Healthcare Business Today: How Virtual Queuing Helps Triaging and the Patient Experience
Article Publish Date: August 2, 2022
Article Abstract:
One of the reasons many patients dread visiting a healthcare provider is the wait they might be forced to experience. There might be a wait to check in, a wait to be called, a wait to actually be seen by the practitioner, a wait to get lab work or an X-ray done, a wait to get the results, and so on …
The time spent in the lobby waiting often is a great unknown for patients. They don’t know how long their wait will be, and they might not understand why that person who just got here was called back before they were.
Long waits aren’t just inconvenient and uncomfortable—they’re counterintuitive to quality care. A crowded lobby can be unnerving, and the thought of a stressful wait can lead people to not seek care when they might really need it. For walk-in providers, such as urgent care facilities, labs, pharmacies, and vaccination clinics, a poor patient experience can also impact the bottom line.
Although some healthcare waits are unavoidable, providers—particularly ones that rely on walk-in traffic or experience waits just for patients with appointments to check in—still should do what they can to improve the patient experience, if not shorten wait times. Virtual queuing technology offers a way to create efficiency while easing a bit of the burden on patients who require care.