Patient engagement is defined as the involvement of patients in their healthcare decisions, treatment plans, and care management. Digital patient portals have emerged as a powerful tool for improving patient engagement, enabling patients to access their health information, communicate with their healthcare providers, and participate in their care.

Importance of Patient Engagement Through Digital Transformation

Digital patient portals are transforming the way patients engage with their healthcare providers. By providing patients with easy access to their health information, digital patient portals are empowering patients to take control of their healthcare decisions and participate in their care. This can lead to improved healthcare outcomes, including increased patient satisfaction, better medication adherence, and more effective chronic disease management.

Barriers to Digital Patient Engagement

While digital patient portals offer many benefits, there are several barriers to patient engagement through these platforms. The report highlights the following barriers:

1. Pre- and post-care effectiveness: No method or system for creating an effective digital experience for patients.
2. Content personalization: Relevant content outside of appointments, test results and billing to address a patient’s healthcare needs, past activities and demographics.
3. Siloed data and multiple systems: Information is stored in multiple hospital systems, making it difficult for patients to navigate and understand.
4. Limited provider engagement: medical professionals need to utilize the technology as a way of better serving patients and the community.

Strategies for Improving Patient Engagement Through Digital Patient Portals

To improve patient engagement through digital patient portals, healthcare providers can implement the following strategies:

1. Promote patient portal engagement: Provide a seamless, branded, and customized experience. Increase patient activity to better understand and communicate with patients on an individual basis with a streamlined experience on any device.
2. Deliver content consistency and personalization: Provide content that speaks directly to the patient’s interests and needs, based on patient specific conditions and education, which provides increased patient retention.
3. One system to access all patient related information: Through integration of disparate systems, create an effective digital engagement experience for health care professionals and patients.
4. Empower provider engagement: Enhance functionality for medical professionals to improve quality, safety, efficiency, and health disparities by engaging patients and their families. 

Conclusion

Digital patient portals offer an important opportunity to improve patient engagement and ultimately improve healthcare outcomes. While there are barriers to patient engagement through these platforms, healthcare providers can promote patient access, enhance portal functionality, and increase provider engagement to overcome these barriers. By doing so, we can achieve better patient engagement, improved healthcare outcomes, and ultimately better health for all.

Dunn Solutions has helped many companies bring their vision for their patient portal to life. Our patient engagement portals allow patients to track the progress of their lab results online and schedule appointments directly with their providers. Through our experience in building custom patient engagement portals, Dunn Solutions knows how to build a user experience to best serve patients, healthcare providers and support staff needs.

 

Image Sources: Healthcare Digital Transformation & the Patient Journey, February 2023 Survey by Liferay and Canam Research