Consumer eHealth Engagement

ManyStrong, UnitedHealth’s New Private, Personal Social Community for Actionable Health Support

2012-05-21T13:34:59Z

ManyStrong Social Community SupportAs soon as he walked through the door at Starbucks, I knew something was terribly wrong. I have known Ben for more than ten years and he has never looked like this. Ben appeared extremely exhausted, had lost his smile and gained a few pounds since our last tea together.

After he dropped his keys on the small round table and sat down next to me, I asked Ben what was happening. His elderly mother had fallen again in her bathroom. Ben had been shlepping her from the hospital to her apartment, running to the pharmacy to change her medication for the third time this week and food shopping to make sure she had what she needed. As I listened to Ben, I wondered how his brother Rob or other family members were helping out. Just because Ben is the oldest child doesn’t mean that he needs to take on all of the responsibility. Caring for his mother day in and day out was taking a toll on my friend’s health.

When he stopped talking to take a breath, I started telling Ben about ManyStrong, the new social community initiative from UnitedHealth Group. ManyStrong is a free new social tool that Ben can use to create an online community to support his mother, Evelyn. When friends and family ask “how can help”, Ben can invite them to Evelyn’s private community which has tools for them to contribute in some way.

Over the past few years, I have worked with many different social communities but this one is different:

Personalized Social Community On Demand: Ben can create a community for the specific purpose of supporting his mother. Within the community, Ben can provide updates and request the help that he truly needs to care for his mother. Knowing Ben, it is easier for him to ask for help this way than it is to pick up the phone to call those who had offered help in the past.

Action Driven Support: By following the link in Ben’s email invitation, friends and family can provide support in their own way. After all, some are a few miles away and others are across the country.

- Financial Support: They can donate money which will be placed on a cash card or purchase a gift card for Evelyn.

- Motivational Support: Her loved ones can leave care messaging to encourage Evelyn on a daily basis, motivating her to get stronger.

- Story Telling For Support: Ben and others in Evelyn’s community can upload pictures and videos to share. Seeing a photo of Evelyn walking after her fall may bring relief to her loved ones. Ben can enter comments that “mom has her dancing shoes ready” which may bring a smile to their faces, easing their anxiety for a moment.

- Physical Support: When Ben adds new requests for help within the ManyStrong community, friends and family can take on the responsibility to make a meal, run an errand to the store, spend time with Evelyn or simply check- in on her. The calendaring feature automatically tracks the need and the person taking on that need for all to see in the community.

ManyStrong Back Story

“We created ManyStrong simply to help people more easily help each other. When people we know get sick, or go through a sudden medical emergency or other serious health event, we naturally want to help them. They are our friends, our families, people we care about. It’s tough to know how to help. And with everything that person is dealing with, it’s hard to find out what you can do to help without putting additional stress on them and their family. That’s where ManyStrong comes in”, explains Kunjorn Chambundabongse (KC), VP Innovation and R&D, UnitedHealth Group.

When serious health issues arise, people turn to online communities for support. Many communities are designed for the individual with the health problem but not necessarily to support the caregiver. In their February 2011 Peer- to -Peer Healthcare research, Pew found 59% turn to family, friends and fellow patients when needing “emotional support in dealing with a health issue”.

How is UnitedHealth providing a unique social community solution? KC clarifies ManyStrong’s differentiation. “Yes there are many communities out there doing pieces of this. Some sites focus on the medical and clinical related side, allowing people to connect with others going through similar illnesses and share treatment data. Other sites focus on the non-clinical side, such as fundraising or keeping people informed through journaling/blogging. And you have many people using the big sites like Facebook, but privacy and security are huge problems with something as serious as health. ManyStrong brings all these tools into one place in a private and secure way, and allows the caregiver community manager to create a safe spot for people to rally together to support a person or family they care about.”

The ManyStrong social community solution can be used to support many different situations such as for a child with the long term illness, a senior aging at home or a co-worker battling a disease. Sometimes companies cannot envision the use cases before launching their offering into the marketplace. KC has thought about the various situations and shares ”we don’t know exactly how people will use Many Strong but we make it our mission to learn from them. When we look at users or potential users of Many Strong, we ask if there is any way that we can make the product better for that family, that community, for the people they’re supporting based on how they’re using it. One community could have hundreds or even thousands of supporters, or it could have a handful of very close supporters.”

