10 Ways of Creating a More Patient-Centric Clinic

Patient-centered care has been a focus in healthcare for years, but with so many other priorities on your plate—like prior authorization, evolving political climates, provider preferences and needs, revenue generation, compliance, and more—it’s easy for patient priorities to take a back seat. Here are 10 things your clinic can do right now to recenter patient care.

1. Optimize Patient Flow

When patients experience long wait times or extended periods alone in the exam room, it creates frustration, reduces perceived quality of care, and impacts operational efficiency. Optimizing patient flow requires collecting granular cycle time data.

Solution: In place of traditional end-to-end cycle time tracking, leverage real-time location to monitor and reduce bottlenecks at each stage of the visit: checking in, time with provider, time with staff, time alone in exam room.

Pro Tip: According to Stat’s data, rooming and seeing the first patient of the day on time prevents delays from cascading throughout the day, drastically improving patient flow.

2. Increase Transparency into Appointment Wait Times

Uncertainty leads to patient frustration. Many patients sit in waiting rooms with no expectations of their expected wait time.  

Solution: Implementing a waiting room screen that displays where a patient is in the queue, who their provider is, and an estimated wait time demonstrates transparency and sets expectations.

Example: Stat-powered displays integrate with your EHR to provide automated queue updates to patients in the waiting room, keeping them informed, reducing anxiety, and improving satisfaction.

3. Establish a Patient Feedback Loop

Understanding the patient experience is vital, but feedback must be acted on in real time. Capturing insights at the point of care lets staff immediately address concerns. For example, clinics using Stat’s patient surveys capture feedback from the patient in real-time, allowing staff to address concerns and resolve issues before the patient even leaves the exam room.

4. Address Care Gaps with Transparency

Patients are often unaware of overdue screenings, chronic disease management needs, or needed follow-ups. Monitoring care gaps for all visits in one day can be overwhelming, and lead to missed opportunities, highlighting the need for population tools.

How to Implement:

• Use population health tools such as i2i (link) to proactively identify gaps.

• Display care gap alerts on Stat tablets when the patient enters the exam room, prompting providers to discuss them immediately.

5. Prioritize Preventative Care

Many health systems focus on treating illness rather than preventing it. Clinics have adopted dual encounters where primary care visits integrate additional personal into the visit, providing diabetes education, dental screenings, and vaccinations during the patient’s alone time.

Pro Tip: Stat’s real-time communication allows integrated care team members to be notified and dispatched to the exam room without in-person conversations or manual message entry.

6. Provide Accessible Patient Education

Many healthcare visits focus on immediate concerns, but patients also benefit from broader health education. Offering educational materials in various formats keeps patients informed.

Solutions:

• Use pamphlets and posters to reinforce key health education.

• Leverage Stat in-room tablets to display regularly refreshed digital reminders and education.

7. Improve Coordination Between Providers and the Care Team

Disjointed communication among providers, nurses, and support staff leads to patient frustration, missed steps, and medical errors.  

Case Study (link): Grace Health, an FQHC in Michigan, demonstrated how real-time communication tools solidified staff coordination (also resulting in a 50% decrease in patient wait time for medical assistants.)

8. Incorporate Patient Advocates or Care Coordinators into Appointments

Many patients don’t know what resources are available to them through your clinic and in their community, leading to missed opportunities for improving their overall well-being. Embedding care coordinators into visits helps patients navigate assistance programs.

Example: Clinics using integrated care coordinators see improvements in patient adherence to treatment plans and follow-up visit compliance.

9. Provide Emotional Support to Patients

Patient-centric care addresses the patient holistically, including their emotional and psychological needs. Care team members should routinely receive training in demonstrating empathy, reassurance, and active listening to help patients feel heard and respected.

The National Council for Mental Wellbeing offers Trauma-Informed Care (TIC) Training for healthcare providers. www.thenationalcouncil.org

Pro Tip: Clinics using Stat are integrating behavioral health providers into primary care visits during patient alone time, improving patient retention.

10. Activate Staff in Medical Emergencies

During medical emergencies, outdated communication systems can delay response times and increase risks for patients and staff.

Solution: Establish an emergency response plan with clearly defined staff roles. Conduct regular emergency response drills to ensure quick, confident action.

Pro Tip: Stat’s emergency alerts allow staff to communicate directly from the exam room with ease. Safety badges and automated notifications have improved response times by as much as 82%.

The Big Picture: A Patient-Centric Culture

Technology, workflows, and efficiency improvements are only part of the equation. True patient-centric care requires a cultural shift—one that prioritizes:

• Optimizing patient flow, feedback and transparency to improve the patient journey.

• Encouraging proactive care and current patient education to improve health outcomes.

• Enhancing coordination among all care team members for seamless care delivery.

• Ensuring staff readiness and leveraging modern solutions for medical emergencies to improve safety and response times.

Even small changes can lead to significant improvements. By adopting these 10 strategies, healthcare organizations can give patients better experiences, improve outcomes, and build trust with their communities.  

Would you like to learn more about how real-time workflows and transparency can transform your clinic? Contact Stat to explore patient-centric solutions that work for your healthcare setting.

‍