HIMSS 2019: Healthcare's Next Big Moves

Advancements in technology have significantly changed all aspects of the healthcare industry, resulting in higher-quality, more convenient care to patients. From the process of scheduling an appointment with a provider in real-time through text message, to accessing medical records on a secure portal from a mobile device, to remote monitoring symptoms of patients with chronic conditions, technology has reshaped the healthcare experience.

Last month, over 42,000 healthcare IT professionals, clinicians, executives and vendors gathered at HIMSS19 at the Orange County Convention Center in Orlando, Fla., to collaborate on and discuss the healthcare industry’s next big moves as digital transformation continues to escalate.

One theme highlighted throughout the exhibit halls and during the sessions was patient experience — and, for good reason. As the rise in accessibility and use of smartphones and mobile devices has drastically impacted communication in today’s world, patients now expect a certain level of ease and convenience in their communications with a healthcare organization.

Technology is Key to Delivering on Patient’s Communication Expectations

As industries such as retail and banking have made the 24/7/365 model of customer service the new norm for today’s tech-savvy consumers, patients now expect the same from their healthcare providers. And when patients have a less than satisfactory experience in communicating with their providers, they will seek care elsewhere — especially patients of a younger generation.

In fact, a recent study done by Solutionreach found that 43 percent of millennials are likely to switch providers in the next few years while 54 percent have already done so in the past two to three years. A major contributing factor in this willingness to seek care where better service is provided is a lack of technology in communication. The same study reports that 73 percent of patients desire the ability to text their doctor’s office.

Artificial Intelligence (AI) Will Be Necessary to Enhance the Patient Experience

Some of the most exciting buzz around the halls of HIMSS was about artificial intelligence (AI) — specifically chatbot technology, and its potential to revolutionize the patient experience. To meet the expectations of communication from any device from anywhere in the world at any time of day, healthcare organizations are turning to unified communications (UC) and artificial intelligence (AI) solutions to offer extended hours of service.

Though the AI healthcare market is expected to hit $6.6 billion by 2021, Accenture data cites that AI technology is already being utilized and is making a significant splash in the healthcare industry today. Chatbot technology is being used to streamline daily processes of responding to incoming questions about common medical symptoms, thereby giving doctors precious hours back throughout the workday to spend more time face-to-face with patients. Chatbots are also being used to extend hours of nurse triage support and for patient scheduling.

These use cases for AI and chatbot technology are indicative of its ability to keep today’s patients satisfied with more convenient communication at any time of the day; it also frees up provider time to give better care to patients in person.

Not only can AI improve patient care and satisfaction, it can save healthcare organizations money while doing so. A recent Accenture analysis reports that clinical health AI applications can potentially create $150 billion in annual savings for the U.S. healthcare economy by 2026.

What It Means for Healthcare Organizations & Communications

As patient expectations continue to expand with digital transformation, the pressure on healthcare organizations to digitally transform will only intensify. Healthcare systems looking to enhance their patient experience must begin with transforming their communications. Implementing unified communications solutions can help healthcare organizations provide patients with 24/7/365 access to care to ensure a positive patient experience.

Revation’s LinkLive 9.0 Platform Enhances the Customer Experience

Based on the changing and increased expectations of patients, Revation has continuously updated its LinkLive platform, which provides secure, cloud-based compliant unified communications, allowing providers to connect with patients via voice, chat, video and mobile.

During HIMSS, Revation announced the latest version of LinkLive, which includes “Reva,” the company’s human-connected bot that utilizes lightweight artificial intelligence (AI) technology to automate the front-end of incoming sessions in a call center.

The new Reva Agent Advisor solution offers extended capabilities to provide call center agents with real-time analytics on their own vocal tone, mood and sentiment while interacting with a customer or a patient. With this type of data providing real-time feedback to call center agents during customer conversations, agents can use the data to enhance customer experience. The data captured by the Reva Agent Advisor solution is fed into Revation’s LinkLive reports to visually display statistics for individual agent performance as well as team performance.

LinkLive 9.0 Press Release 

SAN FRANCISCO–(BUSINESS WIRE)–Today, Revation Systems, a leader in cloud-based, compliant communications, announced the latest release of its flagship platform, LinkLive 9.0. The latest release includes significant enhancements to improve customer and patient experience, including a new feature called Reva Agent Advisor.

‘Reva,’ the company’s human-connected bot, utilizes lightweight artificial intelligence (AI) technology to automate the front end of incoming sessions in a contact center. The new Reva Agent Advisor solution offers extended capabilities to provide contact center agents with real-time analytics on their own vocal tone, mood and sentiment while interacting with a customer or a patient. With this type of data providing real-time feedback to agents during customer conversations, agents can use the data to enhance customer experience. The agent tone data captured by the Reva Agent Advisor solution is also fed into Revation’s LinkLive reports to visually display statistics for individual agent performance as well as team performance.

In an era of rapidly advancing technology and growing customer expectations for communication, Revation Systems’ LinkLive cloud-based contact center solution and its Reva bot artificial intelligence feature make digital transformation consumable for organizations in the healthcare and banking industries. The Reva Agent Advisor solution offers prepackaged tone role types specific to the healthcare and banking verticals, streamlining the approach to digitally transforming consumer engagement.

Other advancements included in the 9.0 release of LinkLive include Reva Agent Connect, which uses artificial intelligence to pre-route customers based on customer relationship manager (CRM) data to route incoming calls and SMS text messages to agents. Reva Agent Connect dramatically enhances the customer experience by shortening the communication cycle for customers and patients, thereby enhancing customer experience. Also included in the release is the desktop recording and playback capability, which enables an authorized agent or supervisors to playback the entire experience (audio and desktop sharing) with a customer or a patient.

Of the new Reva Agent Advisor solution, Irene Vergules, Healthcare Provider Consultant, states, “The preconfigured tone analysis based on agent roles for nurse triage, scheduling and specialty groups provides medical centers with a vastly simplified use of analytics to enhance the patient experience. Agents that are visually aware of their vocal tones with real-time technology at their disposal can fine tune and make adjustments to the conversation in real-time. This type of data and the resulting improved agent performance is invaluable to enhancing the patient experience. In addition to that, the added ability to playback desktop recording from patient sessions provides tremendous insight to our contact center management.”

Of the recent release of the LinkLive 9.0 product suite, Revation CEO and Co-Founder Perry Price said, “As we look to help our customers improve customer experience through digital transformation, our solutions eliminate the complexity that often accompanies new technology. We are excited to offer new technologies that simplify the process of digitally transforming communication in an adaptable and consumable way for healthcare and banking organizations.”

Revation is also announcing its company-wide renewal of the HITRUST CSF® certification, including the extended controls for Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services “CMS” requirements. The latest assessment included over 600 security controls.

The LinkLive solution suite secures communications in the midst of today’s digital transformation. With simplified technology acquisition models that are purpose-built for the healthcare and finance verticals, Revation Systems helps organizations enhance the customer and patient experience.

To learn more, please visit www.revation.com/linklive9.0.