What does success look like? KC explains “success to us is about celebrating the actions of people helping one another. Millions of messages of encouragement, millions in donations to families, and millions of hours of volunteered time… so many beautiful and meaningful actions. Success to us is seeing all these actions across our country and across the world, one community at a time.”

During their initial beta phase, UnitedHealth is offering the entire community site for free and is even covering the transaction fee on the donated money. KC describes their evolving business model for the ManyStrong Community. “Eventually we will need to charge small fees to cover bank transaction processing costs. We are also exploring integration with other service providers such as meal delivery, professional in-home care, and other features to provide even more options for people to give. We may earn referral fees from these merchant partners over time. While the site may earn some revenue, our mission is to give back profits to charitable organizations that will further benefit users of ManyStrong.”

HumanaVitality Paves the “Personalized Pathway” With Rewards to Engage Employees

2012-05-17T12:48:49Z

With the weak economy and strong pressure from healthcare reform, employers are investing in new approaches to lower healthcare costs and lift employee productivity. Increasingly employers are investing in strategies to engage employees in their own health and reward them to motivate needed behavior change.

According to the recent Annual Towers Watson/National Business Group on Health Employer Survey on Purchasing Value in Healthcare, employers indicated that two of their top three healthcare strategies for 2012 are to “develop/expand healthy lifestyle activities” and “adopt/expand use of financial incentives.”

In July 2011, Humana launched their HumanaVitality program, which is designed to both guide and reward the employee for participating in their health and making better lifestyle decisions. “Our members tell us that they are hooked as soon as they use the Vitality Age app to determine their age and learn about how their behaviors influence their health. And as they participate in the HumanaVitality program, members interact with the Vitality Age app to see how they are positively impacting their age,” explains Stuart Slutzky, chief, product innovation, HumanaVitality.

Although employee incentive programs around health are not new, Humana has incorporated several innovative strategies into their Vitality solution.

Personalized Program Design: “We are using information from the employee’s health assessment, claims information and online health behaviors to personalize their pathway,” describes Stuart. Each member sees a set of recommended activities and has the option to select any of over 30 activities to gain points.

In addition to an individualized approach, Humana has decided to test a segment strategy after determining that the pathway is similar for members that are moving through a life stage change. Humana has created a special pathway for expectant mothers, as their first target segment. This means that members who are pregnant view a special set of activities and programs that are relevant to remain healthy throughout their maternity.

Program Reward Structure: Humana has designed their program with different status levels for reward attainment. “Our members begin with a blue status and can move up four tiers to platinum over time as they collect enough Vitality Points™. When climbing to a new status level, they unlock a larger discount in the rewards mall,” shares Stuart. “Humana is also working closely with small group employers in select states to offer a premium reduction based on the percent of employees that achieve silver or higher Vitality Status. Employers may choose to pass the premium reduction to employees reaching silver, gold or platinum Vitality Status." This premium discount is in addition to rewards individual employees can redeem in the HumanaVitality Mall based on their own points earned.

Humana has defined the mall to appeal to members that have different motivations. “Spenders” can get instant gratification by purchasing with their Vitality Bucks. “Savers” can accumulate their bucks for larger prizes. Soon “Givers” will be able to donate their rewards to charity.

Through their “Jackpot Rewards,” Humana uses a gaming mechanic of randomness to select a program participant to win prizes, which are based on their status level. For example, blue status member can win movie tickets or yoga mat but a platinum status member can win a flat-screen television or iPad.

Program to Program Connection: “Our members get rewards points when they enroll in one of our health programs. We are working on rewarding the member with more points for ongoing participation in our health program such as Weight Management. In addition to tying rewards for coaching program usage, our coaches can see the member’s efforts and earnings to date and can promote different point opportunities during their interactions to motivate the member,” Stuart explains.

