Business Development

Subtopics: Partnering, Mergers, Acquisitions, Referrals, etc.

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How Marketing Communications Can Navigate Patients Right to Your Door: 4 Steps to Get Your Facility on Your Customer’s Map

May 4, 2015

By Claire Hovis In health care, it isn’t just the care that’s changing. Power is changing. “Expert-driven” communications that placed providers and large corporations atop the information market are giving way to a generation of empowered consumers who are more engaged and have higher expectations. Access is changing. The Affordable Care Act has brought health Read More

Why Better Physician Onboarding Leads To Higher Profits

April 16, 2015

Serving the central and northeast regions of Pennsylvania, Geisinger Health System is one of the largest rural health systems in the nation, operating nine hospitals, along with a 1,200 member multi-specialty group practice, two research centers, and a 467,000-member health plan. While some hospitals communicate with providers themselves, Geisinger decided to try a different approach, Read More

Physician Referrals: The “Social Network” That Really Matters for Health Care Marketers

April 9, 2015

While health care marketers are often urged to embrace the social media revolution, “another kind of social network has an even bigger impact on health care: the referral network that connects physicians,” says Moses Hohman, CEO of Human Practice, a Chicago-based digital health startup that helps physicians and health systems meet their referral goals. “Though Read More

The Other Social Network: What Recent Research Tells Us about Physician Referrals—and What It Means to Your Revenue Goals

March 23, 2015

By Moses Hohman Much has been made in health care marketing circles of the need to embrace the social media revolution. “Go where the patients are,” conventional wisdom tells us, and where they are is on online social networks. Just last month the Pew Research Center came out with the latest user statistics on Facebook: Read More

Rural Health System Maximizes Profits Through Better Physician Onboarding; Can You Cut Your New Docs’ Time to Profit by 78%?

March 12, 2015

By Lisa D. Ellis Relationships are the focus of attention at Geisinger Health System—and not just with patients, but also with its practitioners and specialists. In fact, aligning with providers, as well as with all of the internal service lines, is a key part of the organization’s strategy, enabling everyone to work collaboratively within the Read More

How To Position Your Service Lines for Success in Today’s Marketplace

February 19, 2015

Service lines may be the mainstay of your organization, but are you using them strategically for the realities of today’s marketplace? If not, you could be missing some important potential for getting, and keeping, your patients. Health care reform has changed the way most hospitals do business—and the impact includes an increased emphasis on value Read More

Spectrum Health’s Internal Communications Strategy Manages Medical Group Growth

January 28, 2015

Spectrum Health Medical Group (SHMG) has grown in leaps and bounds in recent years, and so has its onboarding and communication efforts, which are essential to helping new providers acclimate to the large, multi-disciplinary system. Headquartered in Grand Rapids, Michigan, Spectrum Health is the second largest health care provider in the state, offering inpatient and Read More

Restructuring Service Lines for Success

January 28, 2015

Service lines may be the mainstay of your organization, but are you using them strategically for the realities of today’s marketplace? If not, you could be missing some important potential for getting, and keeping, your patients. Responding to the Current Climate Health care reform has changed the way most hospitals do business—and the impact includes Read More

How To Boost the Profitability of Your Service Lines

January 2, 2015

In a new SHCM article, Stewart Gandolf, CEO of Healthcare Success Strategies, writes that: Clinical service department profitability is a constant challenge for hospitals. That’s nothing new. What’s changed, however, is just about everything else. He explains how patients, newly empowered, now regard medical services through the critical eyes of retail shoppers. Health care reform, Read More

New School Marketing Shifts that Boost Service Line Profitability

January 1, 2015

by Stewart Gandolf Clinical service department profitability is a constant challenge for hospitals. That’s nothing new. What’s changed, however, is just about everything else. The newly empowered patient now regards medical services with the critical eye of a retail shopper. The dynamics of health care reform, facility mergers and acquisitions and increasingly intense competition have Read More

Mastering the Challenge of Marketing Physician Groups

December 17, 2014

by Lisa D. Ellis Many hospitals are acquiring physician groups at a rapid pace. But in the process of incorporating new practices into the larger organization, it’s crucial that hospitals don’t lose sight of their end goal: getting a good return on their investment. Thinking strategically Daniel Weinbach of the Weinbach Group, Inc., in Miami, Read More

Hospitals Face Steep Competition From Freestanding Outpatient Centers

December 1, 2014

by Patricia Chaney With reimbursement cuts, increasingly price-sensitive consumers and payers, and the development of accountable care organizations, independent outpatient facilities stand to take market share from hospitals. Outpatient imaging and ambulatory surgery centers pose steep competition for hospitals in certain markets, but with all providers struggling to balance reimbursements and payer negotiations, there’s more Read More

High-Profile Fundraising for Health Care Nonprofits: Boon or Bust?

