For those in healthcare, video is becoming an increasingly essential tool, not just for training and internal communications, but to continue to provide telehealth and patient services to reduce the growing waiting lists as hospitals and clinics continue to operate at reduce capacity due to COVID-19 restrictions.
There is an enormous cost associated with poor communication in healthcare settings, costing many 1000s of lives and millions of pounds each year globally. Poor communication can lead to “various negative outcomes, such as decreased adherence to treatment, patients dissatisfaction and inefficient use of resources” according to a recent study published by Wellcome Open Research. It is crucial that healthcare providers minimise these risks and find a better way to share essential information with their patients.
When you consider that people are 75% more likely to watch a video than read text, it’s clear that video should be more widely used in all communications strategies for healthcare providers and the various audiences they engage with.
Patient communication
Video is an ideal way to communicate repetitive messaging that your healthcare team spend valuable hours each week delivering, particularly now that more and more patient communication is delivered remotely. Rather than bring patients into a hospital environment for a pre-op information session, for example, which may happen many times per week, why not create a video that effectively communicates these important messages and is then available to share with every patient over the coming months and years.
It is not just the patient themselves that need access to all the relevant information for their treatment, but their parents, carers, adult children or community healthcare teams also need to understand the complete picture regarding their care, treatment, medications, or exercise regimes.
Video is an efficient and effective way to deliver, often complex, information in a way that is immediately accessible and easily digestible for the recipient.
Video is:
- Available to watch on almost any device – phone, tablet, laptop, desktop, smart TV
- Available to watch 24/7, whenever they need it, not just when they attend clinics or hospital appointments
- Available to re-watch again and again as required
- Can easily be shared with family members and carers wherever they may be.
Video is ideal to share information with patients on so many different aspects of the patient journey, including:
- Pre- and post-operative care
- Pre- and post-natal care
- Physiotherapy exercises for rehab
- Chronic pain management techniques
- Disease prevention
- Hospital layout and directions
- Visiting hours and access times
- Hygiene controls and advice
- Seasonally affected illnesses such as winter flu or localised outbreaks of a particular illness such as measles
- Advice for attending A&E departments
- The correct way to take and manage medications
Staff training
Delivering training in healthcare settings can be challenging at any time – juggling the needs of patients, staff on different shifts, dispersed throughout large hospital settings etc. Social distancing measures to combat the spread of COVID-19 further hampers internal training delivery.
Video is an ideal way to deliver in-house staff training, giving healthcare staff effective on-demand learning resources they can access exactly when needed. Video benefits both the user and those providing the training in a number of key ways:
- BETTER UNDERSTANDING Over 60% of us are visual learners, so using videos in training makes it easier to digest and recall key information. Seeing an action demonstrated and described at the same time is highly effective and creates a clear understanding of the behaviours and skills that you want to impart
- BETTER ENGAGEMENT According to Forrester Research, people are 75% more likely to watch a video than read text, so giving them the information they need in the format they prefer will prove more effective in the long term. Video is also better for retention – viewers retain 95% of a message when they watch it through video than any other medium
- REDUCED COST 85% of training costs are spent delivering that training, but with video you need only invest the time and money once to have that training content available in perpetuity. When Microsoft replaced classroom training with video training, they reduced the cost per employee from $320 (€270.40) to $17, saving themselves a substantial $13.9m annually
- GREATER FLEXIBILITY Video content is available to the team 24/7 rather than delivered at a specific time, freeing them to avail of it exactly when it suits them best, regardless of location, shift etc. Short-form video training enables the team to self-direct their learning and easily access the specific content they need for a quick refresh. If a piece of equipment starts to malfunction at 3am, it not reasonable to expect staff to find and read through the relevant manual or call the Clinical Engineering team. Having access to a library of short, tailored videos, available on their own phone, tablet or laptop means that staff have access to the information they need when they most need it
- STANDARDISATION Delivering training through video ensures that it is standardised across the whole organisation – guaranteeing that everyone has access to and benefits from the same valuable information
- FLEXIBILITY Unlike text-based manuals and training folders, videos are easily updated as required and can be instantly circulated to the relevant team members by email, incurring no delays in important information being shared
- RETAINING INTERNAL EXPERTISE The staff in every hospital and healthcare setting have built up incredible levels of specialist expertise and it is so important that this internal expertise is captured, retained, and shared widely within the wider team. In doing so, hospitals are ensuring that this specialist knowledge continues to benefit the organisation, even when staff choose to move on or retire
Studies have shown that information and advice from our peers and colleagues is far more effective than bland, corporate communications. Making it easy for staff to find, share and re-use the information and resources already within the organisations leads to:
- Better team co-operation and morale
- Improved team communication
- Greater collaboration
- A more diverse sharing of insights
“I’ve been working with Video Sherpa over the last couple of weeks and we’ve shot some technical videos about how to do operations. I found their background support, ease of use and the whole experience to be extremely beneficial.”
Kilian Walsh, Consultant Urologist, Galway University Hospital
Simple, in-house video creation
Video Sherpa enables you to increase the benefits of video messaging across the organisation while simultaneously reducing the cost and complexity of creating this video content at scale.
Video Sherpa is a video production platform that enables organisations to easily create their own bespoke video content in-house. It is an intuitive system that streamlines video production for anyone – no prior video experience necessary – and provides your organisation with the software, hardware, and training to create high quality, effective video content exactly when you need it.
How does it work?
- Video Sherpa’s unique algorithm delivers a bespoke shot-list for every user to follow in a step-by-step process, automating camera settings to ensure the highest quality footage
- Video clips are then synced to the cloud-based, video editor where users can trim, caption, add soundtracks and voiceovers to video projects. Video Sherpa software automates colour contrast and colour balance during the render process to further enhance the quality of the finished video
- Video Sherpa allows for both Admin and Standard User roles, with an unlimited number of users available on each subscription. Admin approval mechanisms have been incorporated to ensure that all projects directly published from the client’s dashboard are subject to approval
- Videos can be shared on social media channels, uploaded to website or intranet portals, added to individual or group email campaigns, or shared on newsletters
- Clips can be stored in your own Digital Asset Library, ready to be re-used in multiple videos. External images and video files can also be imported and added to your videos
- Videos can be duplicated and tailored with different messaging for different audiences
If your organisation is serious about improving patient communications and internal training resources, then Video Sherpa is an ideal platform to help you deliver that at scale across the organisation.
Visit www.videosherpa.com for more information, contact the team at hello@videosherpa.com, or call us on +353 87 252 8160.