Consumer-Driven Program Development: The HumanaVitality team listens closely to members participating in the program. They have set up a process to gather feedback that members share through the email and call center channels, as well as Facebook and Twitter, and the team discusses these ideas and suggestions to define program enhancements. “Recently, we heard one of our members ask us to provide points when their kids participate in athletic events. This was a great suggestion and is now another activity that we reward under the program.”

Program Success Evaluation: One key program measure is participation. Humana has expanded the ways that members can participate to earn points including obtaining preventive screenings, exercising regularly, donating blood, getting CPR-certified and quitting smoking. The newest way for members to earn points is by playing their Ubisoft “Your Shape” fitness game on their Xbox.

HumanaVitality’s Future Direction for Engagement

The HumanaVitality team is working on developing a deeper personalized experience by looking at the member’s past behaviors and recommending healthy activities, which match her interests. This is similar to the way Netflix suggests movies based on past viewing behavior.

Humana is also gathering lots of data on how consumers are using their rewards program. “We are applying data analytics to evaluate program engagement beyond participation. We will look at status level movement and actions tied to behavior change,” explains Stuart.

“In the future we will continue to expand the program to ensure we’re providing support and optimizing outcomes for all members – from members with severe conditions to marathon runners,” added Stuart. “New reward partnerships will ensure the program provides relevant and aspirational rewards that foster improved health.”

Group Health‘s Mobile App Brings Consumers and Clinicians Closer for Collaboration and Convenience

2012-05-14T20:30:38Z

In early 2011, Group Health set out to find ways to use mobile to help members manage their health and make better decisions about where, how and when to get care. “We view mobile as another channel of delivering patient care which is important to us given our mission of serving the greatest number of people”, explains Colby Voorhees, Senior Product Manager at Group Health.

Group Health launched their award winning mobile application with key capabilities such as care management with “My Care”, care guidance with “Consulting Nurse” and care planning with “Wait Times” for Pharmacy and Laboratory services.

Group Health’s app moves beyond the mobile capabilities enabled by other health plans which let consumers look up health information, check symptoms or find urgent care.

“We’ve received very positive feedback from members on our version 1.0 app but were surprised that members expected our mobile application to have more capabilities out of the gate such as refilling a prescription or accessing information on the entire family”, Colby reports.

“Love the new app but am frustrated that I have to go to the full site to reorder meds. Will this be available on the new app soon?”

“Please provide a Parental Access feature in the next update, soon. I have to take my kids in much more than I go in so most of the time I end up using a web version on my phone (not fun) instead of the app.”

Last summer, Group Health released their 1.5 version with prescription refill and parental access capabilities. Their mobile app now has over 36K downloads (iPhone 25+K) and Android 11+K) by 14% of their web access users and 5% of their total members.

The two most used mobile app features are “My Care” (37%) and “Wait Times” (36%) followed by “Symptom Checker” a distant third (10%).

In “My Care”, consumers can now see their personalized list of care reminders for preventive and chronic conditions (if applicable), communicate with their clinicians (e.g. primary care and specialists), review their ‘after visit summary’, refill a prescription and access care information for children under twelve such as immunization timing. Members can also use the scheduling feature to check available appointments and book them with their PCPs. “It’s like picking a seat on the plane that you want instead of having someone else select it for you”, exclaims Colby.

Within “My Care”, the top three features used are Reading Messages (32%), Viewing Lab Results (25%) and Making Future Appointments (16%).

Group Health’s Mobile Motivation

The product team at Group Health remains focused on taking complex tasks that the consumer is trying to do and making them simple. Group Health collaborates with consumers to get input on mobile concepts and works closely with them through usability research to make sure the capabilities meet expectations and the interface is intuitive.

While Colby discussed their mobile research, I heard members voice their desire for increased convenience and an improved customer experience.

“If they had an app that made it that easy to interact with healthcare, I would choose Group Health.”

"My spouse would absolutely download that app to take care of his health since he can use it while commuting to work on the bus or while he is waiting in line.”

“I absolutely appreciate the forward thinking technological advances that Group Health has. Something seemingly as simple as an iPhone app to access my health records, completely changes and improves my experience in a way that other knuckle dragging change adverse medical providers just can't comprehend. Thank you.”

