Improve NPS Scores With CipherHealth’s Outreach Solutions

Background

An analysis of CipherHealth’s Outreach Solutions’ impact on a 248-bed, non-profit community teaching hospital showed that patients who engaged with an automated voice call by answering one clinical question gave higher Net Promoter Scores (NPS) as well as more favorable responses on HCAHPS surveys when evaluating their patient experience. This included patients enrolled in the Joint Replacement (CJR), Pneumonia (PNE), Chronic Heart Failure (CHF) and Inpatient programs.

Challenge

Acquiring new patients and creating patient loyalty are current challenges for many hospital systems. In order to improve their Net Promoter Score, the hospital needed automated outreach technology and trained staff in place to communicate with patients post-discharge.

Goal

The hospital sought to markedly increase NPS scores by improving patient satisfaction. By prioritizing meaningful communication, as well as collecting feedback through engagement data, the hospital sought to increase the likelihood of patients coming back in the future or recommending the facility to someone else.

Solution

Looking at the hospital’s patient engagement data alongside their NPS and HCAHPS results yielded a clear result: automated outreach calls with clinical questions had the strongest impact on patient perception across domains and programs.

Impact

The impact of CipherOutreach could be seen by comparing surveys from patients who received and did not receive an automated outreach call. Seventy-nine percent of respondents had received an automated outreach call, prompting them to answer one clinical status question. This single point of engagement had the effect of increasing the Net Promoter Score by 13 points. Further analyzing the data by type of outreach program, CipherHealth determined that patients in the Inpatient, CJR, PNE or CHF programs who answered at least one clinical question also gave notably higher Net Promoter Scores than patients who did not.

HCAHPS Scores Also Improved

Increases were also seen in the hospital’s HCAHPS scores across all domains, with an average increase of 4.6 among those who answered a clinical question. The greatest increase was in “Likelihood to Recommend,” which speaks to the hospital’s commitment to improving patient care. When a patient triggered an issue and received a call back from a member of the hospital’s team, they were statistically more likely to rate higher in four domains, with “Communication with Nurses” the most favorable. Meaningful outreach, automated and live, was central to improving the patient experience.

Report Period: 11/1/18 – 12/31/19

* These are raw scores and are not representative of official CMS HCAHPS scores. Domains with at least 30 responses from reached patients and 30 responses from unreached patients included in calculation.

Conclusion

Meaningfully engaging patients through automated post-discharge outreach is key. The clinical question was a valuable tool, creating opportunities for the hospital’s nursing staff to connect directly with patients through live, manual calls, leading to fewer unnecessary hospital readmissions and higher patient satisfaction, particularly within high-risk populations. Collectively, patients who answered at least one clinical question gave higher NPS scores compared to patients who did not answer a clinical question.

About CipherHealth’s Outreach Solutions

CipherHealth offers a robust suite of multimodal, targeted outreach programs that drive meaningful conversations among patients, providers and caregivers both in pre-care and post-care settings. Messages can be sent via Voice or SMS at a designated time and with a personalized script for the individual patient.