Providers Must Care About Financial Health, Too

In a recent healthcare interaction, something unusual happened. My wife made an appointment with a healthcare provider for an MRI. They told her to be there at 12:15, and they’d see her at 12:30. She showed up at 12:15 and they saw her at 12:30.

It becomes even more dreamy. She got an MRI and left WITH THE DISK. In three hours, she was emailed the report along with a video of the radiologist explaining everything to her on the image. This was a retail MRI provider, and it cost $600.

The two large hospital systems we originally contacted wanted $4000 and $7000. We have a high deductible, so it’s basically all out of pocket. To sum it up, we received better service for a fraction of the cost. The result helped my wife (and her doctors) make more informed decisions about an upcoming procedure.

Because transparency is being mandated, hospitals have transparency pages on their websites. Some even have calculators, but they’re not helpful. Try to calculate a standard procedure like a colonoscopy and you’ll get a range of about $700 to $4500. That’s not an estimate and not enough information to help someone decide.

Compare that to new entrants into healthcare who are finding ways to provide service at a lower cost and advertising it. For example, Costco is about to offer $29 telehealth visits and $74 lab work.

Contrast that with another personal experience: I’ve been seeing my primary care doctor for 20 years. Before my last checkup, I had to sign a document that said if I brought up any health issue outside of the lab work, there would be an additional charge. He eliminated the “personal” in personal care. That’s not a relationship, that’s a transaction. And you know who’s better at transactions? Costco.

I’ve worked in healthcare marketing for more than 30 years. I’ve crafted messages and stories for clients to help them differentiate their services that were like the provider up the street. We used emotions, behavior change messaging and powerful creative to deliver the story. But no matter what we recommended, every single hospital told versions of the same two stories—new advancements and personalized care. (Of course, our creative was much better than most;)

It's time for the story to evolve.

Hospitals and other traditional providers must find new ways to connect with their audiences that not only touts the services, but also includes the value and cost of their services. Potential patients want to know that providers understand what they’re going through, not just physically, but financially.

The movement is underway. As individuals take on more of the burden of paying for healthcare, marketplace dynamics inevitably come into play. Employers are covering less, deductibles are getting higher, and the healthcare costs themselves from traditional providers continue to climb.

Out-of-pocket spending increased 10.4% in 2021 alone. In fact, more than 100 million Americans have some sort of healthcare debt. Most people can’t think about their healthcare without thinking about their money at the same time. Ignoring that in your communication sends the message that you don’t care about what matters to your potential customers.

I had conversations about this a few years ago with several marketing people from different hospitals, and one response captured what they all thought, “Where else are people going to go? You can’t go to Walmart for surgery.”

A funny statement given that Walmart currently has 77 clinics and will soon offer 24/7 virtual urgent care. They have already created a travel surgery program for employees where they pay for employees to travel to other states to find better and more affordable care. You think they can’t build a customer-centric health care system? I wouldn’t bet against it.

Right now, there aren’t many options to traditional providers, so you would think that means patients have no choice, and you’d be wrong. Studies have shown financial toxicity and fear of costs is causing Americans to delay health services. That’s a scary thought: people would rather not get treated and risk an acute medical event than go further into debt. The state where I live, Georgia, was recently ranked the worst state for healthcare by Forbes. One primary reason: 15.5% of residents chose not to see a doctor in the last 12 months due to cost.

As marketplace dynamics and new entrants take a larger role, traditional hospitals and physician practices will need to adjust. Granted, they’ll never be able to out-Costco Costco, but they can do a better job helping people understand their value, and that means speaking to the entirety of a person’s needs, wants and fears. They can help their potential patients feel at ease and confident in their choice. If it costs more, then give them reasons why.

Take my earlier example with my soon-to-be-former primary care physician. If he offers me nothing but a transaction, why wouldn’t I go for the $74 for lab tests and $30 physician review rather than pay him a few hundred dollars? And soon enough, why would payors not see the cost difference and start to cover those costs? Traditional providers must take a fresh look at the services they offer and dig deep to find why a customer would come to them for it, knowing that their audience will be thinking, “how much will it cost me?”

That message needs to be developed now. Because soon, you won’t just be competing with other hospitals or practices for your services, you may start to compete with companies who know how to drive traffic.

Rudy Fernandez is the Creative Director and Principal of Creative Outhouse in Atlanta, GA. He has worked in healthcare marketing for more than 30 years and has developed messaging and creative for hospitals across the country, for The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC), physicians’ practices and various medical associations.