What is next for Group Health on the mobile front? Colby reminded me that they are only on their 1.5 mobile app version and there are opportunities ahead such pushing communications to consumers instead of relying on them to access their My Care dashboard.

As an integrated care system, Group Health has the advantage of leveraging their common platform for patients and providers to support care collaboration and self- management. Consumers can use mobile to access a single source for their care communication and transactional needs.

“We are thinking about the continuity of the care interaction with the clinician. There is a big divide between phone calls and in person visits. We already have secure messaging and can see where video might be the opportunity to bridge the gap in a low cost and high convenience way for patients and providers” shares Colby.

Within healthcare, the consumer demand for mobile services is quickly outpacing the apps being supplied by organizations. Consumers want all the features available on their specific mobile device, which poses a big challenge to organizations that don’t have the resources to fund all of the mobile platforms. The key will be to identify, prioritize and deliver the most meaningful features which will enhance the member experience, enable care collaboration and empower consumers to simply engage in their health.

Deja Vu. Data- Driven Retail Strategies, For Health Care This Time

2012-04-09T19:58:05Z

Health care companies today are following in the footsteps of the retail-oriented, information based financial services industry.

What financial services companies have discovered is that in order to build their business, they must build a personal relationship with the consumer. They accomplished this by creating a consumer-centric database, monitoring shopping behavior through reporting and analytics, motivating activity through multi-channel communications and launching a loyalty program to reward consumer spending,

I was part of this customer-centric transformation as the Director of Database Marketing at GE Capital, which provides private label credit card programs for Disney and Apple, to name a few marquee brands. My cross- functional team started with the consumer in mind. We envisioned the experience that our retailer customers needed to deliver to their consumer card holders to differentiate themselves in the marketplace and capture a larger mind share and business share.

This is the same path that health care companies are marching down to get ready for new customers.

Consumers Are Coming! Health Care Companies Invest in Retail Strategies

In their report on “The Era of the Health care Consumer,” Accenture describes the shift in responsibility from the employers to the consumers and the resulting health care company investment changes from BTB to BTC. Accenture cites the opportunity to learn from the retail sector, especially the segmentation, profiling, loyalty and cross channel communications.

A few health care organizations are making the needed investments to move closer to the consumer in order to better understand their needs for information and tools to support health management. Aetna, for example, has partnered with Best Buy to sell wellness programs to consumers within the retail store and deliver their wellness coaching program online. In addition to store fronts, Florida Blue (previously BCBS Florida) has invested in their Guidewell online initiative to build a relationship with consumers beyond their member base.

Most health care companies, however, are still trying to figure out where to begin.

Barriers for Data-Driven Retail Health Care

There are several key barriers that Health care companies must overcome in order to effectively engage these retail consumers.

Knowledge about the New Consumer: Health care companies have limited or no information about their newest customer that is either considering their health product/service or has just come onboard. As a result, the interaction can feel less satisfying. Using best practices from the financial industry, health care organizations can utilize segmentation and profiling to deliver a more personalized experience while gathering knowledge about the consumer through each touch.

Knowledge about Consumers' Data Needs: During their recent research, IDC Health Insights learned that “despite large investments meant to extend the organizations’ consumer-centric model, health plans know little about how consumers want to consume information…”. Financial Services companies remain aligned with their customers by inviting them to participate in their own private branded online research community. The company captures consumer input and feedback on their product road map and new marketing initiatives.

Knowledge about Proactive & Personalized Communications: Many health care organizations wait for consumers to come to their online marketing destinations including their website and social media and then wait for them to return. Although these companies maybe have tools in place to capture the contact information of interested consumers, they tend to send out the same information to everyone. Financial Services companies segment these target consumers and stream content of interest across their preferred communication channels to bring them back and engage.

Knowledge about Developing a Personalized Incentive Program: One way that health care companies can differentiate themselves is with an incentive program that rewards a consumer for healthy lifestyle behaviors that fit her profile. One of the reasons that some credit card loyalty programs (e.g. American Express) are so effective is that they target personalized offers based on each consumer’s spending behavior profile.

Health care companies can learn from the leaders in the Financial Services industry about how to leverage technology to build a retail consumer relationship through ongoing personalized communications and programs which are aligned with the consumer’s ongoing data needs.

