First off, all of us at Salve would like to wish you a very happy holiday. We hope you find time to relax and recharge however you’re spending it.

Looking ahead to the new year

After such a whirlwind year, we can’t help but look forward to 2021 – the year we’re calling ‘the year of the patient’. 

Disruptors like Apple, Uber and Facebook continue to reinvent the way we perceive user journeys and as a result fertility patients are becoming frustrated and less, well, patient with what’s on offer to them. 

With investment in the industry increasing and new clinics popping up on every corner, fertility organisations are now financially motivated to adapt or fear being left behind.

Why is patient experience more important than ever? 

There are lots of sources out there explaining the financial benefits of putting your patients first and improving their experience with you (see below). However, when it comes to providing answers to how fertility organisations can overcome these challenges, they offer very little.  

We’re taking things into our own hands to conduct a study that analyses the impact patient experience has on retention within fertility. By this we mean the number of patients that return to the same clinic for further treatment because of the experience they’ve had. 

We know that around 65% of patients drop off before the recommended 3 cycles, which is largely due to the psychological demands of treatment. The general feeling is that there’s very little to be done about this. We disagree and have been working hard to improve this statistic and are excited to announce that soon we’ll be publishing a report that proves a lot more can be done. 

How can Salve help you?

Over the past 12 months while the world’s struggled through the coronavirus pandemic, we’ve seen a huge spike in demand for our services. More and more clinics are realising the importance of putting patients first and the role technology plays in making this happen.

Salve uses technology built on years of first-hand insight to strengthen the connection between clinic and patient. By saving time through improved patient education and automation, we provide clinics with the additional headspace needed to focus on what’s most important and what they do best – delivering first-class patient care. 

There are, of course, many positive steps fertility companies can take (both digital and otherwise) to improve patient experience, which we’ll cover in a later post.

2020 – what a year

The coronavirus pandemic has dealt a difficult year to us all. With our day-to-day lives turned upside-down, it seems more and more people have been reminded of what’s most precious to them – like starting or building families. And fertility clinics have been busier than ever. 

During the first lockdown while our industry was ‘closed’, we at Salve made the most of this unique opportunity to review our processes and rethink the patient journey. As a result, we’ve had our busiest year yet and are so happy to be supporting many new clinics, both big and small, around the world. 

Thanks to this growth and a large investment round, there’s been a lot of exciting changes to our organisation and platform, including: 

• Doubling the size of our team

• Rebuilding our patient app from the ground up

• Improving our ability to integrate with different EMRs (Electronic Medical Records)

• Developing a load of new features to improve the lives of those working at our clinics as well as your patients

New features to help make the fertility journey easier

On top of all the other developments happening this year, we’ve released new features (with more to come) that’ll help your business grow while putting your patients at the centre of care. We’ve summarised each new feature below.

EMR-integrated video calling (introduced with the new version of Salve)

Version 2.0 of the Salve app comes with the optional feature of EMR-integrated video calling. This means clinics can simply book the call once in their EMR or scheduler and Salve will take care of the rest. 

As well as saving headaches on the clinic side, this feature provides a more intuitive and pain-free experience for patients too.  

Cryostorage management (2021)

We’re extra excited about this as we know it can be a pain for clinics to manage. As many will agree, it’s fairly easy taking the first year’s payment, but not so easy to collect for year two and beyond. 

We think there’s a real opportunity here, using automation to re-engage patients back through the clinic doors for additional cycles. 

Payments (2021)

As part of our mission to improve the patient experience, it’s important we look to simplify the process of paying for treatment. Our new payments feature will not only provide an effortless way to pay, but will also automate reminders based on triggers in the EMR, making things easier for the clinic too. 

Customisable forms (2021)

Whether you’re looking to capture medical histories or send out a questionnaire, our new customisable form feature will let you to do that with ease then distribute either to individual patients or your entire database. 

Once a patient completes the form, you’ll have the option to export it in various formats or even populate into fields within your EMR (depending on the EMR you have).

Let’s keep in touch

If you’re interested in learning more about the insights you’ve read about today or want to find out what Salve can do for your business, please get in touch at contact@salveapp.co.uk – we’d love to hear from you. 

We’ve put this update together as a yearly roundup. But starting next year, we’d like to expand our offering by sharing updates and insights with you more regularly – including monthly newsletters and the occasional blog. We think it’ll help add even more value to your business. 

We know the festive period might be a little different for you and your families this year, but we’re looking ahead to a brighter 2021 and wish you all the best for the new year.