Study Confirms Patients Want One Digital Platform for Healthcare Needs

A recent study has confirmed what we’ve known for some time, most people would prefer to manage their healthcare from a single digital platform. The study, Healthcare In The Digital Age: Consumers See Unified Platforms As Key To Better Health, a PYMNTS and Lynx collaboration, is based on a census-balanced survey of 2,515 U.S. consumers from Sept. 7 to Sept. 13 to learn about their interest in using digital platforms to manage their medical services and benefits. 

According to the report, “Consumers were asked about their understanding of their existing health insurance benefits and whether they believe a unified digital platform would help them improve not only their understanding and utilization of these benefits but also their overall ability to manage and afford their healthcare.”

Gozio has learned a few key things over the years about how to launch a mobile engagement platform. One of those things is that the more tools and features you can pull into a single location, the higher the engagement. Reasons, essentially, when multiple tools, apps and platforms are vying for attention then none get the attention. When a single platform can offer a wide range of tools and features then it reaches a tipping point where it becomes useful to a lot of people for a lot of reasons. The result is increased repeat use and loyalty.

The new survey supports this concept. Here are a few key highlights from the report:

1. About four out of five people are interested in using a single unified digital platform to manage information about their care and benefits. This was largely true across ages and geographic regions.
2. Seventy-one percent of consumers say a single digital platform would improve some aspects of their healthcare knowledge and management, with 30% saying this is the most important reason for their interest in using a single digital platform. 
3. Consumers who used online accounts for healthcare services report that they saved time and gained improved access to their care. Eighty-two percent of consumers who use them find that the accounts are convenient to use and save time, with 53% of consumers saying that these are the most important benefits they realized with their accounts from a health insurer, healthcare provider or a wellness or fitness app. 
4. The study also found that 85% of people would like to check in for upcoming appointments, and 85% would like to connect with their healthcare provider’s website or patient portal with a platform.

Finally, consumer interest in unified digital healthcare platforms is strong across all the groups surveyed, with 81% of all consumers expressing some level of interest. 

This data reinforces many other studies in recent years showing that overall interest in digital and mobile solutions for healthcare is high. Check out this recent post for more data points on mobile patient experience.

It’s clear that consumers have moved beyond an interest in individual solutions to a growing desire for a single access point. As healthcare organizations consider how best to address this, remember these keys to success: make mobile engagement a cornerstone of your strategy as mobile continues to outpace desktop; choose a platform that is flexible and customizable so you can bring together your best-in-breed solutions on a solid framework and avoid getting locked in to any one solution; and talk to your peers or read case studies to get an idea of how others have been successful.