The Digital front door is a customer engagement platform that allows healthcare providers to interact with patients through digital channels. This telehealth tool has greatly enabled health care leaders to improve communication, collaboration, and customer service cost-effectively.

The variation of digital front door technology has enhanced patients to conveniently leverage digital healthcare options through mobile devices beyond typical business hours.

How Telehealth is Shaping Patients Engagement with Healthcare Systems

In the 21st century, healthcare technologies have become integral in revolutionizing patient care. The variation of different telehealth tools has changed how patients interact with the healthcare system and integrated medical records with service providers. Top front door technologies utilized include:

  • Artificial Intelligence
  • Conversational AI
  • Natural Language Processing
  • Adaptive communications.

Artificial Intelligence

There has been dramatic growth in the utilization of artificial intelligence in healthcare in the past decade. Artificial Intelligence in healthcare refers to technology replicating human intelligence in making decisions and solving problems. AI can be used in a variety of ways, including:

  • Predicting patient health issues
  • Automatic diagnosis
  • Predicting hospital admissions
  • Tracking prescription adherence

Artificial Intelligence uses an NLP system to read and interpret text data, including unstructured data from social media, emails, surveys, and documents.

Conversational AI

Conversational AI is a special type of Artificial Intelligence that allows people to communicate with machines naturally. This technology utilizes algorithms to interpret human conversation and respond similarly to humans.

A good example of Conversational AI in healthcare is the Amazon Echo device. This device uses a virtual assistant named Alexa to respond to questions and carry out tasks. Another example is the FAQ Bot, which helps customers with service information and support.

Since it doesn’t rely on manually written scripts, conversational AI can understand and reply to a more excellent range of questions.

Natural Language Processing

Natural Language Processing is a type of intelligence that allows computers to understand human language. NLP is used by doctors in:

  • Identifying patient sentiment
  • Predicting outcomes
  • Analyzing clinical notes
  • Classifying diseases

One example of how NLP is used in healthcare is the clinical note assistant. This assistant helps doctors to read and understand patient notes from various EHRs.

Adaptive Communications

Adaptive communications is a technology that helps personalize communication-based on the recipient’s preferences. This technology uses a variety of methods to understand the recipient, including:

  • Location
  • Demographics
  • Behavior
  • Previous interactions

The digital front door healthcare uses customized data to understand the patient’s location and preferences. This allows the platform to provide a personalized experience for the patient.

Patient’s Digital Journey

The patient journey refers to a patient’s path when interacting with the healthcare system. The digital front door allows patients to manage their journeys through simplified access, self-service, and convenience. This telehealth supports patients in interacting with the healthcare system through digital channels such as:

  • Online appointment booking
  • Ordering prescriptions
  • Checking lab results
  • Viewing medical records

Stages of the Patient Journey

The Patient journey can be classified into three major categories:

  • Pre-visit
  • Visit
  • Post-visit

The digital front door engagement helps manage the post-visit stage of the patient journey. This stage includes activities such as

  • Managing appointments
  • Ordering prescriptions
  • Checking lab results
  • Viewing medical records

The digital front door is imperative in improving patient care and reducing the burden on healthcare workers.

Clinical evidence

Thorough and accurate clinical evidence is essential to the practice of evidence-based medicine. Healthcare professionals are obligated to rely on the latest research and data for the best possible care to patients. The digital front door ensures clinicians have access to the latest clinical evidence.

The Need for a Digital Front Door (5 C’s)

  1. Champions: The digital front door integrates with other digital tools the healthcare facilities use through high versatility to handle large volumes of patients. Besides, it’s secure and easy to use. 
  2. Convenience: Digital patient engagement offers fast and satisfying handling of patients. At this point, this technology accounts for many patients to receive quality services through digital strategies.
  3. Cohesion: This telehealth has been in the market for quite some time and has proved to be a reliable platform resulting in endorsements from renowned health institutions.
  4. Control: The digital front door helps patients participate in activities that best suit their interests.
  5. Consistency: This technology helps to maintain consistency in the healthcare facility. Despite the experienced pandemic, the expectations of front door technology continue to grow owing to its consistency and efficiency.

Conclusion

Undeniably, digital transformation in healthcare is critical to the industry’s success, and these technologies are a significant part of that transformation. The digital front door is one outstanding example of top technological advancements in healthcare. This technology has massively improved patient care through convenience and timely access to care.