Can Healthcare Foodservices Impact HCAHPS?
Healthcare foodservices have the opportunity to bolster HCAHPS (Healthcare Consumer Assessment Hospital Process and Systems) scores since our operations have always focused on customer satisfaction outcomes.
A commitment to best practices runs deep in foodservice and, although hospitality is considered a soft skill, the healthcare industry now realizes that soft skills are neither soft nor easily achieved.
With reimbursement at risk, healthcare administrators are scrambling to improve satisfaction scores.
The three goals of HCAHPS, based on the Center of Medicare and Medicaid Services (CMS), are, first, to produce comparable data for hospitals that focus on important consumer needs.
Second is to create a tool for the public to improve quality of care.
Third is to establish a platform for consumers to evaluate and improve the transparency of quality indicators.
In essences, it all about how healthcare institutions communicates with patients.
The general areas of focus for HCAHPS is how nurses, doctors, staff, medicines, discharges and environment are presented.
The opportunity for foodservices is to share the best practice of creating positive first impressions and service recovery.
This provides the chance for foodservice operators to share basic service practices with hospital staff and assist in motivating and setting the standards for service excellence.
Most operators will state that their jobs revolve around sales and that being a good sales person is a required skill.
Healthcare workers also are in the sales business; they "sell" wellness and offer patients instruction on how to maintain health by creating an aura of caring and nurturing.
The difference is that healthcare clinical workers now need to think about how to "make the sale," by ensuring that they are meeting the service quality indicators that are required under HCAHPS.
For healthcare foodservices, the mission begins by reviewing serving equipment, retail operations, menu selection and staffing, as well as service touch-points.
For example, are patient trays and table-top equipment worn and in poor condition? Are visitors provided with ample food choices? Are menus and marketing materials current and accurate? As most healthcare operators know, the people who fill-out hospital surveys are normally the family of patients and we must understand their perspective.
That's why we must put a renewed focus on service and remember that we are always on stage and need to perform with a well-scripted patient/customer-focused mindset.
Although, foodservice cannot have a direct impact on how nurses and doctors communicate to patients and visitors, we can share the basic hospitality skills that have been ingrained in us from when we first started in this industry.
An attention to detail and a flair for service are skills that can be shared and, with the challengers posed by HCAHPS, we can play a leading role.
Speaking from experience, hospitality service is everyone's job and to create a culture of service requires slow and steady development, including eliminating poor behaviors and attitudes, keeping the environment clean and setting expectations.
One reality imposed by HCAHPS is that hospitals need to compete to stay in business.
Now that healthcare consumers can shop for the best deal, much the same as shopping for a new car or phone, hospitality standards are no long a nicety but a requirement.
A commitment to best practices runs deep in foodservice and, although hospitality is considered a soft skill, the healthcare industry now realizes that soft skills are neither soft nor easily achieved.
With reimbursement at risk, healthcare administrators are scrambling to improve satisfaction scores.
The three goals of HCAHPS, based on the Center of Medicare and Medicaid Services (CMS), are, first, to produce comparable data for hospitals that focus on important consumer needs.
Second is to create a tool for the public to improve quality of care.
Third is to establish a platform for consumers to evaluate and improve the transparency of quality indicators.
In essences, it all about how healthcare institutions communicates with patients.
The general areas of focus for HCAHPS is how nurses, doctors, staff, medicines, discharges and environment are presented.
The opportunity for foodservices is to share the best practice of creating positive first impressions and service recovery.
This provides the chance for foodservice operators to share basic service practices with hospital staff and assist in motivating and setting the standards for service excellence.
Most operators will state that their jobs revolve around sales and that being a good sales person is a required skill.
Healthcare workers also are in the sales business; they "sell" wellness and offer patients instruction on how to maintain health by creating an aura of caring and nurturing.
The difference is that healthcare clinical workers now need to think about how to "make the sale," by ensuring that they are meeting the service quality indicators that are required under HCAHPS.
For healthcare foodservices, the mission begins by reviewing serving equipment, retail operations, menu selection and staffing, as well as service touch-points.
For example, are patient trays and table-top equipment worn and in poor condition? Are visitors provided with ample food choices? Are menus and marketing materials current and accurate? As most healthcare operators know, the people who fill-out hospital surveys are normally the family of patients and we must understand their perspective.
That's why we must put a renewed focus on service and remember that we are always on stage and need to perform with a well-scripted patient/customer-focused mindset.
Although, foodservice cannot have a direct impact on how nurses and doctors communicate to patients and visitors, we can share the basic hospitality skills that have been ingrained in us from when we first started in this industry.
An attention to detail and a flair for service are skills that can be shared and, with the challengers posed by HCAHPS, we can play a leading role.
Speaking from experience, hospitality service is everyone's job and to create a culture of service requires slow and steady development, including eliminating poor behaviors and attitudes, keeping the environment clean and setting expectations.
One reality imposed by HCAHPS is that hospitals need to compete to stay in business.
Now that healthcare consumers can shop for the best deal, much the same as shopping for a new car or phone, hospitality standards are no long a nicety but a requirement.
