can geolocate based on their address, zip code, or nearby landmarks and request to receive a text message with location information.

– Frequently asked questions: Automated FAQs can help solve common questions about symptoms, vaccine eligibility, safety information, office hours or policies, and more. Questions and answers can be easily updated as the information changes.

– Status updates: VAT can allow patients to check the status of test results, vaccine eligibility and more.

Although VAT is deployed to reduce significant workloads related to COVID-19, they can be used for any purpose that allows patients to access information and basic services 24 hours a day.

It should be clarified that VATs are not the same as IVRs (interactive voice response) which have performed a similar function but are limited to a menu of pre-programmed options. IVAs use voice recognition to understand the context of what patients say and synthetics to respond automatically in dozens of languages. They are typically preconstructed to comply with HIPAA and some use voice biometrics to verify the identity of the caller, an advanced security feature that prevents patients from having to provide personally identifiable information (PPI) when calling or sending messages. of text. This not only adds stricter security, but speeds up interactions, so patients are not made to wait or asked to verify information they believe the organization should already know.

How VAT saved more than $ 2 million at the largest COVID testing organization in the country

VAT also helps healthcare organizations reduce operating costs without sacrificing the patient experience. An example is the COVID Clinic, which offers a public health service to rural and neglected populations by organizing and creating test sites for COVID-19[FEMALE[FEMININE As the pandemic increased rapidly and the need for testing increased rapidly, the COVID Clinic was forced to expand operations at an exponential rate.

At the beginning of the pandemic, most of the calls coming to the COVID Clinic were general questions about where and how to get tested, the testing process, whether insurance is accepted, and the cost of testing. This accounted for approximately 90% of calls. The COVID Clinic was struggling to hire and incorporate agents quickly enough to meet the needs of its growing locations. At times, the contact center was receiving more than 20,000 calls a day and more than 50,000 frequently asked questions a month, all managed by chatbots. In addition to a very small number of staff, the Clinic also did not have sufficient computer resources to manage the volume of calls, which at one point increased by 300% from one week to the next.

To address this, they deployed a VAT to manage an average of 50,000 daily interactions, freeing agents to tackle more complex tasks. Patients can schedule an appointment simply by talking to VAT directly, giving their zip code, and finding the nearest test site instantly. Via SMS, VAT sends an appointment confirmation and reminder to ensure customers make their appointment. The patient can choose to be contacted using the number from which they originally called or select a different number to offer maximum comfort. According to the call volumes that the COVID Clinic has experienced over the past year, it is estimated that it will save more than $ 2 million by using VAT. Once the coronavirus is under control, the COVID Clinic plans to modify its business model to a mobile emergency care center, but will continue to take advantage of the benefits of VAT.

The bottom line

VAT provides patients with quick, easy, and accurate self-service options, free agents to focus on more complex patient interactions, and help organizations gain the confidence they can scale to meet each patient’s needs during the increase. of Delta. Even after the pandemic, this technology will help put patients at the center of their care with easy access to important information, appointment scheduling, health records, and prescriptions. Adopting this innovation can help healthcare organizations deliver better service outcomes and prepare to succeed now and in the long run, even in times of great uncertainty.


About Callan Schebella

Based in San Francisco, Callan Schebella is EVP of Product Management at Five 9. Callan has worked throughout his career in voice automation, machine learning, and related technologies, focusing on creating solutions that make it easier for companies of all sizes to create and maintain voice-enabled applications.




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