New York, NY (PRWEB) August 21, 2014
The Mount Sinai Hospital has expanded its use of a patient survey tool called RateMyHospital®, which captures real-time patient feedback and enables staff to make rapid changes that improve each patient’s care. The tool, now available to admitted patients in the Hospital’s cardiology, medicine, orthopedics and oncology units, collects feedback regarding patient satisfaction using smartphones.
"We are expanding our use of this survey tool, because it gives us the timely information we need to respond to patient needs, and demonstrates that we care about their experience," said David Reich, MD, President and Chief Operating Officer, The Mount Sinai Hospital. “The system is fast enough to enable our staff to use the information to improve our patients’ experience within minutes or hours while they remain under our care in the hospital.”
Traditional patient-satisfaction scores are based on paper, telephone, or electronic surveys that are sent to patients after they have left the facility. RateMyHospital® helps health care providers get real-time patient feedback that they can act on immediately. Survey response rates with RateMyHospital are about 15 percent, according to its designer.
First launched in the Derald H. Ruttenberg Treatment Center of the Tisch Cancer Institute in July of 2013, the Center has already received approximately 2,500 completed mobile surveys from patients’ smartphones, with most surveys filled out by patients within 24 hours of receiving a text message.
"RateMyHospital is one of the many tools we have recently implemented to help the Mount Sinai Health System improve the experience of care for the communities we serve, and given the tool’s early success, we will continue rolling it out in the coming months in other clinical areas," said Jeremy Boal, MD, Chief Medical Officer and Executive Vice President for Clinical Operations, Mount Sinai Health System.
To use RateMyHospital®, patients receive a link to a survey as a text message on their smartphones, and fill it out at the point of care. Patients are asked 11 questions based on a five-star rating system, with five being the best score. The questions cover topics, such as room cleanliness and the attentiveness of the nursing and medical staff. Patient feedback can be seen immediately by staff on a web-based dashboard, enabling them to address patient concerns and make timely improvements.
“Patient satisfaction, communication and transparency are priorities for the Mount Sinai Health System and using emerging technology is furthering those missions,” said Margaret Pastuszko, MBA, Chief Strategy Officer, Mount Sinai Health System. “This program represents the first time that patient satisfaction information has been gathered using the patients’ own mobile devices, and then analyzed and acted on immediately.”
“We are very happy to expand our relationship with Mount Sinai as a global leader in care quality and transparency," said Edward Shin, MD, Chief Executive Officer of Quality Reviews, Inc., the software company that designed the tool. “The leadership at Mount Sinai is committed to giving consumers a voice through this technology, which is set to revolutionize the patient experience.”
About the Mount Sinai Health System
The Mount Sinai Health System is an integrated health system committed to providing distinguished care, conducting transformative research, and advancing biomedical education. Structured around seven member hospital campuses and a single medical school, the Health System has an extensive ambulatory network and a range of inpatient and outpatient services—from community-based facilities to tertiary and quaternary care.
The System includes approximately 6,600 primary and specialty care physicians, 12 minority-owned free-standing ambulatory surgery centers, over 45 ambulatory practices throughout the five boroughs of New York City, Westchester, and Long Island, as well as 31 affiliated community health centers. Physicians are affiliated with the Icahn School of Medicine at Mount Sinai, which is ranked among the top 20 medical schools both in National Institutes of Health funding and by U.S. News & World Report.
For more information, visit http://www.mountsinai.org, or find Mount Sinai on Facebook, Twitter and YouTube.