Improving Patient Engagement and Care with Health-Related Content

Are you seeking ways to increase patient engagement in your healthcare organization? Or are you wondering why health-related content marketing is important in healthcare delivery? This blog post will explore how health-related content plays a meaningful role in delivering quality healthcare. Amidst the ever-changing landscape, it’s crucial for your practice to stay informed. By studying the significance of health-related content in healthcare, we can discover ways to improve patient care and provide better services.

Key Benefits of Using Content to Improve Healthcare Delivery

Exploring the value of health-related content in healthcare delivery can help us better understand how to make healthcare more accessible and effective for patients. There are four fundamental ways in which health-related content can enrich healthcare delivery. Let’s jump in and take a closer look at how health-related content can help revolutionize the healthcare industry!

1. Patient Patient Engagement and Satisfaction

Evidence-based health-related content can encourage patients to engage in their healthcare by increasing awareness about medical conditions and recommended lifestyle changes. It can also promote community and social bonds. Interactive, personalized, and responsive health-related content, such as social media posts or emails, can help individuals feel seen and heard, increasing overall satisfaction. Increased patient satisfaction, in turn, can lead to greater loyalty to the healthcare brand.

2. Organizational Awareness and Credibility

Before an organization can start helping patients, it must first introduce the patient to its services. To gain a patient’s trust, the organization needs to establish a foundation of credibility and faith in the services being provided. This is where health-related content comes in. Publishing high-quality health-related content can introduce individuals to an organization’s services while increasing access to healthcare in the process. Health-related content can also help healthcare providers and organizations establish themselves as credible partners in the patients’ wellness journeys.

3. Informed Decision-Making and Compliance

In the increasingly patient-centered healthcare industry, patient education through health-related content is essential to delivery models. Limitations such as time restraints, supply chain shortages, and communication barriers emphasize the importance of making high-quality medical information available to patients outside the doctor’s office. Expert health-related content can encourage patient compliance with healthcare plans. Health-related content can also improve patient outcomes by increasing awareness of specific health conditions and available treatments or lifestyle changes. Accurate health-related content also empowers consumers to identify their options. In sum, health-related content can provide the necessary knowledge for patients to make informed decisions about their healthcare.

4. More Efficient Use of Resources

By providing reliable information, health-related content can decrease medical care costs and unnecessary emergency department visits. This option encourages more efficient use of limited medical resources. In addition, patients can access digital health-related content whenever it is most convenient for them, decreasing the demands on providers. The content distribution also encourages healthcare professionals to stay up-to-date on best practices and emerging research.

How Can Content Be Used to Engage Patients in Their Own Healthcare?

How can a properly executed healthcare content marketing strategy uplevel your organization’s patient engagement? Knowing your audience is an essential step in the process.

Let’s hone in on how creating custom health-related content can foster trust and loyalty, resulting in a more successful and engaging healthcare delivery system.

By providing education that includes easy-to-digest information about health conditions, treatment options, and medications, healthcare delivery organizations empower their patients to step into a more active role. If your consumer health-related content requires a dictionary or involves reading the fine print, patients are likely to look elsewhere. By contrast, long and short-form videos (such as those found on YouTube, Instagram, or TikTok), games, and other interactive media can offer a fun and refreshing way for patients to engage more meaningfully with the material they seek.

In the modern world, numerous companies are leveraging social media as a powerful means for disseminating health-related content. Social media health-related content can also connect patients and consumers with local resources and support groups (both virtual and in-person). Some organizations even use content platforms to construct communities around particular health concerns. The use of health-related content to engage patients in their healthcare is continually expanding, making this an exciting time for healthcare content creators.

Types of Health-Related Content That are Best Suited to Support Healthcare Delivery

Although articles and blog posts remain a cornerstone for content, healthcare organizations should use a variety of formats to support healthcare delivery. Because consumers have diverse preferences and learning styles, an organization’s health-related content is more likely to reach a broader audience using various formats. Additionally, healthcare delivery organizations could benefit by using a credible expert for health-related content support. 

Here are a few examples of the formats that organizations may use to present health-related content:

• Short or long-form videos (e.g., YouTube, Instagram, or TikTok)
• White papers
• Audio recordings
• Social media posts
• Infographics 
• Interactive games 

Lastly, organizations involved in healthcare delivery may consider using health-related content written by healthcare professionals. By using clinician-written content created by individuals such as nurses, organizations can make valuable resources available to their patients and consumers. Nurses, as America’s trusted professionals, are equipped to produce evidence-based health related content injected with first-hand experience. Nurses are also uniquely positioned to explain complex medical conditions and present health research at varying levels. Whether you are targeting the general public or a subset of healthcare professionals, nurses’ education and experience can help your organization put its best foot forward.

References

Brenan, M. (2023, January 10). Nurses Retain Top Ethics Rating in U.S., but Below 2020 High. Gallup. https://news.gallup.com/poll/467804/nurses-retain-top-ethics-rating-below-2020-high.aspx 

Chylinski, M. (2011, November 21). What’s Working with Health Content? Content Marketing Institute. https://contentmarketinginstitute.com/articles/how-healthy-is-healthcare-content/

MedicoReach. (2017, March 28). 4 Reasons Why Content Marketing is Important for Healthcare Industry. https://www.medicoreach.com/4-reasons-content-marketing-important-healthcare-industry/

Rodela, J. (n.d.). Healthcare Content Marketing: Trends, Tactics, and Tips. ClearVoice. https://www.clearvoice.com/resources/healthcare-content-marketing/