Easing patient journeys in hospitals with Electronic Queue Management solutions for Africa
Budget constraints, limited resources, and competing priorities remain the leading challenge amongst healthcare providers across the continent of Africa. With this combination of pressures, comes the need to streamline workflows and increase efficiencies in hospital operations.
There is empirical evidence that easing patient journeys is one such process that can help health providers improve the quality of their services. We shall explore how targeted innovations in queue management can be leveraged to deliver greater patient experiences.
Queueing solutions
In the wake of COVID-19, there is an increased need for queue management systems that can handle patient flows safely and efficiently. The benefits that accrue from such an investment are significant. In the short term, it can improve productivity whilst substantially decreasing costs by ensuring that the right patient is at the right place at the right time. To do this effectively, hospitals need to visualize the patient journey with a view of eliminating bottle necks and make the process of seeking treatment efficient and intuitive. The more seamless an experience you can create, the better the customer experience will be.
Mapping out the patient Journey
A patient journey is basically the steps that patients go through when they undergo a visit / treatment in the healthcare facility. Critically important in the understanding of patient journeys is that it consists of several stages (pre-, during, and post-visit), where each stage has one or more touchpoints.
Through patient journey mapping, healthcare providers can identify pain points and work on the solutions to these problems. Many accredited studies have found that reduced queue times are critical and valuable to a patient’s perception of a hospitals.
So, why is easing patient journeys important for hospitals? Below, I have summarized four reasons.
Reducing costs
A queue management system opens up opportunities to reduce costs throughout the patient flow by making every step of seeking treatment more effective.
Improving the patient experience
With a queue management system, you can achieve optimal waiting times, reduce perceived waiting times and improve the patient’s overall perception of the services in your hospital.
Increasing staff satisfaction
By streamlining the patient flow and making it more efficient and structured, a hospital queue system can increase staff satisfaction by simplifying the process of service provision.
Collecting important data
New generation queue management systems can capture important patient information – helping you to enhance performance while opening up opportunities for benchmarking.
Conclusion
In essence, the scope of a queue management system exceeds that of a simple queuing instrument. Whereas its main beneficiaries are health professionals, hospital management teams can reap the benefit as well in terms of patients’ insights and creating measurable efficiencies. A hospital queue system such as Q-SYS simplifies the work of administrators and what’s more, is that the changes in patient experiences happen almost right away.