With conversational AI, healthcare businesses can significantly improve corporate performance - starting with customer service.
Conversational AI is on the rise - and it’s no surprise why. Virtual assistants are vastly valuable for the corporate world, giving companies a leg-up in customer service. This is critical, particularly in industries like healthcare, where the customer-centric approach is growing in popularity.
Considering the physician shortage, giving customers the attention they deserve is challenging, but conversational AI can help address this dilemma. With virtual assistants, healthcare businesses can significantly improve corporate performance - by starting with customer service.
Before diving into improving corporate performance, let’s take a step back and discuss virtual assistants in healthcare. Often when you think of virtual assistants, what comes to mind is a simple chatbot that answers questions or redirects you to another location. These are fairly common nowadays and can be seen on virtually every website and application.
In terms of healthcare, virtual assistants also perform these tasks, but that’s only the tip of the iceberg. Virtual assistance significantly optimizes the way that care providers interact with patients. You may think that conversational AI reduces interactions between providers and patients - but that’s not the case. In reality, virtual assistants help providers to work faster and more efficiently, ultimately allowing them to improve patient care and, thus, corporate performance.
Healthcare virtual assistants can provide patients with accurate information to help them navigate their care or route them to resources that can help. Whether this means connecting them with a provider, helping them schedule an appointment, or refilling a prescription, virtual assistants have got it handled.
Now, let’s get back to how this impacts corporate performance.
As mentioned, modern healthcare businesses are all about the patient (aka customer) experience. The more positive an experience your patients have, the more likely they will be to stay with your practice and continue seeking care from your providers. So, how do virtual assistants improve the patient experience?
Studies show that healthcare businesses that utilize conversational AI see a 30% increase in customer satisfaction. This is primarily due to virtual assistants’ quick response time and personalized engagement - two things that traditional healthcare businesses often lack.
Without a virtual assistant, patients typically have to call their doctor for every single need. Whether scheduling an appointment, inquiring about their health, or refilling a prescription, patients get stuck playing phone tag for something that only takes a few minutes - not including the limitations of business hours.
But, with conversational AI, these interactions become significantly improved, allowing patients to communicate more easily with their providers. With 24/7 support, patients can get the answers they need at any time.
Even if a patient needs to speak with a human support agent, their virtual assistant will direct them to one promptly, ensuring that every query - no matter how complex, is answered in a timely and efficient manner. The easier it is for patients to engage with your business, the more likely it is that they will - and they’ll be happier to!
The correlation between customer engagement and corporate performance is clear. The more engaged and satisfied that customers are with your business, the more business they will bring. So with that out of the way, let’s dive into the more corporate-centered impacts of conversational AI.
Healthcare companies with virtual assistants measured 2.8 billion interactions per year between patients and chatbots. That number is astronomical - but imagine if virtual assistants weren’t in use. Each of those interactions would instead be between patients and healthcare personnel. Now, imagine those interactions on top of business hours and a limited healthcare workforce. That means that the majority of a team member’s day would be spent addressing these interactions.
But, with the use of virtual assistants, healthcare businesses can save 30% of time for their staff - time that could be spent caring for patients or driving business forward rather than scheduling appointments and answering common queries.
Virtual assistants significantly save time for healthcare personnel, whether receptionists or doctors themselves. The virtual assistant will handle the front-end of patient needs, ensuring that they get quick and accurate care without taking time away from actual care. Consequently, providers can delegate their time Learn More - Healthcare towards caring for patients rather than getting clouded by administrative noise.
As we all know, time is money, so saving such considerable time will result in major cost savings. In fact, healthcare businesses see $3.6 billion in annual cost savings after adopting conversational AI into their practice. The time saved by using virtual assistants allows providers to treat patients more accurately and efficiently, thus allowing them to see more patients (and retain their current ones).
Additionally, as many time-consuming tasks can be delegated to the virtual assistants, fewer resources must be devoted to such operations, furthering the cost savings you reap.
Speaking of time-consuming tasks, let’s focus more on exactly which tasks virtual assistants can automate. Within any healthcare business, your personnel is responsible for scheduling appointments, alerting patients of upcoming appointments, refilling prescriptions, collecting patient data, and sending invoices for billing.
With conversational AI bots, all of these tasks can be automated. Not only does this make these processes significantly faster and easier for patients, but it improves operations within your business. Automating these processes ensures they are completed quickly, eliminating many common administrative bottlenecks.
Additionally, these processes can be performed more accurately, ensuring that payments, appointments, and prescriptions are correct. While these tasks may not seem connected to a patient’s health, if mishandled, they could compromise patient care.
All of the ways in which AI virtual assistants can improve corporate performance ultimately boost your bottom line. By improving countless time-consuming tasks, your healthcare business can operate more efficiently, ensuring seamless performance and improved patient care.
In automating high volumes of patient traffic via virtual assistants, patients get the answers and care they need in an instant and personalized manner - and your business can cater to the consumer market. Virtual assistants ensure that patients are attended to and cared for, saving significant time and frustration.
On the corporate end, your employees will have more time on their hands to devote to patient care and improving operations. Plus, with improved resource allocation and cost savings, your business will see a significant boost to your bottom line from the mere adoption of conversational AI.
Interested in learning more about DRUID’s conversational AI technologies? Download our case study today.
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