What happens when 32 specialties at Wallace Tower, 16 specialties at Texas Children’s Hospital The Woodlands, and 51 Texas Children’s Pediatrics practices take part in their own “Shoot for the Stars” MyChart challenge? It means more patients and their families are signing up for My Chart, the hospital’s online patient portal.
Due to the tremendous success of the 5-week MyChart Madness Challenge in March – which generated close to 2,000 same-day MyChart activations across the hospital system – clinical staff launched a second competition to add to these successes, while engaging their teams around Texas Children’s Patient Access Initiative.
MyChart Instant Activation is one component of the Patient Access Initiative, which essentially pushes a text or email notification to patient families that allows them to sign up for a MyChart account via phone instead of having to use a computer to sign up. Patients are then able to access their personal health information, communicate directly with their care team at any time, and schedule their clinic appointments online.
The Shoot for the Stars My Chart Challenge began on July 23 and ended on August 31. The competition generated impressive results across the organization which has helped to improve access for our patients and their families.
Wallace Tower and The Woodlands
Over the course of five weeks, Wallace Tower generated a total of 979 same-day MyChart activations. Of the 32 participating clinics at Wallace Tower, the neurology team won with 204 same-day activations. Over the course of four weeks, The Woodlands campus generated 100 same-day activations with Dermatology winning the challenge.
Texas Children’s Pediatrics
Texas Children’s Pediatrics (TCP) conducted their own competition which began on July 23 and ended on September 2. TCP generated a total of 11,206 My Chart activations. Several practices won weekly and overall raffles including TCP Baytown, Cy-Fair, Lakewood, Pasadena, PMG and Sterling Ridge.
Texas Children’s Pediatrics also conducted a creative competition where each TCP practice designed a creative campaign to display the benefits of MyChart and encourage MyChart activation.
Here are the top three creative campaign winners:
- TCP Pasadena – “MyChart is Out of this World”
- TCP Heights – “Be Incredible…Sign Up for MyChart
- TCP Rayford – “MyChart-Land”
Click here to view all of the MyChart campaign posters.
Patient access: Opening the door at Texas Children’s
Since launching this initiative in March, Texas Children’s has seen significant improvements in patient access across the hospital system. Several enhancements were implemented in waves across specialties which included:
- Standard clinic sessions: After evaluating 944 provider templates, extra slots were found where physicians could see patients for a duration of four hours. By standardizing clinic sessions for all specialties across Texas Children’s, over 53,000 new appointments have been added to the system.
- MyChart activation: In October 2017, the organization had less than 8,000 monthly MyChart activations. To date, we have now exceeded over 60 percent activation for MyChart throughout the system.
- Direct scheduling: More than 100 patients have used this online feature that allows current patients to quickly and easily schedule appointments online on MyChart.
- Electronic waitlist: This MyChart feature automatically offers up available appointments to patients desiring a sooner appointment. Since its implementation, over 300 patients have accepted an appointment on average 52 days earlier than their prior appointment.
Click here to watch this video that highlights our patient access journey and our recent accomplishments.