Connected Mobile Health Apps to Sustain Consumer Engagement

2012-03-30T19:26:48Z

World Congress Leadership Summit on Mobile Health, July 25-27th in Boston

Over the past three years, I have participated in this interesting event by running a workshop or panel.

During my panel this summer, you will learn how health care organizations are investing in the drivers for continuous consumer engagement:

Connecting multiple mobile apps to personalize the care shopping, decision making and care collaboration experience.
Connecting mobile into chronic care programs with integrated tools for self management, shared decision making and coaching support.
Connecting mobile into wellness programs with capabilities to harness social community influence, digital coaching and incentives for motivation.

Moderator:

Sherri Dorfman, CEO & Consumer eHealth Engagement Specialist,

Stepping Stone Partners

Panelists:

Dan Brostek, Head of Member and Consumer Engagement, Aetna
Michael Yetter, Director, eBusiness, Independence Blue Cross
Nick Martin, VP Innovation and R&D, UnitedHealth Group
Patrick Feeney, Director, Mobile and Emerging Technologies, Blue Cross Blue Shield Illinois

UnitedHealth Group Integrates Multiple Mobile Apps for Holistic Self Management & Coaching

2012-03-08T13:40:20Z

Health Plans are finding new ways to bring value to consumers by empowering them with tools and guidance to manage their health while on the go.

At many conferences, health plans present their newest mobile application or texting campaign to engage consumers.

UnitedHealth Group announced their latest move at the recent Consumer Electronics Show to integrate several mobile health applications into their OptumizeMe solution, through partnerships with CareSpeak Communications, FitNow and FitBit. UnitedHealth is integrating content and tools to bring new capabilities to both consumers and caregivers.

Through the CareSpeak Communications’ partnership, consumers sign up to receive two-way texts to help them manage their medication and condition. UnitedHealth delivers CareSpeak’s personalized messaging to provide relevant content to each consumer segment ( e.g. asthma, diabetes, cancer, etc). A patient with diabetes opts in to receive customized education and reminder messages and can give a caregiver permission to monitor her health. The patient’s clinician is also kept in the loop with medication and condition management data to discuss during patient interactions. Patients are further engaged by receiving text based educational quizzes and viewing online reporting showing their effectiveness in managing their medication and condition over time.

With the integration of FitNow’s Lose It! mobile app, consumers can better manage their weight through fitness and food tracking tools, educational nutrition information, motivational reminders and social peer support.

From the FitBit integration, consumers automatically track their physical activity instead of having to key it in. Since this activity data is no longer self reported, UnitedHealth Group can use validated information to drive their rewards program. The FitBit app also tracks the consumer’s sleeping behavior for a more complete view of their health.

Integration Delivers Insight

UnitedHealth Group has invested in this set of mobile technologies to capture and connect multiple sources of data for a holistic view covering the consumer’s physical activity, dietary behavior, medication adherence, biometric and mood information.

“With these partnerships in place, we are connecting all the pieces of data across our platform for a common view for the consumer to self manage and share with their coach while creating a personalized experience”, explains Nick Martin, VP Innovation and R&D, UnitedHealth Group.

This supports the trend for “integrated end to end health to care solutions” where technology connects with care management platforms and programs, as noted by IDC Health Insights’ analyst Janice Young.

Coach/CareGiver & Consumer Collaboration

Nick Martin describes how the OptumizeMe application is being used by the consumer with their coach. “Let’s say you are trying to lose weight. Your coach can push messages to your mobile which are educational and supportive. And if you give your coach permission, she can see your tracked physical activity”. Think about how much more motivated and accountable the consumer will feel when her coach is monitoring and responding to her daily progress. On the health side, the asthma patient can give access to her caregiver to monitor and address medication compliance issues. Her caregiver can also send encouraging and educational messages between visits.

UnitedHealth’s partnerships deliver new capabilities to their OptumizeMe mobile app giving consumers a new way to remain in close contact with their coach and to self manage with the social support from caregivers. With the power of the personalized information pushed and pulled from the consumer’s mobile phone, UnitedHealth Group can successfully generate both stronger consumer engagement and better health outcomes.

