Focusing on increasing satisfaction with staff responsiveness, one Florida Veterans hospital partnered with Get Well to implement GetWell Inpatient, Get Well’s interactive patient care solution, to improve patient engagement. Through some small — but significant changes to collecting and responding to patient feedback, the facility was able to demonstrate a 45% increase in composite top box Survey of Hospital Experience of Patients (SHEP) score.
GetWell Inpatient engages Veterans daily throughout their stay, soliciting feedback on how satisfied patients are with their hospital stay experience. Every day, patients received a simple question prompt asking about their stay. The care team then followed up on any negative response with a secondary question of “What do you need help with?” Asking this simple question enabled the team to drill down on any areas of need, such as bathroom assistance or help with pain control.
Improving SHEP performance with better engagement
Armed with this valuable information, nursing leadership now
- Had the information needed to prioritize leadership rounding
- Could focus on service recovery
- Help raise awareness to staff regarding patients in need
- Empower Veterans to take an active role in their healthcare journey
As demonstrated by the results of this initiative, addressing Veterans concerns quickly can have a direct correlation to Survey of Health Experience of Patients (SHEP) performance. SHEP is the VA version of the U.S. national HCAHPS. Proactively managing priority SHEP/HCAHPS improvement priorities allows healthcare organizations to impact these important outcomes.
If you are thinking about implementing patient engagement solutions to help impact performance improvement, here are some things to keep in mind:
- Set clear targets for performance improvement with stakeholders
- Identify champions to lead each initiative who have a vested interest and the power to affect change
- Ensure procedures are in place that support your initiatives
For more information, please visit https://www.getwellnetwork.com/getwell-inpatient/.
