10 Ways TigerConnect is Making Physicians' Lives Better April 26, 2019 Tag 1268 For every hour a physician spends with a patient, two hours are spent doing administrative work – a stat frequently cited in the healthcare industry. But what does this actually mean? I've witnessed physician burnout first hand in healthcare, as an orthopedic surgeon and now as a technology partner to many large healthcare systems. At hospitals across the country, when many types of physicians start a shift at a hospital, they receive sign out from the previous shift, which typically includes a verbal report and stacks of handwritten notes. After studying the notes, they have to piece together the care team for each patient — figuring out which nurses are on duty and assigned to their patients, and any specialists that need to be involved. This level of manual coordination is absurd with all the technology we have available to us. This is what gets me so excited about what we do at TigerConnect, we are truly solving a very acute problem in healthcare by increasing access to resources and information at the point of care. And we are doing this all through technology that is commonly used in our everyday life — text messaging, video and voice. Let's look at 10 ways TigerConnect can relieve physician burnout rather than add to it: 1. Remove Friction in Clinical Communication – When TigerConnect is used enterprise-wide, it becomes a central directory, with easy access to your entire healthcare network, all from your smartphone. Simply put — significant friction is removed in the coordination of care. TigerConnect becomes the one-source of truth for all the contacts a physician needs to communicate with in order to provide the best care for their patients. No more struggles coordinating care – easily message or call the right person, in the right role, assigned to the right patient, at the right time. 2. Easily Identify and Communicate with Specialists – With TigerConnect, a physician is able to easily select the on-call specialist they want to interact with, even without knowing the actual person they are trying to reach. In addition, schedule integrations ensure the right on-call specialist is associated with the right role at the right time. No more time spent scanning schedule spreadsheets – simply tap the desired role to connect with and start communicating immediately. 3. Lose the Pager – In many hospitals today, nurses, physicians, and ancillary staff still carry pagers. Unfortunately, this typically means 4-digit call back numbers with no context as to who is paging or the level of urgency. With so little context it's nearly impossible to triage messages. Does one page mean a patient just needs a Tylenol or is it something more serious? When the entire care team is on the same TigerConnect system, more context can be provided through secure text message and often completely resolved, eliminating the need for a pager. No more pages from all over the hospital with zero context – secure text, voice, and video communication options give physicians the ability to know what is going on across all their patients at scale. 4. Less of an Interruption – For those times when a physician is on-call, TigerConnect is much less of an interruption. Rather than receiving a page and having to call back the hospital, the hospital team can text their question and include patient medical records and photographs if necessary. Most questions can be resolved over secure text, and if a phone call is needed for deeper discussion, it's easy enough to initiate a call or video chat from within the app. No more constant call-backs to the hospital when on-call – questions and photos can be sent via secure text and often resolved without the need for a callback, reducing interruption fatigue. 5. Easier to Manage On-Call Schedules – If you are an on-call specialist you want to be as helpful and easy to work with as possible so fellow physicians will consult you again. But when you're not on call, you don't want to be bothered. TigerConnect automates the process of logging users in and out of a role by syncing up with the most popular scheduling systems and can even work using Excel spreadsheets. The handy calendar view also lets physicians see schedules up to four weeks out. No more messy schedule management – on-call specialists are automatically logged in and out of their shift, when they're on-call they get messages and when their not they don't! 6. Role Hand-Offs in Just a Few Taps – For physicians that wear multiple hats, the ability to designate another colleague as the person responsible for their on-call duty when they need to be with a patient is a huge help. This ensures everyone else in the hospital knows who's on duty. No more lack of visibility into who's covering a role – when a physician is tied up with a patient, they can simply assign their on-call role to someone else, so everyone knows who's on duty. 7. Let Others Know Your Availability – Another handy feature is the do-not-disturb notification that can be set by a physician in the event he or she is tied up with a patient and unavailable. The physician can also update their status with a note of why they are unavailable such as "in surgery until 3 p.m." They can also set up forwarding for any messages that might come in, and escalation can be set up at the administrator level for specific roles to ensure any urgent messages that come in do not go unanswered. No more interruptions while with a patient – the do-not-disturb setting will alert others that you won't get their message. 8. Streamline Communication with the Pharmacist – Instead of the constant round of call-back requests from the pharmacist to clarify orders, TigerConnect allows physicians to receive text messages directly from the pharmacist. This allows them to more easily approve or deny a refill request or clarify an order. No more constant call-back requests from the pharmacist for clarification – seamlessly interact with the pharmacist by role using text, voice, or video. 9. Easily Communicate with Medical Records – Instead of the constant calls from medical records flagging missing codes that are needed for insurance reimbursements, physicians can leverage TigerConnect to more easily clear up discrepancies and missing information. No more rounds of calls to medical records – clear up code discrepancies with medical coders via secure text. 10. Patient Follow-Up Post-Discharge – With only 49 percent of patients remembering physician instructions after they leave the hospital, according to a study published in PLOS One, it's more likely than not that a patient will have questions following discharge. With TigerConnect, staff can easily receive status updates from the patient's primary care provider or home health staff. They can also leverage TigerTouch, our patient-facing, virtual care messaging capability, to connect with the patient directly after a procedure, clarifying post-op instructions, seeing patient photos, and more. No more lack of care coordination after discharge – ensure the patient is recovering properly after a clinical event with open communication with the entire care team, patient, and family.