Regence Reaches Step 3 on their Consumer Engagement Path

2012-02-14T20:11:02Z

Regence Program Rewards Transformational Activities

Regence started on a new path to consumer engagement back in 2005.

After seeing a recent presentation outlining their consumer engagement framework, I reached out to Torben Nielsen, VP, eBusiness Strategies and Services at Regence to learn more. Torben shared their past journey as well as their future direction with me.

Here are the 4 steps along their consumer engagement path. Regence is currently at Step 3 and has a conceptual view of their next step which will continue to evolve as the market landscape fills in around them.

Consumer Engagement Step 1: Know Me

Regence’s first step focused on the passive cardholder, giving them value as they logged in. The cardholder saw all of their claims, benefits and provider information. This was back in 2005. Prior to that “it was not a good experience” since the member only saw some of their claims information and the list of providers “did not even indicate whether each one was inside or outside their network”.

Consumer Engagement Step 2: Engage Me

Beginning in 2008, Regence decided that they needed to get to know their members in order to effectively engage them.

Instead of linking the member over to their health or wellness program vendor’s website, Regence decided to keep the member within their portal to capture their online behavior.

Around that time, Regence launched their Rewards Program which awarded points to members for “tranformational activities”. These activities were rewarded because they “informed, empowered and educated the consumer”, including looking up content around a health issue or participating in a wellness program. Regence decided not to reward members for “transactional activities” such as looking up a claim or searching for a provider. Regence really needed to keep the member on their portal to track their online behavior in order to reward them.

Next Regence started their email program, sending out relevant electronic communications to bring members back to the site. Although many health plans have an interest in emailing members, I hear all the time that they do not have their email addresses. Regence collects the member’s email address during their site registration process. “We can’t engage with out email. It would be a missed opportunity to get in front of the member”, Torben emphasizes.

In addition to generating additional portal traffic, health plan communications can also strengthen their member’s satisfaction scores, which is more important now than ever with the increased market competition.

Consumer Engagement Step 3: Connect Me

Over the past two to three years, Regence has been moving faster down the path with consumers.

“Connect Me” goes beyond the “member to health plan” relationship. According to Regence, this also includes strengthening the “member to member” bond through social community and the "member to their care team" bond through ACO efforts.

One important way for Regence to strengthen the “member to member” relationship is by getting consumers to contribute more content online through conversations, ratings/reviews and suggesting local events in their geography.

Another aspect of “Connect Me” addresses the cross communication channel experience since members are increasingly accessing and engaging through their mobile devices. “We’re connecting the data that we’re sitting on to provide a more personalized experience for our members”, explains Torben.

Consumers are engaging with Regence!

67,000+ patient reviews have been submitted by members, of which 90% are favorable (i.e. the member would recommend the physician/facility).
63,000+ posts in the Community section of myRegence.com, written by more than 6,000 unique content creators.
346,000+ have opted- in for member electronic communications (e.g. updates and alerts, account information, etc)
260,000+ subscribers signed up to receive the bi-weekly myRegence.com email newsletter

Consumer Engagement Step 4: Partner with Me

As they look down their Consumer Engagement path, Regence has determined where they want to be directionally. Regence wants to be relevant to the consumer’s every day life. Something consumers need to check as part of their daily routine. Their starting place to look for information to meet all of their health needs.

Although it is challenging to know exactly where the market is going, Regence will remain in touch with their users to help guide the way.

In fact, Regence has over 400 users that help advise them by providing ongoing feedback to potential directions. [Note: Innovative companies have consumer advisory boards as a best practice. Increasingly, these consumer advisory boards are managed in a private online area and the insight captured is used to guide product and marketing decisions.]

Regence is co-creating with this growing group of consumers to define and refine online capabilities. When Regence asked for feedback about “patient reviews”, members felt they needed to see more than the reviewer’s screen name. Users wanted “the ability to connect with their peers in order to get advice when selecting a provider”. In the latest patient review experience, the screen name is linked to the reviewer’s Community profile page, where to learn more about who they are, where they’re from, what they do for a living and members have an the opportunity to make a friend request.

