Guests: Dr. Neal Kaufman – DPS Health

The topic of patient engagement is often defined as people actively involved in their health and health care to achieve better outcomes and lower costs and there is a growing body of evidence which demonstrates that patients who are more actively involved in their health care experience better health outcomes and incur lower costs. As a result, what we are seeing is that many public and private health care organizations are employing strategies to better engage patients, such as educating them about their conditions and involving them more fully in making decisions about their care. “Patient activation” is a term that refers to a patient’s knowledge, skills, ability, and willingness to manage his or her own health and care. “Patient engagement” is often defined as a broader concept that combines patient activation with interventions designed to increase activation and promote positive patient behavior, such as obtaining preventive care or exercising regularly. Patient engagement is one strategy to achieve the “triple aim” of healthcare which is defined as improved health outcomes, better patient care, and lower costs. Furthermore, Meaningful use stage 2 rules foster patient engagement in a simple way: Physicians and hospitals receiving federal EHR incentive payments must motivate at least 5% of patients to view, download or transmit their digitized health data.

Learn more about how to identify and interpret effective patient engagement, physician reactions to the rise in patient engagement, how mobile devices, apps, and wearables stand to impact patient engagement, and more!