Microsoft Dynamics 365 offers a rich, flexible, and extendable platform of capabilities that enterprises have been relying on for nearly two decades. Sales, Service, and Marketing form the core horizontal plays of the platform as they utilize D365 as the centerpiece of their digital transformation journeys. Where does healthcare fit in with these? After all, the cannon of ethics symbolized in the Hippocratic oath can be boiled down to the basic mantra ‘do no harm’, which hardly leaves room for proactively building a pipeline! Thanks to Microsoft’s industry-specific cloud offering, this has been demystified.

Healthcare providers – like organizations in any other field – can now place Dynamics 365 at the center of their digital transformation journeys with confidence. This can be done by leveraging the Microsoft Cloud for Healthcare’s inbuilt capabilities to perform Patient Outreach for enhanced patient experience. Let us explore three key areas of patient outreach: patient segmentation strategy, patient engagement campaigns, and event management.

Patient Segmentation

The Microsoft Cloud for Healthcare makes segmenting your patients a breeze. The first step is to bring EMR data into Microsoft’s Dataverse. We recommend a phased approach starting with “Swivel Chair” Manual integration that HCLTech can walk you through, maturing to bidirectional sync among the systems to provide a 360-degree view of the patient journey.  

Next, use Dynamics Segmentation capabilities to identify and organize the patient cohorts whom you can effectively service without creating risk based on their age, medical history, and other demographic information. Segment patients based on tiers and qualifications that you define. For example, identify a group of patients who share a common characteristic or experience within a defined period (e.g., patients under 30 years of age who had a knee replacement surgery postponed in the last 13 months due to the pandemic).

Note that the system makes it possible to update EMR and ancillary systems with relevant changes (e.g., changing a Non-essential procedure to Essential). Armed with all the relevant data, you will be able to schedule procedures – essential and non-essential – that can be safely executed with the HCP capacity available.

Patient Engagement Campaigns

Whether you use off-the-shelf templated patient journeys or build your custom journeys to personalize the patient experience, the Microsoft Cloud for Healthcare will guide your patient engagement campaigns. From a strategic standpoint, we recommend communicating the following key points early and often:

• We are here for YOU and we care about YOU.

• It is safe to receive care at our facilities! We have taken every necessary precaution to ensure your safety.
• Based on your medical history, we have identified you as “Low-Risk.” (Shows personalization!)
• We want to make sure that we know about any recent changes – e.g., What is new with you? Are there any new conditions or symptoms? We are in a new year – do you have new insurance? Please complete the latest patient-360 to ensure we have the latest information.

With adequate planning, the tools make it very easy to re-engage your patients and make them feel important, cared for, and welcome. Patient Outreach campaigns can be based on segments, such as segments identified as “safe to return,” as well as by patients with unfulfilled orders. Many healthcare providers do little to capitalize on unfulfilled orders and rely on the patient to come in. HCLTech can show you how we have helped other healthcare organizations utilize Microsoft Cloud for Healthcare to reach out to the patients proactively with unfulfilled orders, and ensure they are committed to coming in for the procedure. This fosters better relationship with the patient, advances the care plan, and secures revenue that may otherwise be unrealized. We will show you how to personalize patient messaging and enhance engagement based on patient preferences and timely delivery using Microsoft Cloud for Healthcare.

Event Management

Use the Microsoft Cloud for Healthcare to set up and manage events by organizing agendas, speakers, invitations, registrations, and attendance – all in one place. In this post-COVID-19 era, many events are virtual, and Microsoft Cloud for Healthcare can easily accommodate virtual or in-person events. If needed, you can execute virtual events nimbly via native integration with different webinar platforms. Utilizing the power and flexibility of patient journeys, the events can easily be embedded to ensure the initial event messages are sent and replies are monitored. Microsoft Cloud performs condition branching logic for Healthcare based on patient responses to the event messaging. It is so easy and all under a single umbrella.

Key Benefits of the Microsoft Cloud for Healthcare

Prepare for patients to come back to your facilities

• Allows you to ensure your Healthcare Providers have the necessary availability/bandwidth.
• Allows you to organize cleaning plans, facility preparation, etc.

Recapture lost revenue by ensuring patient procedures are rescheduled

• Enables you to reach out to patients with unfulfilled orders proactively.

Most importantly, maintain and even increase patient confidence, trust, and loyalty

• Demonstrate to the patient that they are not just a number and that you know where they are in their care plan.

Simply put, re-engaging your patients is the right thing to do, but ONLY if you are ready to re-engage. The Microsoft Cloud for Healthcare will help you assess – and then guide you through every step of the re-engagement process.

Reach out to us to learn more about HCLTech’s experience implementing these capabilities at a large Midwest Hospital and helping the customer recapture lost revenue and improve their patient experiences. All this, while getting them started on their digital transformation journey with Microsoft Cloud for Healthcare.

This blog was originally published on PowerObjects Blog. PowerObjects, an HCLTech Company is a leader in delivering Microsoft Business Applications solutions and the Dynamics 365 workloads through unparalleled offerings of service, support, education, and add-ons.