Strategies for Enhancing Infusion Patient Experiences

Leyla Henderson, President of Active Infusions and NICA 2024 session speaker, shares innovative strategies for enhancing patient satisfaction and improving outcomes in health care settings, emphasizing the importance of patient-centered care and individualized experiences.

Please share your name, title, and a little bit about your professional history. 

My name is Leyla Henderson and I am President of Active Infusions. My partner Caitlin and I are both registered nurses, but I returned to school for my MBA and have been working on the operation side of health care ever since. 

I have worked in many different verticals throughout the health care space including in hospitals, family medicine, community-based clinics, and a free-standing birth center. Before I started Active Infusions, I was typically hired by organizations that were failing or almost failing to turn them around from an operation point of view. 

How do you measure patient satisfaction within a health care organization, and what key metrics do you believe are most important to track? 

We use several methods to track patient satisfaction. We call every patient 24 hours after infusions, and a clinical coordinator checks in with patients about their experience. In addition, we send a review link to all our patients after infusion treatments for more detailed feedback. 

What are some common challenges that health care organizations face when trying to enhance patient satisfaction, and how do you recommend addressing these challenges? 

I know they sound unrelated, but insurance reimbursement rates really hinder our ability to provide more resources to patients. We wish we could host support groups for patients receiving IV therapy and provide them with some additional free resources such as access to a social worker or chronic disease life coach. Ideally, we would provide even more amenities to patients during their infusion and to host insurance and chronic disease health care advocacy classes for patients. 

However, financial challenges arise as private insurance companies and PBMs continue to work together to lower the reimbursement rates for these medications. As providers, our margins keep getting squeezed. Much paperwork and many hours worked are required by insurance companies yet are not reimbursable. 
Since insurance companies only negotiate with large centers, I think a simple solution would be for all Ambulatory Infusion Centers to band together to negotiate with the bigger carriers as a collective group. If we were to inform insurance providers that we will not see their patients and that their patients will have to go back to receiving treatment at a hospital facility, which is the most costly way for patients to receive medications for the insurance provider, they may be more willing to discuss reimbursement rates.  

In your experience, how does focusing on patient happiness directly impact organizational growth and profitability within a health care practice? 

As I mentioned during my session at NICA 2024, patients are more likely to be compliant with their medication when they enjoy the place they come to receive their treatments and they are more likely to keep their appointments. As more infusion centers are established, competition increases regardless of where your center is located. Patients are starting to realize that they have choices and they have more infusion options than their doctor’s office. 

In addition, when patients are treated like a number or your staff is just going through the motions, everyone is aware. When patients are not happy, they may take it out on your hospitality or nursing staff, which may contribute to employee burnout and retention. High turnover rates can be a significant cost for any facility. In health care, high turnover can result in serious oversights such as superbills not being submitted, referrals from providers not being processed quickly, and prior authorizations not being completed. These mistakes may lead to increased frustration with referral sources. 

Can you discuss any innovative strategies or best practices that you have found to be particularly effective in enhancing patient satisfaction and improving outcomes in health care settings? 

We started this center because Caitlin, my partner, needed infusions for her chronic disease. We talked about her experience of waiting for hours past her appointment time because her only choice was to receive treatment at a hospital-based chemotherapy center. And when she was finally seen, she was not allowed to work from her phone or laptop during infusion treatments. The center was crowded and noisy. In addition, when she had to take time off work to receive these treatments, it was the middle of 2020 when RNs were getting held over for shifts. Due to significant nursing shortages, it was difficult to secure time off. All these factors led her to become non-compliant with her treatment and she ended up in the hospital for 2 weeks.

Due to these experiences, we decided to make our business as patient centered as possible. We are open 7 days a week from 7 am to 10 pm. We often get calls to ask if the hours listed on our website are real because of the wide range of appointment times we offer. This flexibility allows people to receive their medications on their schedule and we have treated teachers, nurses, construction workers, and even physicians who may not be able to make an infusion appointment during standard business hours. 
We offer streaming services, free Wi-Fi, and snacks that patients can eat such as ginger-flavored lozenges because infusion medications can leave a bad taste in your mouth. We ask our patients if there is anything they would like that we do not have for their next infusion such as comfort food or an extra blanket. 

At our Vienna location, we noticed that many people during the day needed to attend Zoom meetings during their infusion. When you are in a large center or even in a private room, you often must keep your camera off because maybe you do not want your boss or co-worker to know you are receiving treatments. We created an office with a desk and art on the wall behind them, just like a real office setup. The IV pole can be hidden behind a fake plant and the front of the office is glass so that the RN can monitor their infusion while they work. We also allow patients to bring a friend or family member to sit with them during the infusion. 

What is one key takeaway from your session at NICA that you hope the audience walked away with? 

The approaches we implement at our center may not work at your center, but that does not mean that you cannot re-focus your priority on patient satisfaction. Start small. Talk to your front desk staff, your nurses, even your PA and billing department, about what they love about the services you are currently providing. What do they think needs improvement? If their best friend or sibling needed repeated infusions, would they be excited for them to come to this center?  What processes cause delays in treatment, what could you do to fix that? Are your nurses being allowed enough time spent with each patient, do they know anything about their patients? Are patients newly diagnosed and confused and scared and looking for resources? Does your staff know of support groups for each diagnosis and how to connect patients with these groups? If a patient has been living with their diagnosis for a while, can connecting them with a patient that is newly diagnosed be encouraging?  When was the last time you did a patient satisfaction survey? Has your office manager met with a patient post-infusion and checked in on how it went? Do patients feel welcomed or do they feel like just a number? What part of the process did they enjoy, and which part could use improvement? You can learn so much by just having meaningful conversations.