More patients mean the need for smarter healthcare
Healthcare reform has led to an increase in patients for many doctors, says Tracy Bennett, MD, Women’s Health Marketing, Welch Allyn. While that’s good news from a business standpoint, it also requires that they work more efficiently to continue to provide the same high-quality care as before. For distributor sales reps, this signals a need to provide solutions designed to help make their physician customers’ day move faster and easier.
“Due to a [larger] patient population overall, and the need for improved efficiency for clinicians to see more patients in a given day, our more value-based products have seen an increase,” she says, noting the company has experienced a higher demand for women’s health products – particularly its disposable vaginal specula and cordless illumination system. At the same time, “we have seen [more] family practice and internal medicine physicians performing more OB/GYN exams in their offices,” she adds.
As a result, the company’s ambulatory and acute care sales teams, along with its strategic account managers, “have been working closely with their distribution partners at the IDN level to standardize selling of our women’s health products,” she points out. “They continue to utilize our experience selling across the continuum of care. We also continue to leverage our experience from corporate account GPOs and large customer accounts at the IDN level.”
To a large extent, the increasing availability of electronic medical records (EMRs) has made this possible, she continues. “EMRs are in the majority of our customers’ practices,” she says. “The first stage of meaningful use really made an impact on the implementation of EMRs, and the next phase is now focused on the use of the EMR and sharing patient information with trusted sources.
“We have seen practices that have a full EMR system, but are still using paper-based workflows and charting as well,” she says. Not only is this approach redundant, it leaves physicians at risk of losing critical patient information, she notes. “Getting information into the EMR accurately and easily in the patient care setting can lead to better patient care and increased productivity.”
Ask the right questions
By asking the right questions, sales reps can gauge their physician customers’ interest in – and need for – women’s health products.
• “Doctor, what type of vaginal specula are you currently using for pelvic exams?”
• “Do you use metal vaginal specula? If so, what issues are you experiencing with reprocessing?”
• “Are you concerned with cross contamination?”
• “What light source do you currently use during pelvic exams?”
• “Do you have issues with cords getting in the way during your exams?”
Sales reps should impress on their customers the value of addressing their pain points and ensuring their patients’ safety.
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