instantly health

Image by Gerd Altmann from Pixabay. If you’re a hospital CEO or a Board of Directors member of a tax-exempt hospital, you’re not going to like this post. I know hospitals don’t care much about optics unless they get caught, but there are times where an action crosses the line of ethical behavior. No matter how well-intentioned the idea was of the senior leader in the hospital who thought of or approved the idea, it’s still wrong. There is a growing trend in hospitals in adding job candidates to their fundraising efforts by Development departments. I don’t know who the rocket scientist was in the hospital that came up with that idea, but it’s a breach of trust and confidentiality. Especially after receiving the standard HR “thank you for your interest email” and never hear another word from the hospital. Until, of course, they receive a communication from the hospital Development department asking the applicant to contribute to the latest Capital Campaign or give us some money becaus...

Image by Andrezj Rembowski from Pixabay. The hospital quality award season is underway as various organizations and magazines, with their black-box analytics, tag community hospitals and health systems as the best or tops in specific care categories. I am not making light of the accomplishment as quality awards are essential for the patient information in the decision-making process. I have to admit that a newly proclaimed award category of the “Triple Crown of Healthcare” for a Fortune/IBM Watson Health Top 100 Hospital Ranking , CMS 5-Star Ranking , and Leapfrog for Safety is a hard-earned series of awards. My question for your consideration is, how is the hospital and health system positioning the quality award contextually? This is an important question and goes beyond the traditional look at our claims and how good we are.   The question is asked since there is little if any, context or content on the value and meaning of the award. Why, in that case, should the patient a...

Permission check image by Tumisu from Pixabay. Provider marketing is challenging, and it doesn’t matter if it’s a medical practice, home health agency, Ambulatory Surgical Center, hospital, or health system. With the HIPAA Privacy Rule and General Data Protection Regulation (GDPR) compliance in Europe (read up if you’re not familiar), things are only going to be more challenging. Apple made user privacy and data control changes with the IOS 14 update , allowing individuals to stop Apps from tracking activity. Add in that browser cookies are a thing of the past; 2022 is shaping up as the year patients take control of their privacy and data. Your ability to digitally market to patients has changed. But that does not mean you can’t be effective. Job number one is now ensuring that patient privacy is protected. And from my point of view, there is a way around these patient control challenges. It’s about doing what you are allowed to in the spirit of the regulations and becoming the...

I mage by StartUpStockPhotos from Pixabay Well, I am trying something new. Beginning with the end of the month in October 2021, I recapped the posts published in the month, with a post summary and clickable links for each in one place. This way, if you missed a post or wanted to reread one, the months’ published content is in one easy-to-find place. During October, we looked at why providers need to market core values, moving to one view of the patient to the hospital system and vis versa and finished with removing ageism from healthcare marketing. I’ll be honest, and I am not sure if it will be of benefit for you, but I’m giving it a try anyway. As the saying goes, “nothing ventured, nothing gained.” Image by Peter Linforth from Pixabay. October 5 - Why Healthcare Providers & Vendors Need to Market Core Values https://bit.ly/3DdD6Mz In the latest Healthcare Business & Marketing Insights blog post, I explore why healthcare providers and vendors consider marketing organizati...

Image by Rudy Anderson from Pixabay, A funny thing happens when you get older.  Brands, especially those in healthcare, suddenly decide that based solely on age, one is now in need of senior services, specialized care, and other age-based items. Ageism and inaccurate stereotypes occur not only in healthcare but in many consumer brands. Based on legend, past practice, misguided beliefs, and stereotypes, ageism is harmful. Ageism harms society, the individual, and employment opportunities.   It’s nonsense how Boomers, Gen-X, Gen-Z, Millennials, and other age groups are perceived by marketing harmful and inaccurate stereotypes. It is ageism and it is wrong. Image by Brandon Roberts from Pixabay Age-based stereotyping is wrong on many levels. Age assumption-based marketing does not reflect the new market realities of how someone of any age uses technology, their experiences or expectations as individuals, and how they relate to the world, beliefs, self-perceptions, attitudes, an...

Bitcoin image by Petre Barlea from Pixabay Cryptocurrency (Crypto) is a popular dizzying array, for the most part, of non-government regulated currency. With wildly fluctuating values, crypto is gaining more adherents each day and uses for paying bills. While not yet every day in healthcare, providers have started to accept digital currency for medical bills.  The hospitals that are known to accept cryptocurrency can be primarily found in the medical tourism industry. Bitcoin, Ethereum, Cardano (ADA), Binance Coin (BNB), Tether, Solana, XRP, Dogecoin, Polkadot (DOT), and USD (USDC) are some of the more popular cryptocurrencies as outlined by SoFi Learn in “Understanding the Different Types of Cryptocurrency,” September 17, 2021.   CryptoSlate has compiled a list of 21 Healthcare Cryptocurrencies that you may wish to review, including performance along six dimensions. Ethereum image by WorldSpectrum from Pixabay. Now it is true that few counties have declared cryptocurrency t...

Image by Gerd Altmann from Pixabay.  Change can be good in the leadership of healthcare providers and vendors. Conversely, change, if not managed correctly organizationally, can be debilitating. And the professional sports world is full of examples of good and bad change, from leadership to players. The point is that major professional sports teams in leagues worldwide live in a continuous cycle of evaluation and change regardless of the sport. In the professional sports world, the common saying from GMs and coaches to owners, players, staff, and fans when explaining change is “if you’re not changing, you’re falling behind.” Thinking image by Pexels from Pixabay. When you think about that statement, there is a pearl of intuitive wisdom for healthcare providers and vendors, working in a sea of change coming from all directions. This was never truer as we continue to experience upheaval driven by seismic shifts in technology, diagnosis, treatment, care delivery, and innovative new e...

Idea image by Gerd Altmann from Pixabay. The title, in a nutshell, explains why so much hospital marketing is features based, not a value proposition, brand promise, experience or benefits to the patients based. Ponder that statement for a minute. Now review some of your advertising and messaging- all about your beautiful facilities and locations, your technology for diagnosing and treating disease, third-party awards, how much you care about the patient, even specialized medical services that few people need. Hospital marketing, in that case, is focused on the Board, senior management, and medical staff with all the points they hold near and dear to their hearts.  Cold and soulless, these messages are devoid of meaning for the patient yet allow senior management to pat themselves on the back for a great job of building facilities. Other hospitals and health systems in the market take the same approach with a slightly different spin. And then you hear from the medical staff with...

Woman physician image by Daniel Damn outsideclick from Pixabay Let’s face it, the current efforts by local, state, and federal governments are falling way short of the target number of vaccinations needed to reach community herd immunity. While availability and access of the COVID-19 vaccines are widely available, convenient, and free,  the efforts by anti-vaxxers, science deniers, conspiracy theorists and disinformation 12 continue to gain followers and support. While many efforts are underway to reverse the trend, from state lotteries, free giveaways, public relations, etc., it’s just not working. Now comes the finger-pointing and blame game focusing on the social media tech giants as the source of the problem by allowing COVID-19 misinformation to be shared. What hospitals and health systems are now facing as the COVID Delta variant spreads like wildfire, as society opens up, is the fourth wave of the pandemic, that of the unvaccinated. It’s time to stop blaming third parties...