Home healthcare is having a moment. Thanks to our uninvited guest, COVID-19, it’s skyrocketing in demand. Think of it as the introverted cousin of hospital healthcare — just as caring but much more convenient and less risky for our loved ones, especially those who are older or managing chronic illnesses. Did you know that 6 out of every 10 adults in the US have a chronic disease? And 4 out of 10 are juggling two or more. Add to this a population of over-65s expected to leap from 45 million in 2012 to 75 million by 2030, and we’ve got quite the healthcare fiesta (or fiasco) on our hands.
But here’s the catch: managing home healthcare isn’t a piece of cake. It’s more like spinning plates. You’ve got to juggle schedules, optimize routes, match patients to care professionals, and all this while keeping everyone happy. Trust us, Excel doesn’t cut it anymore (if it ever did).
This is where we at Wise Wolves come in, and no, we don’t howl at the moon. We’re more into transforming the home health sector with our mix of healthcare know-how, hands-on home health experience, and Salesforce tech wizardry. We’re about to blow your minds by sharing Salesforce’s latest product designed just for home health—a revolutionary solution that will transform your scheduling and management needs.
Before we dive in, let’s get up to speed with some industry trends and challenges and then see how Salesforce’s shiny new tool can help.
A Leap Toward Home Healthcare
COVID-19 kicked off a colossal shift toward home healthcare, a trend that’s not going anywhere any time soon. A comfortable bed and your favorite TV show beat hospital food and fluorescent lights any day, right? Home healthcare offers a viable alternative as people grapple with the challenges of hospital-based care—increased risk of infection, high costs, and less personalized care. The World Health Organization even reports that by 2050, one in six people will be over 65, solidifying this sector’s VIP status.
Upping the Ante for Patient Expectations
We’re in the era of everything digital. Your home health clients want their care to feel like Amazon Prime: swift, seamless, and intuitive. The “old school” way of managing health that relies on disconnected systems and manual processes falls short of these expectations.
Maximizing Care Professional Efficiency
With the escalating demand for home healthcare, the clock is ticking for hardworking care professionals. Any slip-ups in scheduling, route planning, or communication could be the difference between top-notch care and a missed appointment. Plus, rising costs for supplies and wages mean they’re not exactly swimming in money, so efficiency is everything.
The Hunger for Real-Time Data
The hunger for real-time data and insights is real, especially with the industry’s increasing complexity. Healthcare providers must make data-driven decisions for efficient scheduling, performance tracking, and continuous improvement. Got an abnormal blood test result that needs a follow-up? Real-time data can trigger automatic processes, easing the administrative load while boosting patient outcomes.
A Silver Bullet for Your Pain Points: Salesforce’s Home Health Scheduler
Salesforce recognized these industry-wide challenges and developed an innovative product to tackle these problems. The Salesforce Home Health Scheduler is a versatile tool designed to create an end-to-end solution that guides home healthcare providers from patient intake to complex scheduling and from executing visits to gathering feedback.
Here’s how this shining star can transform home healthcare:
Supercharging Scheduling and Communication
Efficient scheduling is the backbone of home healthcare, but it’s a complex, time-consuming process. This jigsaw puzzle of patient preferences, care professional capacities, and territories is finally set to be sorted with the Scheduler’s optimized appointment management system. It’s like having a smart personal assistant who sorts and plans all your appointments. This means more time caring for patients and less time wrestling with calendars and maps. Plus, the platform’s features allow for easy rescheduling and reassigning of appointments, making it simpler to adapt to last-minute changes.
But there’s more to home healthcare than just planning. If you’ve ever played the classic game of ‘telephone’ where the message gets distorted as it passes from person to person, you know that’s a game healthcare can’t afford to play. The new Scheduler ensures that providers, patients, and coordinators are all on the same page. No more miscommunications, just smooth, efficient care.
Empowering Patients and Care Professionals
The mobile application component of the Scheduler presents a significant transformation in the home healthcare experience for both patients and care professionals. Patients can stay informed about their upcoming visits, while care professionals can efficiently manage their schedules, track their hours, and update patient details on the go. This mobility offers more autonomy and convenience to all parties involved.
Making Sense of the Data Avalanche
Healthcare providers often find themselves snowed under with data, lacking the right tools to dig out valuable insights (unless they want to spend hours they don’t have to try to fit the pieces together). The Scheduler has embedded analytics and recommendations, offering real-time insights into scheduling efficiency, care professional performance, and patient feedback. Let the data lead the way to improved service quality and better patient outcomes.
Connecting The Dots (or Sources of Truth)
Ah, the “single source of truth” — as elusive as a polite political debate on social media. But while the single source of truth doesn’t exist, we can still form a helpful, interoperable network of information by linking many sources of truth. Think of it as healthcare’s version of a connect-the-dots puzzle, where the dots are patient histories, medication lists, test results, and treatment plans.
With all this combined, it’s easier to see the full picture, reducing errors, streamlining care, and speeding up interventions. By bridging the gaps in our data, we can create a comprehensive, actionable understanding of patient care — knowledge that is truly life-saving!
More than a Buzzword: Value-Based Care
Value-based care is a term bouncing around the healthcare echo chamber that has prime potential. Think of it as healthcare’s answer to quality over quantity. Instead of focusing on how many tests or treatments we can squeeze in, value-based care is about getting the best patient outcomes.
Value-based care is a win-win situation. Patients get better care, which leads to better health. For healthcare providers, it helps cut down on unnecessary tests and procedures, saving a lot of time and money. It also emphasizes prevention and managing chronic conditions before they become serious problems. But to deliver on this promise, healthcare providers must be armed with the right tools. They need data, insights, and the ability to coordinate care across different providers and settings. This is another area where Salesforce’s new product shines, helping to turn the promise of value-based care into a reality.
Outfoxing the Competition with Wise Wolves
The Salesforce Home Health Scheduler is more than a product; it’s a transformational gadget that can solve many home health puzzles and tame the chaos of the home healthcare world (or at least we hope so). At Wise Wolves, we’re already salivating at the thought of integrating it into our clients’ home health solutions.
If your organization is ready to revolutionize its home healthcare services, keep your eyes peeled for Salesforce’s new product. And remember, Wise Wolves is always ready to lend a paw in implementing it effectively. Together, we can ride the tide of change and bring superior care right to the comfort of your patients’ homes.
Get in touch to start planning how to outfox your competition with Wise Wolves.