Why Online Reviews are an Asset to Home Health Care Agencies

The medical community’s view of online reviews has taken a sharp turn of late – in fact, it has reversed totally from its previous stance of hostility. As reported in The New York Times’ “Your Money” column, Medical Justice, Inc. – a company dedicated to physician reputation – now gives out iPads to physicians who make use of its services, so that patients can post an immediate opinion in the office.

This is in stark contrast to its previous “mutual privacy agreements”, which muzzled patients and prevented online reviews from being posted. A lawsuit destroyed the firm’s ability to use these agreements, since they were found to be unenforceable, and possibly fraudulent, also.

Though this transformation was largely involuntary – resulting as it did from a lawsuit – it still represents a positive trend with a lot of possibilities, one that the medical community (including home health care) should embrace.

Home Health Care Agencies Should Take Note

The type of relationship between home health care and patient where a tablet is given to the patient and they are invited to post their opinion online is obviously a much healthier one than a situation where quality issues are being addressed on the back end.

Home Health Care Agencies can turn the online review process into an asset by openly inviting patients to post their reviews immediately – showing that they believe in the quality of the care they have provided, and that they are confident that the patients will provide fair, positive reviews also. There are benefits in directing patients towards sites like SeniorServiceReviews.com, as well as others that LTC Expert Publications lists as good places to review one’s senior service.

Home Health Care Agencies can get good reviews by the simple, straightforward practice of providing high quality care that produces satisfied patients.

Of course, not all review sites are responsive to negative or fake bad information. Incorrect information on Google may never be corrected, but sites like SeniorServiceReviews.com allow home health care agencies to manage all reviews so that any negative reviews are treated as a customer service issue before being posted.

The benefits of encouraging patients to have their say about a home health agency are high enough to counterbalance these remaining problems, and the occasional crank posting a bad review will not be able to overcome the positive image created by numerous reviews from genuinely satisfied patients.

LTC Expert Publications

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