How personalized medicine empowers patients and cuts healthcare costs

Originally posted on Becker's Healthcare.

As healthcare leaders face the growing demand for patient-centered care (PCC), the juggling act of improving patient satisfaction, controlling costs, and driving innovation can be overwhelming. Today’s reality often falls short of the ideal state: patients navigate a labyrinth of forms, encounter impersonal interactions, and wonder if they receive the most effective treatment. Traditional care models can force providers to play whack-a-mole, reacting to issues rather than proactively shaping better health outcomes.

How do we unlock a new era of healthcare excellence? The answer lies in a fundamental shift: personalized care delivered within a truly patient-centered framework that improves satisfaction for patients and clinicians while enabling better clinical, operational, and financial outcomes across the healthcare ecosystem.

The impact of personalized medicine on patient engagement and healthcare efficiency

Imagine a healthcare system where: 

• Each patient’s unique medical history, sociocultural background, social determinants, wellness goals, and communication needs and preferences are considered at every stage of the health journey to make care more effective and equitable.   
• Providers eliminate redundant intake forms and questions to reduce patient frustrations and enable safer and more efficient care.  
• Technology allows clinicians to seamlessly capture, analyze, and use data to deliver proactive and targeted interventions tailored to an individual’s genetic makeup and lifestyle.

For patients, personalized care means the healthcare ecosystem knows their medical history and needs and can deliver the right care at the right time via the preferred vehicle or approach (in person or virtual) in a cost-effective and price-transparent manner. Patients who feel valued, understood, and empowered are more likely to be engaged in their health and wellness plans. Clinicians are more satisfied when they have the right tools and information to provide high-quality care. Personalized care can also save money by preventing unnecessary procedures and hospital readmissions.

How personalized care improves access, outcomes, and cultural competency

Here are real-world examples of how personalization can drive more meaningful PCC:

1. A health system in California that serves a sizable Korean population worked with the pastor of a local Korean church to reach women in the community who were reluctant to get mammograms due to cultural concerns. The organization set up a mammogram truck behind the church, which led to an increase in early-stage breast cancer detection. By improving cultural competency, creating a community partnership, and enhancing convenience and accessibility, the health system can better connect with its patients and improve health outcomes.
2. A health system in the Southeastern U.S. makes prenatal care for their Medicaid population more convenient, efficient, and flexible by offering expectant moms at-home remote monitoring equipment to enable more prenatal appointments for those most at-risk. This creative approach reduces the need to take time off or arrange childcare to attend standard appointments.
3. During the COVID-19 pandemic, a hospital in India gave patients at-home pulse oximeter kits. These kits allowed patients to check their pulse rates, blood oxygen saturation levels, and temperature, and self-report the results in a mobile app that their doctor could access to address declining conditions and provide virtual care. 

Advancing patient-centered care: overcoming barriers with data, technology, and collaboration

While the potential of personalized care is clear, some challenges must be addressed to move into a new era of patient-centered healthcare, such as:

• Operational strategic priorities and models: Leaders must work across departments to define enterprise-wide, patient-centric operating models and desired performance metrics. 
• Data integration and interoperability: Legacy and fragmented systems often make accessing and sharing patient data difficult.  
• Data security and privacy: Robust cybersecurity measures are essential to ensure patient safety and trust. 
• Data accuracy and accessibility: Clinicians need reliable patient data. 
• Social determinants of health: Income and access to healthy food can significantly affect health outcomes. 
• Health equity: The industry must ensure everyone can access high-quality patient-centered care, regardless of race, ethnicity, or socioeconomic status. 
• Change management: Shifting to a patient-centered model requires enterprise-wide cultural change.

Technology and data can help organizations overcome these barriers and build a strong foundation for success. Investing in health IT modernization efforts — such as AI tools, cloud solutions, data and analytics platforms, and more — is critical to improving interoperability, enhancing data-driven decision-making, strengthening cybersecurity, and making care more convenient, accessible, and affordable through virtual care and digital front door solutions. Building meaningful collaborations between healthcare organizations and communities is essential to tackling health disparities and giving the most vulnerable populations a voice.

Given the complexities of patient-centered transformation, many healthcare leaders choose to work with an end-to-end strategic partner, like Nordic, that can bring deep technical expertise and extensive knowledge of healthcare operations and workflows to every step of their efforts, from pre-planning and execution to post-implementation support and organizational change management.  

Prioritizing individual needs and preferences and tailoring care plans is critical to improving patient-centered care. By advancing personalization through technology, data, and partnerships, healthcare leaders can achieve the seemingly impossible: empowered patients and clinicians, improved health outcomes, optimized operational efficiency, and enhanced financial sustainability.

Want to scale the impact of personalized care across your organization?

Download Nordic’s e-book, “The Foundational Role of Strategic Health IT,” to explore how the right technology strategy can engage patients, empower clinicians, and drive enterprise-wide outcomes.