DOCTORS CAN USE INTERNET TO IMPROVE THEIR REPUTATION

The sheer number of internet users in India alone is staggering, the world surely has many more. People all over the world seek many things online, medical help is one of the things that are constantly sought. Now with google and other search engines, bringing up the world on your screen with a few clicks, nothing is impossible. Now patients aren’t just using the internet to search for information on aliments, they search their doctors too. If searching alone wasn’t enough, they also research, evaluate and in many cases recommend their doctors to the world. This is a good news for doctors everywhere. What needs to be seen is how doctors utilize this opportunity to improve their online reputation. 

Patients on internet

These days it is common for people to simply enter their symptoms in the search engines and seek information. The amount of information that in available from various sources is mind boggling. Patients usually search for symptoms, treatments and opinions. They also seek specialist for their aliments and usually choose the ones that are highly recommended. 

Not always safe

While the search for information and the knowledge gained is important, this often makes a doctor’s task difficult. medical terms, information and cases on websites can be either complex or vague. Wrong information can be dangerous for patients as well as for doctors. Armed with their online information patients often question doctors without reasons bolstered by the backing of whatever information they found online. This is why doctors need to be online, to guide the patients and help make informed choices. 

What can doctors do?

Doctors must have a steady online presence. They should have a profile on medical sites and register on sites that put them in touch with their patients, for e.g. Aboutclinic.com. This makes it easy for the patients to find them, engage with them and reach out to them. Doctors can also start a blog/ website, be active on social media sites like YouTube, Google +, Twitter and Facebook. Answering questions on sites like Lybrate, Quora and Real Self also helps build a doctor’s credibility. 

How will it help a doctor?

A doctor’s reputation precedes him. A doctor whose online presence is strong has a good chance of snagging the attention of patients who need their help. It is easy for patients to be swayed by any amount of information online. But information what comes from a credible source will save their lives. A doctor whose online reputation is solid,boasts of blogs, recommendations and patient testimonial will definitely be a popular medical practitioner. In turn it will help you improve your practice and help you provide service to patients who seek it.

Reasons Why Patients Should Register On Aboutclinic.com

Most patients find their doctors through word of mouth or through recommendation. With the advent of internet, a plethora of options have opened up for patients all over the world. You need not depend on anyone’s advice or referral. You can search, find and choose the doctor you want through a few simple clicks. However, the wide chasm of information available on internet alone cannot help you determine who you should consult. Moreover, the overload of information and half available information prevents you from making the right choice and taking the right decision. Here is where about clinic can help you. About clinic is an online platform that brings doctors and patients together. Here patients can not only choose doctors, but also fix their appointments with them.Here are a few features to help you along.

*      Hassle Free Registration

Registering on About clinic.com is one of the easiest things to do. The registration process sis hassle free and only takes a very little time. We understand patient confidentiality and none of the information you provide will be used without your permission. Once you register you can easily use the site to find the doctors you need.

*       Find Best Doctors

We have a huge registry comprising of doctors all over the world. It doesn’t matter what part of the old you are from and what kind of specialist you seek; we have it all. Our online registry of doctors and clinics is quite extensive and this allows you to have a wider choice. The profilesof the doctors have comprehensive information on their work, achievement and clicks which will help you make an informed decision.

*       Quick Response by Clinic

Once you connect with the doctor or clinic you wish to get in touch with, you can get a quick response. You don’t have to wait too long for them to reach out to you. In fact, once your enquiry is raised, you can expect a call from them very soon.

*       Book Your Appointment

Instead of running from pillar to post and being stumped by automated responses at the clinic, you can book your appointments online through aboutclinic.com. All you need to do is choose the clinic or doctor of your choice and book at appointment with just a few clicks, all this in the comfort of your own home.