Regence’s Results Realized

Due in large part to Regence’s consumer engagement strategies, myRegence.com experienced the following results in 2011 over 2010:

30% increase in the cumulative number of content creators (i.e. those who have left a patient review, posted in Community or both).
88% jump in the number of $25 gift card redemptions through the Rewards program
76% increase in the Consumer Engagement Index (CEI) which measures the user adoption of transformational features
26% open rate for targeted email campaigns, nearly 2x the industry benchmark of 14%

Regence has also noticed that their segmentation efforts for email have been effective in engaging consumers. For example, by sending a Patient Review email to previous reviewers, Regence realized a 38% open rate.

As Regence moves onto step 4 in Consumer Engagement, they are conceptualizing new ways to reach out to their members with relevant information from their plan, community and care team. And they will be innovating with and listening to their users throughout their journey.

Shared Decision Making Tools Engage Consumers for Better Outcomes and a Better Experience

2011-09-27T19:04:12Z

CareFirst BCBS Medical Home SDM Tool

Over two years ago, I led a panel on patient decision support tools for a large interested crowd in Boston, despite the very snowy day.

Since then, I have noticed a few key changes. Physicians are now prescribing information to patients, using the EMR to send emails with links to health resources. And innovative health plans are playing a role in bringing shared decision making tools to engage and empower their members. Health Plans have a big cost saving incentive when these tools educate their members about less invasive and less expensive options.

3 Key Engagement Drivers With Shared Decision Making Tools

While evaluating technologies for my panel on “Evolving Web & Mobile Tools to Engage Consumers in the Shared Decision Process”, I identified how three key drivers of consumer engagement are being utilized:

1. Education

These tools show the consumer what the treatment entails and share patient stories which tell them what to expect. This education reduces anxiety by putting the consumer in control to understand their health issues and presenting options to address them.

2. Evaluation

Shared Decision Making tools are ideally designed for “preference sensitive conditions” where there are multiple clinical options (For information about target conditions, see the recent report on the Dartmouth Atlas Project which was developed with The Foundation for Informed Medical Decision Making). The most effective tools offer alternatives, capture preferences and guide the consumer through the process while documenting their decisions. This helps set expectations for their experience and supports the discussion with their doctor or care coach.

3. Collaboration

As the patient and clinician/coach review the SDM summary document together, they can discuss questions, concerns and comments to make the best decision.

Health Plans Leverage Shared Decision Tools

During the panel, health plans described using Shared Decision Making tools to engage members in two key areas:

Medical Home

Panelist Zev Lavon, PHD, Director Solution Architecture, CareFirst BCBS emphasized “the story of the patient is not their last doc visit or lab test”. CareFirst launched their Primary Care Medical Home initiative across a panel of physicians deploying communication tools to push information to patients to support the management of their chronic conditions.

Wellness Coaching

According to Mark L. Robitaille, MBA, Head of Care Management Support & Engagement, Aetna puts these tools into the hands of their health coaches to send emails with resources links to members or use the tools to look up information for the members without internet access.

Independent Health panelist, James J. Mis, MBA, Communications Manager, Health Care Services, described their interactive voice response campaign to inform members about viewing a shared decision making video (from Emmi Solutions) selected for their specific health interest.

Emerging Mobile SDM Tools

With a high penetration of smart phones and strong usage across minorities, health care organizations are realizing the tremendous opportunity to deploy mobile applications to engage consumers. To date, most health mobile health applications have been focused on wellness with educational information and tracking.

Panelist Changrong Ji, Senior Solutions Architect, CareFirst BCBS described the opportunity for mobile shared decision making tools. In the future, she envisions that sensors will capture the context of the consumer’s daily life, database analytics will identify patterns and machine learning will be used to help identify relevant mobile messages to send back to the consumer.

Healthwise’s View on Patient Response

During the Shared Decision Making Summit, the chairperson, Don Kemper, Healthwise’s CEO discussed the opportunity for shared decision making tools to give a “voice to the patient”. After the physician prescribes health information, the tool gathers patient’s preferences to document them in the medical record. I strongly agree with Don as he explains “there is no better way to engage the patient than to assure them that their voice will be heard in treatment and care plan decisions”.

