My philosophy is, to get a consumer to change their behavior (like for instance remembering to take their medication), you must have very relevant conversations. The hard part in healthcare is that the more honest your conversation is, the riskier it gets, and the less channels you have to communicate your message over.
PHI or “Protected Health Information” creates this problem, or shall I say, complicates things, because protecting our health information is a good thing right?
PHI is under the U.S. Health Insurance Portability and Accountability Act (HIPAA) and in a nutshell, is any information about health status, provision of health care, or payment for health care that can be linked to a specific individual. This includes any part of a patient’s medical record or payment history. PHI has a broad interpretation and as a result not everyone in the industry can agree exactly what type of data is considered PHI.
For instance, at mobileStorm we’ve witnessed compliance teams rule that including the name of your physician in an SMS text message is completely fine, while another team says that even a cell phone number can be considered PHI. Communicating with large populations quickly is incredibly important in keeping America healthy; however PHI can make this tricky. While people interpret PHI differently, our experience has been that most companies will always err on the side of caution. Large fines for privacy violations has the industry on edge. In February the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services issued a $4.3 m fine to Cignet Health Care of Temple Hills. The action is the first monetary fine issued since the Act was passed in 1996.
Since February two more lucky winners received gifts, UCLA Medical Center for $865,000 and Massachusetts General Hospital for $1,000,000. These three episodes have all happened in 2011 alone. The interesting part is that the amount of penalties and fines have been significantly increased. Prior to Feb. 2009, the maximum fine for those subject to HIPAA rules was $25,000. Now, the fines can top out at $1.5 million.
It’s clear that the industry needs to do everything it can to protect our information, but believe it or not, this can conflict with trying to keep people healthy. Strange? Not really.
A good marketer knows that you can influence a customer’s behavior and get them to purchase something from you if your message is extremely relevant. For instance I like shopping at Nordstrom’s but I would never want them to send me the latest fall collection from Salvatore Ferragamo, I am more of a Ecco guy myself. Someone handling Nordy’s CRM solution would be able to analyze my historical purchase behavior and when they go to send an email campaign out for the Men’s Half Yearly sale, they would entice me into their store by showing me how I can pick up a pair of Ecco’s new causal Street shoe for half off. Marketers are lucky, they don’t have to worry about having the government imposing massive fines on them. Unless of course they are spamming, but let’s be honest, you really have to be a malicious spammer for that to happen. Very few people in the U.S. have been sued and they were sending billions of emails.
The truth is, a marketer can use any and all channels to promote their products and services with very little repercussions. Email, SMS, web, mobile web, push notifications, faxing, voice broadcast, instant messager, mobile apps, and direct mail are a few weapons at their disposal with thousands of service providers and platforms to choose from. The Healthcare industry is limited to what they can use, so as a result their reach is less broad. This becomes a problem with certain income and age demographics. Not everyone can afford the Internet or knows how to use a smart phone. With less ways to reach people, the smaller your chances are at getting someone to change their behavior to stay healthy.
PHI cannot be transmitted electronically over an unsecured channel, this is one of the reasons email never really took off in healthcare like it did in retail. As an health plan or hospital, there are few channels where you can have truly relevant conversations. Sure PHI might protect your personal information, but it is also limiting relevant conversations that have made marketers a killing for years.
We published an mHealth report this year where we predicted by 2015, 85% of American’s will have a smartphone. When that happens, large scale communication can be ubiquitous and conversations will become as relevant in healthcare as marketers have been seeing for years. We developed a HIPAA compliant technology that encrypts mobile messages, and has a very simple user experience to read and reply to messages (like SMS offers). We are banking on the fact that there is no better device to influence a healthy decision than a smart phone. Its the one device that goes with you room-to-room and perfectly interrupts your day (just ask my wife). Heck if you use a smart phone as much as I do, then you will know your leg will buzz without your phone even being in your pocket (note: There is actually a condition for this, I forgot what they call it).
So even though we have a ways to go, and healthcare organizations cannot yet enjoy conversion rates that marketers are used to; relief is on the way. We just need to hope that Steve Jobs continues to release his gagets on every major network; none of this “we will launch on AT&T first, and maybe Verizon at some point”.
If we see anything like another iPhone, let’s hope it’s cheap and available to everyone. Because devices like the iPhone, will be one of the only ways we are going to be able to receive extremely relevant communication, in a secure way, and with an incredible ed-user experience.
“New Message from your Doctor: Jared, I hope you enjoyed Taco Bell. You met your quota for the year. Did you remember to take your heartburn medicine?”
- Jared Reitzin
Founder & CEO of mobileStorm Inc
jared (@) mobilestorm.com