Headline: Doctors and internet can be friends

Ask any doctor today and they might tell you internet is the bane of their existence. People all over the world are on a path of self diagnosis like never before and come to doctor staying ‘I know I have prostate cancer because Google told me so’. Self diagnosis aside, doctors are also forever grieved by the number of misleading information internet provides to the people. However, one positive aspect of internet is that it can lead people right to you and the services you offer. Social media and websites are the most beneficial to the doctors in more than one way. Doctors can not only connect with their patients they can also grasp the latest buzz in the world of internet.

So it brings us to the million dollar question why should doctors use the internet? As mentioned before, it is one of the best ways to connect with people and to make sure that your services reach your patients in the best way possible.

Start a library

Post blogs, links to your articles, journal articles and other online resources that you deem credible.  These will not only help you but also help the patients who follow you. Patients turn to the internet for their medical queries and come up with random diagnosis. You can put an end to it by providing answers that will soothe their worries, educate them or even lead them to the right professionals.

Find collaborators  

The internet is great in helping you connect with likeminded professionals. It is always good to have collaborators who can help you with a tricky diagnosis or better opportunity.  Science is a team sport an strength lies in number.

Grow your practice

Let the patients find you rather than waiting for a referral.  For example when someone searches “best [your specialty] in [your area]” your name should be listed among the top names. This helps your practice grow. Given the high number of people relying on internet for all their queries, this is one great way to grow your practice as you lead more people to you.

Manage what patients can see
Patients rely on reviews and comments left by patients and other doctors. The internet is far more powerful in providing a better reference than you think. With the internet, you can manage what patients see about you. Have yourself listed on websites, answer quires and keep an eye on your ranking. Patients are already keeping an eye on the websites.

Manage your professional reputation. 

Websites that advertise your services are quite helpful in managing your reputation. Any kind of lawsuit or penalizing actions from your medical board are very gravely destructive even if they are baseless. A little bit of active web presence can counter worthless or damaging information that can potentially ruin your reputation.  You can manage your own reputation with internet by your side.

Performance analytics  

Internet will allow you and others to analyze your own performance. You could show the number of times your papers have been read or cited, compare your rank to your colleagues. Measure the number of visitors on your website visitors etc.

Learn

The internet may have too much information but it is also a great learning ground. You can gather the latest information online and research it in all ways possible. 

Advance your career.

By making it easy for people to find you and all about your services, you can advance your career like never before. It’s not just writing articles that gets you ahead. You have to utilize it in more than one way be it with videos online or interactive services. Internet is a great place for experiments. .

What makes this easier on you is when you stop thinking about web activity as unsavory self-promotion.   You need to understand that a successful academic career depends on people being acquainted with your work and your name. Disseminating knowledge helps the advancement of science and internet allows that. In future you much look at this boon of science as one the best thing that has happened to the world of medicine and to you as a professional. Allow internet to broaden your horizon as a professional as your help yourself and your career grow.

Medical Marketing Challenges Faced By Doctors And Ways To Resolve Them

There are many accomplished doctors we come across who are burning out an invisible battle in their everyday lives trying to find a perfect balance between a sense of satisfaction and financial well being in their profession. Regardless of the number of years dedicated to formal education and practice, most struggle to become reasonably successful while some still find it harder to break even.

The battle out there is not all fair!

Essentially there are no short cuts to the pain, patience and perseverance involved in becoming a competent and qualified medical practitioner. The journey begins with qualifying for a reputed MBBS program that takes five and half years of education coupled with a compulsory internship and eight years or more if you want to get into the specialization of your choice. In a cut-throat competitive world we live in, it may ideally take doctorsa little more than a decade (depending upon their personal expertise) to set a firm foot on establishing their practice. The agony still endures. Are you really adequately rewarded for all the slog and sweat you gave in to all these years? Have the whopping capital investments made towards beefing up your clinic infrastructure paid off? Do you still worry that despite your skills and rich experience, you may not have enough number of patients to see?

What can Doctors do to even out the odds?

There are concrete steps doctors can take to minimize these challenges and stay ahead of competition and the good news is that it is not typically taking the conventional route of upgrading systems, adding support staff and getting special training to do the kind of outreach and coordination that make a successful practice.  At AboutClinic we realize that as a good doctor, you need to maintain a steady clientele as well as attract new patients to optimize your investments, financial and academic. We can help you maximize your potential and overcome your professional barriers in the constantly changing healthcare landscape.