Shared Decision Making Tools for Your Consumers

What are you doing to bring Shared Decision Making Tools to your consumers to motivate engagement in their health and wellness? I can help guide you through the process of identifing, evaluating and piloting these technologies to deliver better outcomes and a better experience for your consumers.

I Wish for Mobile Health.....

2011-09-20T14:23:49Z

My wish list grew as I researched how companies were using mobile to generate engagement in consumer- driven industries such as financial services, retail, travel and entertainment.

As I prepared for my Mobile Workshop at World Congress’s Product Innovation Conference, I identified, evaluated and selected mobile applications to inspire the workshop participants with their mobile health strategies. Each mobile application was chosen because it cleverly incorporated key engagement capabilities. Some mobile examples were designed to engage short term while others were intended to sustain engagement over the long run.

During the workshop, I presented more than a dozen selected examples which I organized into four groups based on how they engage consumers. Let me share one example from each group with you.

1) Life Management

Companies are creating mobile applications that help consumers get things done while on the go.

Example: Omnego launched a “Go Travel Wallet” application which enables consumers to load and access their travel documents including digital pictures of their passport and insurance documents. Consumers plan their travel by using all of their travel information such as rewards programs, credit cards and travel providers. They save money with the merchant coupons that are placed in their mobile wallet from social media, QR codes (scanned), emails and texts.

2) Information Access

By placing QR codes on their promotional materials, companies are grabbing the attention of their customers and offering them access to special content in return.

Example: For an upcoming movie, Fox Spotlight has splashed QR codes across their marketing materials distributed or placed (posters) around the community, all ready to be scanned to access exclusive content.

3) Social Community & Commerce

Businesses are realizing the power of using mobile to tap into the social networks of their customers.

Example: Amazon’s Back to School mobile application is targeted to the student segment. Students can buy and sell text books, access exclusive deals and share their “finds” with their social network.

4) Social Gaming

While playing a social game through a mobile application, consumers interact virtually with the company’s brand and are driven into the business’s physical locations.

Example: New Balance gets their customers moving in the community collecting “virtual batons” which can be redeemed in their stores for rewards, These batons appear on the consumer’s mobile phone by using GPS and maps. Consumers are motivated to visit the store quickly since the virtual baton can be stolen by others playing the game.

Mobile Insight & Guidance

During our workshop, my colleague Ahmed Albaiti, CEO of Medullan shared technology and consumer demand trends. After sharing a framework and guidelines for the interactive game, we split our workshop participants into teams.

Ahmed and I worked closely with our team as they defined their target users, thought through their needs and current resources to support them and then conceptualized a mobile application.

As I observed my group, I noticed that it was easy for them to suggest mobile capabilities from health applications already on the market but I had to continuously challenge them to incorporate innovative ideas from other consumer industries. My role was to help my team see how these innovative examples can be applied to healthcare to meet their business objectives.

It was exciting to watch the teams describe their wish for a mobile application designed for their target consumers.

Imagine a mobile workshop for your company, where all of your internal stakeholders are focusing on the users, identifying their own wish list and defining capabilities to truly engage these consumers.

Evolving Web Based and Mobile Tools to Engage Consumers in the Shared Decision Making Process

2011-09-06T18:21:44Z

World Congress Leadership Summit on Shared Decision Making

September 23, 2011

Panel Session:

Piloting and evaluating SDM tools in the Patient Centered Medical Home to drive physician- patient collaboration for better outcomes

Testing an online platform for shared decision making with health coaches across different consumer segments and conditions for ongoing behavior change

Designing an integrated experience as consumers use SDM tools across multiple channels and multiple care touches

Leveraging a mobile decision support tool to effectively educate consumers and enable them to evaluate their care options while on the go.

Moderator:

Sherri Dorfman, MBA, Chief Executive Officer, Stepping Stone Partners

Panelists:

Mark L. Robitaille, MBA, Head of Care Management Support & Engagement, Aetna
Changrong Ji, Senior Solutions Architect, CareFirst BCBS (Mobile strategy)
Zev Lavon, PHD, Director Solution Architecture, CareFirst BCBS (Web strategy)
James J. Mis, MBA, Communications Manager, Health Care Services, Independent Health