Q4400

The historical retail strategy focused on taking advantage of brand strength to growvolumes in hospital diagnostics and laboratory services.

The emergence of new competitors offering these services at a discounted price point requires a rethinking of your retail strategy, especially since some payers attempt to steer their insured to a stand-alone diagnostic or laboratory center.

Amazon, CVS Aetna, Wal-Mart, and others from outside our industry are launching new low-acuity Retail stores to serve existing consumer customers.

CFO’s in many markets are seeing declines in Retail volumes and net revenue, thus the need to broaden the Retail strategy to include additional patient services that stand-alone facilities typically do not offer and the “market disruptors” will not offer.

Some have placed 18-hour Urgent Care Centers strategically throughout their service area to capture diagnostic, laboratory services, and Primary Care volumes that do not require an appointment.

Urgent Care Centers housed in a larger facility typically include 5-day-a-week testing to make it easier for those who live close-by and a specialty laboratory service for those who require a weekly blood draw.

In addition, some providers house a Primary Care office in the same facility as the Urgent Care Center, making it easier for patients to see their PCP.

These strategies can strengthen the effectiveness of your Primary Care component for the new patient funnel, but will they be enough to protect market share and net revenue?

Building-out services that naturally flow from convenient Primary Care visits speaks to wellness and those in the communities you serve who need these services.

Wellness visits for seniors typically involve a checkup for BP and blood work results, and a series of short cognitive and mental health tests. These are a positive, but leave a lot of potential “on the table”.

America’s experience with COVID has exposed how vulnerable we are as a nation. Millions of us are in need of an intervention to make lifestyle changes. Hospital providers are ideally positioned to lead in this effort.

Diet, nutrition, and exercise touch on this, but there is much more we can do.

Indeed, there is an opportunity for providers to lead in wellness and what one CEO calls Upstream Medicine.

The quest for wellness goes well beyond the transition to value where patient outcomes determine reimbursement.

Today’s younger demographic demands ease of engagement and convenience. This naturally sets-up a robust telehealth opportunity to meet their needs.

One New Jersey provider introduced a new digital self-registration app for an initial PCP visit. Demand was so overwhelming that the provider realized immediately it did not have enough PCP’s in its 4-hospital system to meet the demand and had to shut-down the initiative.

They concluded they need another 100 PCP’s and are engaged in this recruiting effort. A second key takeaway was the realization that many consumers have an interest in wellness and will engage if you provide a consumer-friendly way to do so.

Any wellness service that can be quantified to prove need is of value to the community you serve. These strategic additions will strengthen community loyalty, generate additional revenue, and differentiate the provider from its competition.

Indeed, a well-conceived, well-executed new Retail strategy will meet more community needs and deliver greater operational and fiscal success.

We provide the data analysis that uncovers new Retail targets of opportunity.

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