 

Some key guidelineswe suggest for communicating effectively with existing clientele and finding prospective patients are:

• Build a professional website for your practice- this is imperative to almost any professional or business. Remember that it should be a reflection of your brand and practice.
• Exploit the power of social media strategy with an active Facebook page & Twitter handle. Share smart and useful content for better patient engagement and spreading the word about your practice.
• Utilize online marketing strategies like E-mail marketing to share your medical practice updates & offers to prospective patients.
• Use Electronic referral program to identify trends and keep track of referral colleagues
• Grow your patient base by engaging in powerful search engine optimization (SEO) for your website and reach out to more consumers and attract new businesses.

Achieving marketing success is an on-going effort with the above guidelines. However there is no “one size fits it all” approach that can work for all medical practices. At AboutClinic, we devise tailor made solutions to your marketing needs to best suit your professional objectives. Our aim is to improve patient experience, professional growth and personal satisfaction and address your marketing challenges under a single roof.
 

What is your biggest challenge as a physician? Let us know your concerns and find out more on what we can do for you at www.aboutclinic.com

 

How Hospitals Can Benefit From “Data Lake” Approach In Health Management Systems

Healthcare organizations are constantly dealing with mammoth unstructured data generated everywhere and the limitations of value based health programs and intelligent healthcare infrastructure to manage them effectively and efficiently. This is further pronounced with the rampant increase of patients that need medical care and healthcares struggling to offer quality with stringent budgets and resources. Overcoming the challenges of healthcare indicates the need for the following course of actions when it comes to ingenious Healthcare Data Management:

• Interoperability (exchange and use)of data between providers and health systems
• Data access from a variety of source
• Adapting and scaling data services with flexibility

The above stated health care data management plans would not only weed away invaluable information but also encourage a much needed change in preventive care, wellness, speedy diagnosis and treatment.

Overcoming the challenges of EHR with superior data model- Data Lake Approach
 

Despite the potential benefits of EHRs (electronic health records) of a digital storage of healthcare information throughout an individual’s lifetime with the purpose of supporting continuity of care, education, and research, the limitations of cost constraints, technical and standardization limitations are inherent barriers. The volume and variety of data needed for an effective PHM (Population health management) require highly structured data which is not available either with EHRs or EDWs. 

In an evolving healthcare industry, where information is integral to the success of any system, the traditional “Data Warehousing” needs to be replaced with “Data Lake”.
 

In 2010, James Dixon came up a new architecture for data management;he was instrumental in coining the term “Data Lake”with his cutting-edge idea. In simple terms, Data Lake is a storage repository that holds vast amount of data, both structured and unstructured that is easily accessible, scalable and storable. The key differences with data warehousing are:

• Data Lake can accommodate both structured & unstructured data
• It can store data in any format, unlike data warehousing that needs modelled data before use
• Offers easy configuration on the go that is not possible with highly structured data warehousing
• Costs much less to store data

Data Lake allows an effective PHM model with its flexibility, versatility, scalability and cost effective approach. With the vast amount of unstructured data that is growing at a rate of 48% every year, the future of healthcare looks more promising with the Data Lake approach to drive clinical accuracy, quality and operational efficiency.

Artificial Intelligence - a promising future to healthcare

AI is almost everywhere making a huge difference to our lives. The self-driving smart cars, in Google searches, Amazon suggestions, movie suggestions from Netflix and in many other devices you may be using on a daily basis but you hardly know!  Likewise, AI is transforming healthcare organizing patient routes or with better treatment plans, and improving patient outcomes by helping physicians with literally all the information they need to make a good decision. The advanced analytics and bots used in AIhas made scheduling appointments to giving medical reminders possible.

