HIT Consultants Magazines Features Patty’s Article on Infusion Clinics
HIT Consultants Magazine is a media outlet dedicated to healthcare technology news and analysis for healthcare professionals. The magazine has featured KS&R Director of Healthcare, Patty Trainor, spotlighting her expertise in Infusion Clinics, offering a valuable perspective on patient care and innovative healthcare delivery.
How Pharma Can Enhance Infusion Clinic Operations and Patient Care
Infusion Clinics (ICs) face a delicate balancing act. They must strive for operational excellence while simultaneously navigating the realities of competition, patient care challenges, and compliance requirements. It’s a difficult challenge, and as ICs adapt to evolving demands, there’s a growing need for pharmaceutical manufacturers to step up with tailored support.
From streamlining medication access to advocating for policy changes, manufacturers can significantly impact how ICs manage patient experience, operational efficiencies, and compliance. Helping ICs to improve productivity should be important to manufacturers due to the shared goal of ensuring patients have access to their medications and stay on them for better treatment outcomes. And both providers and ICs likely prefer to work with manufacturers that provide additional support. Here are actionable recommendations for ICs that can foster collaboration, enhance clinic performance, and ultimately improve patient outcomes.
1. Focus on the patient experience
Specialty pharmacies and pharmacy benefit managers (PBMs) sometimes require medications to be processed elsewhere, creating competition for ICs. This results in lost margins to the IC, who can counter this where possible by hiring pharmacists for in-house pharmacy.
ICs can draw patients to their facilities by focusing on improving the patient experience and going the extra mile by offering “white glove” treatment. This includes finding ways to reduce wait times, assisting with travel to and from appointments, quickly setting up translators when needed, and providing private rooms—specially tailored for families and children. Clinics that excel at noticing body language cues and troubleshooting problems patients may not openly share also stand out.
Additionally, creating a comfortable atmosphere and simply being a good human can go a long way. Recognizing the patient experience—often filled with intimidation, needle sticks, long appointments, and boredom—helps ease fears and builds trust.
There are additional measures ICs can take to further improve the patient experience:
- AI Integration: While artificial intelligence is still slow to adoption for most ICs, it has potential to significantly improve scheduling processes.
- Staff Training: The importance of having well-trained staff cannot be overstated. Soft skills are crucial for effective communication and building patient trust.
- Prior Authorization Expertise: Having a PA expert in-house is essential. They possess deep knowledge of insurance coverage, coding, and more. It’s risky to discover coverage issues after administering an infusion.
- Addressing Scheduling Challenges: Frequent changes in scheduling can lead to operational inefficiencies, such as the potential waste of medications if they are mixed too soon and the appointment is rescheduled.
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