Three digital health tools to help combat clinic burnout

While the peak of the pandemic may finally be behind us, our healthcare system’s capacity continues to struggle. Recruitment challenges, increased patient needs and COVID-related precautions and protocols are all weighing heavily on the hearts and minds of our healthcare community.

As a clinician-built company, we appreciate first-hand how post-pandemic burnout affects both day-to-day operations as well as the well-being of our staff and patients. With this in mind, here are three proven ways the Ocean community is leveraging today’s existing technology to help regain their work-life balance and improve the clinical experience.

1. Supercharge scheduling with Online Booking

Manually scheduling patient appointments by phone or email is a time-consuming and labour-intensive task that can easily consume a large portion of the administrative capacity for any clinic.

Fortunately, with Ocean’s Online Booking patients can schedule their own appointments online just like they would for their other appointments. But unlike other solutions, Ocean’s powerful customization options are specifically designed to accommodate myriad configurations used in healthcare settings. Want all your physicals booked on Thursday mornings? Easy. Don’t want patients to book more than 2 weeks in advance? Done!

Plus, with Ocean’s EMR integration, all your appointments will flow seamlessly into your existing systems without the need to manage multiple schedules.

2. Reduce data-entry with digital patient forms

When time is of the essence, making the most of in-clinic visits is critical for giving providers and their patients room to breathe. With Ocean, clinic administrators and providers can significantly reduce the time spent on data entry by having patients complete forms for intake, patient history, and screening before their appointment instead of during.

For example, during the peak of the pandemic, many nurses and administrators attached a COVID-19 screening form to their appointment reminders. This effectively reduced the need for thousands of screening calls while saving countless staff hours.

In addition to sending forms before an appointment, Ocean’s automated Patient Reminders offer a great tool for sharing or collecting data after the visit. Patients can receive automated reminders that include information about their care plan and medication schedule, which reduces the need for follow-up calls and helps ensure patients adhere to their treatment plan.

3. Streamline referrals with the Ocean Provider Network

The traditional method of sending referrals by fax is outdated and unreliable, and can lead to unnecessarily long wait times due to administrative effort, data entry, and accidental misplacement of a faxed document. Sending a referral to a specialist only for it to be rejected due to incompleteness or inappropriate service requests only adds more stress for everyone. Decision fatigue has also been shown to contribute to clinician burnout, especially when every decision requires the careful review of multiple documents or guidelines.

Thankfully, by auto-populating patient data, making it easier to find and connect with specialists, and incorporating clinical decision support into referral forms, clinicians using Ocean are able to make more informed decisions faster and with fewer clicks than ever.

For example, the Ocean Healthmap provides an entire directory of healthcare providers and specialists within the area, right from the EMR. Search results can be narrowed down based on wait times, distance from patients, subspecialities offered, and more. When sending an eReferral on the Ocean Provider Network, referral forms designed by the receiving specialist are auto-populated with required patient data directly from the patient chart. This saves valuable time on each and every referral while significantly reducing the likelihood that the referral is declined or considered unnecessary.

Clinic administrators can also benefit from the Ocean Provider Network. Ocean sends real-time, regular status updates to each stakeholder, including the original sender, recipient and patient. This leads to fewer phone calls and greater transparency throughout the referral process.

While there is no magic bullet for resolving the significant burnout clinics and clinicians are facing, leveraging the right digital health tools can be incredibly helpful in reducing it. By reducing administrative burden, improving patient engagement, and enhancing clinical decision-making, staff can feel more fulfilled and motivated in their jobs.