Although IBM’s Watson is the bigwig in cognitive computing for healthcare, more and more companies have been interested and invested in AI in healthcare. To name a few in the race are Dell, Hewlett-Packard, Apple, Hitachi Data Systems, Luminoso, Alchemy API and Digital Reasoning.

Speed and Accuracy, the biggest blessing of AI

“By 2025, AI systems could be involved in everything from population health management, to digital avatars capable of answering specific patient queries.” — HarpreetSingh Buttar, analyst at Frost & Sullivan.

Against the mammoth database of diseases, these smart devices embedded with cognitive capabilities are efficiently unifying and synthesizing data and delivering accurate diagnosis prescriptions faster than the traditional analytics tools. 

While IBM's Watson is helping save lives in diagnosing cancer, recommending treatment plans that matched human oncologists, Google's DeepMind can recognize sight-threatening eye conditions just with the help of a digital eye scan. 

The promise of speed and accuracy of AI has raised hopes of precision in diagnosis of healthcare in this digital era. It is a great boon for patients living in remote areas where chronic diseases is thehighest and fastest and access to physicians can be many miles ways. Better and best practices with fewer complications and false diagnosis makes AI in healthcare a super cost saving mechanism. 

But are we hoping AI to replace physicians?

Having known all the wonders of a supercomputer’s ability to reproduce the behaviour of human intelligence, there is no reason not to believe that one day the robot may possibly replace physicians. However that definitely has years to count, probably decades to achieve the kind of accuracy. Despite the endless possibilities of technology, human beings are social and aspects of empathy and words that go a long way in healing, is something that the virtual model may not be able to offer. Practicing medicine is an art and the opportunity of AI in healthcare lies in amplifying a doctor's proficiency, not replace it!

Why it's time for doctors to say bye to old school marketing techniques?

Keeping up with tips and tricks of Online Marketing Strategies for doctors is as imperative as for any other internet savvy start up you may find these days. It is that age when most patients will consider doctors that can boast of a good online reputation in an unravelling competitive market.  Leveraging the online presence for doctors means getting noticed, establishing a brand name, building loyalty and finally amounting to an increased patient base and improved satisfaction.

A Google Think study that doctor's should reckon on-

This soaring percentage of patients going online for medical information's suggests that the well informed and net savvy patient is not only taking responsibility of their own health but that doctors also have no option but to embrace the digital age.

Although it could be a bit overwhelming platform for doctors, who once thrived on the patient's reference and word of mouth to accept the paradigm shift, it is a good idea to be there and tap the power of internet.

4 Online marketing ideas for doctors that will pay off

A few "must have" online marketing strategies that most doctor's should implement are:

•  Differentiation - Before drawing out what internet strategy will work best for you, it is first important to be cognizant of what distinguishes you and your practice from others. Do you offer patient- centric care? Are you well facilitated in terms of equipments and machines? or that you are the Best Specialist in town? This singular factor can be the key to a successful marketing campaign.
   
• Online Exposure- Exploiting the web exposure is the first step to connect to your patients and market your practice to the Health Care Industry. An attractive SEO friendly website that not only stands away from competition, but also allows easy navigation and a good user experience will go a long way in optimizing your visitors base. Be versatile in updating news, blogs and social networking links. Unleashing the power of social media platforms like Facebook, LinkedIn& Twitter can hardly be undermined as an effective patient engagement tool. The more you are talked about, the better the recall.Google My Business is a one-stop listing which allows not only  your local business to appear on search, maps and Google+ but also climb higher in rankings. Bring into play all the online practices and create successful stories!
   
• Get Mobile Friendly - Mobile is not the future, it is Now!. Ever since smartphones and tablets have replaced the traditional devices, it would be oblivious to ignore the mobile web traffic. Making your website responsive to  electronic gadgets like smartphones and tablets is the smartest way to unleash your internet traffic.
   
• Campaign Development-  Creating a publication schedule that will keep your patients awareness in sync with your developments and research will help educate them and differentiate you as  a medical provider. Crafting a physician campaign engages a relevant audience and helps you go that extra mile in building credibility.