Sarah Jones, Chief Outcomes Officer at b.well Connected Health, shares her perspective on key topics at HLTH.
After years of bouncing between my OB, urgent care, and virtual care, I finally decided to get a PCP. An “executive” primary care experience, no less: a few hundred dollars privately paid gets me access to a handful of easy-access appointments, clinical ‘extras’ like an EEG, and lobby snacks! What did it not include? My new doctor having access to ANY of my previous medical records from the neighboring health system. My doctor was stymied: “Your records should show here automatically!” Despite triple checking my demographics, the EHR connection between the systems didn’t work and I spent 30 minutes recounting my adult medical history from memory. This experience illuminated a systemic issue that I knew was affecting not just me but millions of patients across the country. If I, as someone working in healthcare, was dealing with this kind of disjointed experience, what were others facing? The lack of seamless access to data is a critical issue that drives much of the work I do today at b.well Connected Health.
We hear a lot about “access” in healthcare in terms of getting appointments, but true access is more complex. It also means having access to data—both for providers and patients. In healthcare, access to accurate and timely data isn’t just a nice-to-have—it’s fundamental to providing quality care. And yet, the barriers are often glaring. Many healthcare organizations still struggle to deliver seamless experiences because their systems operate in silos. At b.well, we’re focused on tearing down those barriers and providing tools that enable both patients and providers to make better, faster decisions with real-time information.
A Holistic Approach to Healthcare Access
At the most basic level, ‘access’ is defined as “the timely use of personal health services to achieve the best outcomes.” Healthcare organizations have entire departments dedicated to ensuring the optimal amount of appointments available for access. Similarly, the industry spends a lot of time thinking about the patient experience that comes with that access. But one thing has become very clear to me: it’s a balancing act for health systems to improve patient experience and maintain the nuanced flexibility providers expect. This balance between traditional appointment access and access to patient data is crucial for improving care. For instance, making it easier for patients to schedule appointments often means restricting provider flexibility. And when providers have more autonomy, it’s often at the cost of a more cumbersome patient experience. It’s a balancing act that requires thoughtful integration of technology, data, and access points.
So while access and patient experience optimizers would all love to make it easy and simple for patients to schedule themselves into convenient appointments, it’s not quite that simple. System-wide implementations are typically highly complicated. The hours that patients would like to see providers don’t always align with the hours providers prefer to work. Even something as simple as communications to patients if a provider needs to reschedule aren’t as straightforward as we would hope.
Access Isn’t Just About Appointment Availability
When we talk about access in healthcare, it’s not just about making sure patients have enough appointments. It’s about ensuring that patients can access care when they need it, and that both they and their providers have access to the right data at the right time. Today, we see a growing demand from consumers to access their healthcare data at any time. The question then becomes: even if patients are aware they can access their data, do they actually have access to it? Too often, the answer is no.
We’re working to change that. At b.well, we’ve been partnering with health systems to improve their access strategies by integrating virtual care into their scheduling systems. When patients log into their portal and can’t find a timely in-person appointment, we provide the option for virtual care, seamlessly guiding them through the scheduling process. This not only increases access but also optimizes the utilization of provider resources. One health system saw an overwhelming response when we first implemented this—virtual care slots filled up almost immediately, proving that when access is easy and available, patients will take advantage of it.
And it’s not just health systems that are evolving. Retailers like Walgreens are stepping up to close care gaps. They offer easy access to services like vaccinations, eliminating the need for patients to visit their primary care provider for something as simple as a flu shot. Imagine being able to log into your health app and schedule a vaccine appointment at your local Walgreens right then and there. It’s a small but powerful step in reducing care gaps and driving better outcomes.
Data Quality is the Key to Personalization
While access is critical, it’s only part of the equation. Personalization is at the core of what patients expect from their healthcare experience today. But delivering a truly personalized experience is impossible without high-quality data. For personalization to be meaningful, providers need access to clean and actionable data to tailor care effectively. The challenge we often see with healthcare systems is that their data isn’t always clean or actionable. For example, something as basic as knowing when a patient’s appointment begins and ends should be straightforward, but it’s not always easy to pull that information.
Having reliable, up-to-date data is essential for delivering on the promise of personalized care. Without it, even the best intentions to improve the patient experience can fall flat. At b.well, we’re constantly working to ensure that the data flowing through our systems is clean, actionable, and readily available to both patients and providers.
The Future of Healthcare is Seamless Access
As healthcare evolves, the industry must shift towards making access to care, data, and services easier for everyone involved. By improving access to both healthcare services and healthcare data, we can ensure better outcomes for patients and providers alike. It’s not just about getting patients through the door faster; it’s about creating a system where patients can easily access the care they need, when and how they want it. The success of health systems that prioritize access proves that if you build it—if you make access easy—patients will come. And they’ll come back.
Healthcare access isn’t just about appointments—it’s about enabling seamless, real-time access to both care and data, which together create better outcomes. If you’re attending HLTH this year and want to dive deeper into how we’re transforming healthcare access and outcomes, I’d love to meet with you.
