Right Place, Right Time: A Unified User Experience
Right Place, Right Time: A Unified User Experience
Can Transform Health and Human Services
Technology has transformed and enhanced so many aspects of our lives — increasing convenience, improving access to goods and services, and lowering costs. Companies like Amazon and Netflix have forever changed how we shop and entertain ourselves, while banking apps have revolutionized the ways we manage our money. Today, people expect a streamlined, user-friendly experience that makes it easy to accomplish tasks, access information and solve problems.
However, the healthcare industry has fallen behind in developing user experiences that are intuitive, helpful and convenient. While amazing treatments and drugs continue to be developed, much of the technology used in healthcare has become outdated and increasingly difficult to manage. These challenges can be especially acute in health and human services, where beneficiaries must navigate disparate systems; providers must contend with inefficient processes and incomplete information; and state employees are unable to utilize the data they possess to the fullest.
Next-generation platform technology is changing all of that — transforming the digital user experience and providing remarkable benefits for all stakeholders, including beneficiaries, providers, social workers, support personnel and data analysts.
A True Revolution in the User Experience
Historically, health and human services data has resided in silos, leading to inefficiencies, inconvenience and incomplete data analysis. By putting this enormous pool of data on a single platform, layered with a simplified user experience, vast quantities of information are made accessible to the right people in the right place at the right time.
Much like consumer apps and websites, the health and human services technology of tomorrow is human-centric, device-agnostic, and configurable to changing needs and requirements. Experiences are as intuitive and easy to use as popular consumer platforms, and data can be updated in real time and available instantly. Through artificial intelligence and machine learning, the system can make recommendations, track health trends, provide reminders, personalize the experience and help all users make more informed decisions.
As a result, beneficiaries are more engaged, providers can operate more efficiently, and state employees can use the data they possess to improve the health of entire populations.
A Seamless, Personalized Experience for Individuals and Families
To access the benefits available to them, beneficiaries must often navigate a confusing array of websites, forms, physical locations and call centers.
Imagine the ability to access an entire array of health and human services — from Medicaid to food stamps to housing — through a single platform. Beneficiaries sign up on the system once and then easily view their healthcare plans, treatments and available benefits. Applying artificial intelligence, the system detects if a beneficiary is likely to be eligible for food stamps and makes that service available to them quickly and easily. When a beneficiary’s name or address changes, that information is immediately available to everyone in the system. When health status changes or benefits are added, physicians and social workers can easily see the most current data. Educational modules deliver personalized information based on a beneficiary’s own health conditions, helping them stay informed and empowered to take action for their health.
A person-centered, cross-platform user experience can make navigating health and human services easier than ever.
A Streamlined, Data-driven Experience for Providers
An enhanced user experience is key to reducing the administrative burden on clinicians, who often provide services at lower costs through Medicaid than for commercial services. For example, providers must often visit the websites of different managed care organizations to obtain prior authorizations, with each website using a different protocol. On the new platform, this process can be standardized across all MCOs, saving providers valuable time to focus on their patients. That is just a single example of the many processes — from recredentialing to excuse notices — that can be dramatically streamlined.
In addition, by making patient data available in real time, physicians will be able to easily monitor and manage treatment plans, resulting in better clinical and financial outcomes more effectively.
Optimized Workflows for States and Their Employees
Ever-escalating medical expenses are a constant concern for states and their taxpayers. A next-generation user experience can help lower costs by automating repetitive tasks, helping beneficiaries become more involved in their own care and giving data analysts the information they need to gain cost-saving insights.
By analyzing benchmarking data, states can compare their performance to that of other states and gain prescriptive insights to improve those metrics. For example:
- How does my state compare to others in the percentage of beneficiaries over 60 who have received flu shots?
- How long does it take other states to onboard new physicians?
- How does one physician group compare to another in terms of healthcare outcomes?
States could also save millions of dollars through greater transparency into the care of their beneficiaries, from avoidance of duplicate medical tests to early intervention that prevents the need for costly medications.
Unprecedented Data Access, Unparalleled Benefits
Here is the big takeaway: there is a direct link between a better user experience and better health outcomes, and modernizing systems should lift engagement and satisfaction across the board. Beneficiaries can take a more active role in their own healthcare journeys. Providers can manage patient care with a smaller administrative burden. States can maintain a stronger connection to beneficiaries and receive greater insights into their needs.
All these benefits are possible for a relatively small cost: according to estimates, CMS spends less than 2% of Medicaid costs on technology, while 95% or more goes to medical treatment. (Sources: CMS, Kaiser Family Foundation). By maintaining or slightly increasing the budget to adopt a vastly superior technology platform, states could save hundreds of millions of dollars.
See It in Action
The future of healthcare is here, and stakeholders are ready to embrace it. Through visionary leadership at the state and federal level, we can provide better healthcare for all. Contact us to learn more about this groundbreaking technology poised to transform health and human services.