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It is a proven fact that over 80 percent of adults in the United States search online for healthcare information on an annual basis to research diseases, conditions, treatment plans, procedures, and physician credentials. And there are dozens of places to access credible, reliable information on most of those topics. Whether you go to WebMD, Revolution Health, Discovery Health, or any other 800 pound gorilla in online health content and information, there is always one key ingredient missing – your identity.

You can go online and find as much information about prostate cancer, arthritis, or any other condition as you want, but what is really important to understand is that as a healthcare provider, you are a credible source of knowledge, science, and medical opinion. Allowing your patients to source that information from other Web sites doesn't give you the opportunity to promote your own way of diagnosing and treating these conditions, highlight your friendly staff, and provide the ability to request an appointment online.

With today's Web site technologies, that and more is not only possible, it is readily available to healthcare providers.

I have been working with hospitals and medical groups for years implementing online solutions that drive patient satisfaction and patient loyalty initiatives that drive business success and one of the solutions with the highest return on investment is online patient education programs. The benefits that these solutions bring to a practice include:
Informed patients with fewer questions and more time seeing new patients
The ability capture patient's attention while promoting your own services and physicians
Improved results within major search engines
The ability to improve the overall quality and depth of care your office provides
Bolstering your own credibility within your patient population
And more!

Now there are a lot of ways to implement these types of initiatives since the patient education topic is a very large umbrella. I have outlined a few of what I consider to be some of the most worthwhile and cost-effective solutions for small to mid-size practices.

Proprietary Content

This is a category that I would consider to be the most beneficial to any practice. When physicians actually take the time to write their own content about the conditions they treat, the procedures they perform, and the healthcare trends that affect their patients, it not only provides a great resource for patients, but positions that physician as a leader in their field. If you are an OB/GYN, you should write a synopsis on birth control, outline in detail the available options, indicate each of their pros and cons, and create a series of frequently asked questions that help to educate your patients. As new treatment options become available or new prescriptions enter the market, publish articles on your Web site that define your opinion on them.

Web site content from your own voice and not that of a sales person or medical content approval board is going to allow your patients to connect with you on a different level and they will learn to go to your Web site regularly for future updates.

Syndicated Content

I completely understand if you simply don't have the time to prepare this much content (heck, it took me weeks to find time to write this article). If that is the case, you can still get the job done with syndicated content from external publishers that allow you to host their health content. A few of the ones that I believe are the most reliable are as follows:

HealthDay (www.healthday.com) provides several articles per day in which their own writers research, author, or comment on healthcare trends, topics, and concerns like heart care, diabetes, weight management, and more.

Health-E-tips (www.healthetips.com) publishes weekly and monthly health, fitness, and nutrition tips that can be posted directly on your Web site. These tips are brief and provide actionable items that patients can utilize to improve their own health.

Blausen Medical (www.blausenmedical.com) has one of the largest 3-D medical animation libraries on the market today. With 30-90 second animated movies on over 300 conditions and treatments, Blausen's Human Atlas is a great utility that can be plugged into your Web site and provides a tremendous educational benefit.

Discovery Hospital (www.discoveryhospital.com) has partnered with Discovery Communications to package and host the entire health encyclopedia that you can find on DiscoveryHealth.com for use on physician practice, medical group, and hospital Web sites. With over 7,500 articles including illustrations videos, and expert commentary, this encyclopedia approach is the most comprehensive patient education approach you can take and Discovery Hospital provides the industry's only content license models for physician practices.

No matter which option you want to go with – homegrown vs. professionally syndicated – you may in fact have to re-develop (or create for the first time) your practice Web site in order to best accommodate the resource and initiative. For most practices around the Central Florida medical community, this is a good thing since most healthcare Web sites in our market tend to fall way behind the curve in terms of intuitive design, functional

Web site features, and reliable, timely content.

Implemented correctly, patient education and consumer content will be intermingled throughout your service line content, physician profiles, and appointment request details in order maximize its effectiveness, get the most patient eye-balls, and bring the most new patients through your door. In the end patient satisfaction, patient loyalty, and practice marketability will improve with an initiative of this nature and your business goals will benefit.


Michael Barber is founder and CEO of Cyrus, a Web site development and eHealth strategy firm located in Longwood, Fla., serving healthcare clients nationally.

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