Achieving the Healthcare Triple Aim with Triple Down Support
The Triple Aim is a framework for improving healthcare outcomes, which was first introduced by the Institute for Healthcare Improvement (IHI) in 2007. The Triple Aim focuses on three goals: improving the patient experience, improving population health, and reducing healthcare costs. This blog post discusses the Triple Aim in more detail and explores how it can be applied in healthcare.
Improving the Patient Experience
The first goal of the Triple Aim is to improve the patient experience. This means providing patients with high-quality care that is safe, effective, and patient-centered. To achieve this goal, not only must healthcare providers listen to their patients and respond to their needs and concerns, but every patient touchpoint, from scheduling their appointment to paying their bill, should be a pleasant and seamless experience.
Improving Population Health
The second goal of the Triple Aim is to improve population health. This means focusing on the health of entire populations, not just individual patients. To achieve this goal, healthcare providers must work to prevent illness and disease by promoting healthy behaviors and lifestyles. They must also address social determinants of health, such as poverty, education, and housing, which can have a significant impact on health outcomes.
Reducing Healthcare Costs
The third goal of the Triple Aim is to reduce healthcare costs. This means finding ways to deliver high-quality care at a lower cost. To achieve this goal, healthcare providers must eliminate waste and inefficiencies in the healthcare system. This means spending less time doing administrative tasks or being stuck in the EHR and more time with the patients. They must also work to prevent unnecessary hospitalizations and readmissions and to reduce the use of expensive tests and procedures that may not be medically necessary.
Applying the Triple Aim in Healthcare
The Triple Aim framework can be applied in many different healthcare settings, from hospitals and clinics to community health centers and long-term care facilities. To implement the Triple Aim, healthcare providers must focus on several key strategies:
Improve Patient Experience
According to a Solution Reach study, every patient disappointed with their experience reaches ten other patients. On the contrary, every patient was satisfied with their experience only reached four patients. Organizations that focus on patient experience drive financial and clinical outcomes. Provider organizations must treat the whole patient from the beginning to the end of their care, not just in the exam room. Part of that treatment involves creating a patient-centered culture. Give patients a voice. They want to be educated on their care, and equipped with the tools/technology to actively participate in their healthcare journey. This involves teaching patients how to use patient portals and empowering them to engage.
To make this possible, physicians must have the time to give to patients. Equip doctors with more intuitive, less intrusive technology tools that support the physician workflow and make their administrative tasks less time-consuming so they can spend more time focusing on the patient.
Improve Provider Satisfaction
Switch to a “shared care” model versus a physician-centered model to distribute the provider’s burden. In this model, everyone in an organization begins to carry the weight, reducing physician burnout and increasing satisfaction. Organizations can start reducing work through pre-visit planning and pre-appointment planning. Invest in scribes to complete non-physician order entry and streamlined prescription management. For more clinical tasks, have a clinical staff assistant filter electronic information for fewer inbox messages.
Reduce Per Capita Cost
Technology needs to be a part of the solution to control costs. Utilizing technologies that reduce the administrative burden on physicians opens them up to provide better quality care to patients also to allocate more time to see and treat other patients. Technology tools can lower staff time spent on scheduling appointments, engage patients as consumers, decrease appointment cancellations, and decrease wait times to make appointments.
The Triple Aim framework provides a roadmap for improving healthcare outcomes by focusing on the patient experience, population health, and healthcare costs. By implementing the strategies outlined in this framework, healthcare providers can work together to provide high-quality care that meets the needs of their patients and the community as a whole.