Clear communications are the key to positive patient experiences in hospitals and healthcare practices. Immediate welcoming visual experiences are the first impression for a patient and promote a positive environment and the organization’s brand identity. Hospital digital signage simplifies the experience.
The real challenge is – how does a hospital quickly and effectively communicate to people who arrive already feeling anxious? In today’s tech savvy world, the best way to communicate real-time information is on displays.
Digital signage and interactive displays can do a lot for improving patient experiences. Here are some applications and benefits of hospital digital signage:
1. Digital Wayfinding – Visually Guiding Patients
Modern hospitals can be hard to navigate, especially when a patient is arriving. Despite the best efforts to lead patients simply upon arrival, patients getting lost in a hospital can cost the organization over $220,000 a year in added labor costs. Not to mention the negative patient experience.
Digital wayfinding signage with interactive capabilities allow visitors to quickly access directions to navigate a building. It frees hospital staff from directing traffic and reduces social interactions, which are concerning during the COVID-19 pandemic.
With the Arreya Digital Signage platform visitors can carry the map or directories with them on their phone through beacon technology and the PWA progressive web app widget. Clinics can share the digital directories prior to the patient visit for easier access to correct parking and entrances. Shortening the distances to clinics for patients with disabilities and limited mobility issues.
A progressive web app or PWA is a website that looks and behaves like a native mobile app. It combines the features of web browsing with an intuitive app-like experience, without the barrier of needing to visit an app store and having to download an app.
Types of Digital Wayfinding Content:
- Maps
- Physician Directory
- Physician Profiles
- Clinic Specialties
- Clinic Wait Times
2. Hospital Room Digital Signage – Personalizing Patient Care
Far from the old clipboards at the end of a patient bed, patient bedside digital signage has revolutionized patient care. It focuses patient information into real-time updates for staff. In recent years, hospitals have placed greater emphasis on patient-centered care and shared decision-making, thus improving the patient experience and reducing readmissions.
Hospitals can adapt one of the TV channels into a patient portal. It gives every room a personal portal with care team info, vital signs and appointments. Additionally educational medical videos or at-home care can be easily added to the digital content and personalized for each patient.
Much like hospitals, senior living facilities also have patient or resident care. Specific TV channels with directed content for residents can increase socialization even during COVID-19 isolations. Content can include movies, exercise classes, information or livestream events. Engaging residents with content that keeps them active and mentally stimulated.
3. Digital Waiting Room – Reducing Waiting Room Anxiety
Waiting is not something anyone wants to do, but when you are not feeling well, time becomes more critical. Digital signage in waiting rooms can reduce the anxiety of waiting. Announcing wait times or where a patient is in surgery helps reduce the stress on waiting family members. It also removes the extra burden on staff to keep family members informed of progress. 
Check-in kiosks have become a part of most modern healthcare clinics. It removes many of the direct contacts with staff, which is significant during COVID-19 pandemic, and gets the patient to care quicker.
Additionally, clinic or hospital marketing information can connect visitors to the other services and outreach that the practices provide. Promoting the foundation and branding of each facility. While it’s not a replacement for one-to-one conversations with caregivers, well-prepared on-screen content can cover common questions and allow doctor-patient visits to get to the specifics more quickly.
4. Information Signage – Communications in Real-time
The most common form of hospital digital signage is the informational displays. Typically located in entrances and public spaces, digital signage easily engages patients and visitors with events, safety announcements and wellness awareness tips.
With the Arreya Digital Signage platform, scalability is simple and cost effective. Displays in elevators work in complete offline mode and once receive an internet connection, the digital content automatically updates.
Cafeteria digital signage content can be scheduled for daily updates from Google sheets without ever accessing the Arreya admin. Multiple managers can add relevant information from different sources and pinpoint the locations.
The COVID-19 pandemic has demonstrated how important safety announcements of protocol need to be part of daily information. As the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention updated t
heir safety protocols and guidelines, hospitals and clinics needed a way to quickly communicate this information with visitors and staff. Healthcare digital signage was an effective and safe solution. With Google Translate, Any language can be translated instantly for barrier-free visitor communications for everyone. With Google Dialogflow integration in Arreya Digital Signage, touchless and touchfree interactions easily become a part of non-interactive digital displays.
With digital signage, hospitals can be more strategic about what information they share, as well as when and where they share it. Information is easy to update, and system administrators can push real-time alerts in emergency situations.
5. Digital Donor Recognition – Celebrate Donors and Raise Funds
In a time when fundraising dollars are being spread across so many non-profits, it’s important that hospitals reach beyond the traditional local donors. Hospitals can expand their donor outreach with digital donor walls. Through the Arreya PWA widget, digital content can be shared with potential donors who never visit the hospital. Beyond the monitor on a wall, Arreya content channels can be viewed on tablets and phones anywhere.
There are many cost benefits to digital donor recognition. Unlike static donor walls, in depth information about the hospital giving opportunities, top donor stories and the benefits of donations can be highlighted in digital content. Different levels or campaigns can be combined and updated easily. This reduces the expenses of doing multiple donor walls and costly updates. Allowing for more frequent updates and increasing engagement.
Combining static donor walls with digital donor recognition grows the donations by visitors. Inspiring instant donations.
Arreya Digital Signage software was developed for the donor recognition industry. Intuitive tools that make interactive content easy for anyone to create and deploy. The List-eez data management widget collects data, like donor names, directly from Google sheets and sorts lists into viewable information. Making donor updates automatically. Learn more about the donor recognition displays by Presentations | Arreya
6. Employee Digital Signage – Motivate and Inform Staff
COVID-19 has been a challenging time for hospital employees. Powerful messaging about safety concerns can quickly be deployed with the Arreya alert widget to all screens. Staff birthdays, employee events, hospital and clinic statistics can be shared through employee digital signage to help motivate and retain employees.
Information that would in the past be shared through email or paper, can now be seen on employee displays in break rooms, staff elevators and nurses stations. With the powerful PWA widget, staff can view employee digital content on their phones or tablets from anywhere. Celebrate the wins and keep digital content informative.
These are just some of the many ways digital signage and interactive can be utilized in hospitals and clinics. Investing time and money into digital technology can benefit hospital staff and patients. The goal of any great digital signage is to relieve the anxiety and stress related to healthcare, reduce the cost of staffing and increase awareness.
The possibilities for digital signage are only limited by the creativity of the technology partners.