The patient experience is central to the success of your medical practice. Whether you want to get a sense of how patients are feeling about your practice or whether you want input on proposed changes, patient surveys are invaluable for gathering insights and feedback. Here’s why patient surveys are an important part of business development – and how you can implement them in your practice.
The Benefits of Patient Surveys
Patient surveys are a great way to gather meaningful information and feedback about what patients want and expect from their interactions with you. They help you make informed decisions about how your practice runs and where to focus your efforts. Actively seeking outpatient feedback also opens the lines of communication and shows your patients that you care about their experience and their voice. Surveys not only help measure patient satisfaction, but they’re a powerful signal that you stand for patient-centered, collaborative approaches.
When combined with quantitative data, patient surveys provide a holistic picture of your practice and how it’s running – and where things could be improved. Surveys take the data and add “wisdom.” Or, in other words, they take the “what” and layer it with the “why” and the “how.”
Tips for Creating Patient Surveys
Creating a patient survey is like conducting any line of research. You want to start with a purpose or goal, then design a survey to give you the information you need to act. Here’s what to do:
- Decide what you want to know. Are you interested in overall satisfaction? Do you want to gauge interest in certain new services or treatments? Do you want to know if patients will follow you to a new address? Do you want to see whether a proposed rebrand will resonate with patients? Define your overarching question, then work from there. Make sure your goal is relevant – and achievable!
- Let your patients talk. Keep your survey brief, on point, and with room for answers that go beyond a binary. Instead of “yes” or “no,” have patients provide a scaled rating to statements or write freely in a box. If your survey group is small, you can work through the responses yourself; if your group is large, machine learning software can parse it for you. Remember, your patients are busy, so ask only the most important questions – and add a “general comments” box at the end. You can also have patients opt into being contacted with follow-up questions.
- Decide how you’ll run your survey. Will you hand patients a page after their visit? Will you mail the survey to their home, send it via your newsletter or dedicated survey site like SurveyMonkey, or use a text or telephone approach to contact patients? The best approach will depend on your patient cohort and their demographics. Are they tech savvy? Likely to pick up the phone? Will you need to provide an interpreter or someone to notate responses? Remember, you want enough responses to ensure they represent the whole patient population.
- Analyze responses and implement changes. Depending on the questions you’ve asked and the method you’ve used to gather responses, this could be as simple as having a computer analyze responses, or it might require you to pore over the results to find themes and trends. Work through the responses with your team to see how specific feedback points could be addressed. Then implement a list of changes in the order of priority and a timeline for execution.
Let GZ Help You Deal with Patient Pain Points
The setting and layout of your practice is vital to the patient experience. If your patient surveys have flagged your location or space as a problem, talk to the team at Gittleson Zuppas Medical Realty. As experts in medical real estate, we can help you find a space that meets the needs of your patients – keeping them loyal and encouraging word of mouth.