October 30, 2014

by Jennifer Redmond Implementation of the Affordable Care Act has created an equal share of opportunity and difficulty for health care providers. In an evergrowing market, providers are vying for the attention of consumers in creative ways, but some, in an effort to edge out the competition, are met with vehement criticism. This pressure to Read More

Dr. Devi Shetty’s Health City Envisions a New Kind of Medical Tourism

October 1, 2014

by Cheryl Haas Devi Shetty, MD, is out to change the world of health care delivery through compassion, quality, and affordability. India’s most renowned heart surgeon and Chairman of Narayana Health has built a chain of 21 medical centers that cut costs so substantially that they can provide clinical excellence at a fraction of the Read More

Pursuing New Opportunities: Pace Picks Up at UCSF Benioff Children’s Oakland

October 1, 2014

by Joan Trezek For more than 100 years, Children’s Hospital and Research Center in Oakland, CA, has been the go-to facility for tertiary pediatric care in San Francisco’s East Bay. That hasn’t changed, but a great deal about the hospital today is very different from how it was positioned even 10 years ago. One significant Read More

Supermarket Chain Offers Infusion Services

August 1, 2014

by Nancy Vessell When a Midwest supermarket chain began offering chemotherapy and other infusion services, a few heads were turned. “When I first learned about it, it did catch me by surprise. To my knowledge, I haven’t heard about other grocery chains getting into this [medical area],” says Michael Abrams, managing partner of Numerof & Read More

The Importance of Addressing Culture When Merging Different Entities

July 1, 2014

by Sheryl S. Jackson Keep Focus on Patient-Centric Care and Take Time to Engage Everyone in the Process Increasing financial and competitive pressures within the health care industry have spurred hospital acquisition of other health care providers – physician practices, urgent care centers, and imaging centers. While the reasons for acquiring other entities varies from Read More

Digging Deep to Learn the ‘Why’ of Leakage

July 1, 2014

by Nancy Vessell The key to spotting and stemming leakage of physician referrals at Texas Health Resources (THR) doesn’t hinge on expensive data collection. Certainly, data showing where patients are going in the large north Texas market is helpful to this health system of 25 hospitals and 5,500 affiliated physicians. But the data only serves Read More

Physician Onboarding: Four Steps in One Process

May 1, 2014

by Nancy Vessell With 40 to 60 new physicians arriving every year to serve an eight-hospital system and its medical group, where 40 people are involved in physician recruitment, onboarding, orientation, and retention, the opportunity for “dropped balls” measures in the tons. That’s according to Jim Zache, vice president of physician recruiting and physician relations Read More

Dedicated Men’s Health Programs Can Reach Reluctant Consumers

April 1, 2014

by Kris Rusch “When it comes to health,” asserts an article in Harvard Men’s Health Watch, “males are the weaker sex throughout life.” Com­pared with women, men on average have more chronic illnesses, die at higher rates from diseases, and have a lower life expectancy. Men also take more risks with their health. They use Read More

A New Model Attempts to Give Health Care Wings

March 1, 2014

by Cheryl L. Serra Imagine bringing health care to patients instead of requiring patients to travel to health care. Ernie Clevenger, co-founder and president of CareHere, LLC, did just that. The result? His company has a health care clinic with a retail component, the CareHere Walk-In Clinic and Wellness Store, located in the Nashville International Read More

Hospital Affinity Programs Reward Loyalty and Give Members VIP Treatment

January 1, 2014

by Cheryl L. Serra Members of the Spirit of Women in Springfield, MA, recently had the opportunity to see and hear hu­morist and work-life balance expert Juliet Funt, daughter of Allen Funt, host of the 1970s TV show “Candid Camera.” They may also take ad­vantage of a discount on the cost of mini-med school, an Read More