Not ready for clinical analytics? Try operational analytics

However, clinical analytics solutions can be challenging to get across the finish line and, in some cases, harder to even get to the starting line. Generally, they come with a higher price tag, more complicated integrations, and a much steeper challenge to secure the necessary buy-in to take the first step.

So, what do you do as a healthcare provider who is interested in harnessing the power of analytics but is looking for a way to dip your toes into the pool instead of going headfirst off the high dive?

Why don’t you consider giving operational analytics a try to see the benefits?

Operational analytics easier to get going, but with same impact

And before we get into why this is the correct answer, we should make something clear. Just because the barriers to entry for operational analytics solutions are lower doesn’t mean the potential benefits to healthcare providers are also lower. In fact, you may be able to see more impactful gains faster with many operational analytics solutions. This can help you see the power behind analytics and how it can transform the clinical side.

So, what are operational analytics?

Before we talk about what makes operational analytics solutions potentially more attractive, we should quickly define what they are and share an example. Operational analytics solutions, in this context, refer to data-driven solutions that help healthcare providers find efficiencies and improve processes that affect the overall operations of the organization.

An example of ways operational analytics are being used in the healthcare industry would be using software to analyze data to predict patients more likely to miss upcoming appointments. Knowing this ahead of time means you can take actions to mitigate the results, like double booking or offering patients additional appointment reminders. As you might imagine, this could have a profound effect on an organization’s bottom line.

4 truths about operational analytics

So, what makes operational analytics a more attractive option for healthcare companies looking to get started? How do operational analytics solutions differ from clinical analytics solutions? While we could talk for days about the answers to these questions, I wanted to share a few of the more important truths with you today.

• ROI is clearer with operational analytics. Demonstrating ROI potential is critical to securing buy-in for a new idea. With clinical analytics, calculating ROI requires a lot of assumptions and complicated calculations. With operational analytics, many ROI calculations use already existent data and just a few simple calculations.
• Operational analytics can work in tandem. An analytics opportunity doesn’t have to be purely clinical or operational. There are many opportunities that fall into both categories that offer a nice hybrid of easier to implement while still maintaining the higher benefits ceiling.
• Operational analytics solutions are easier to integrate. Often, clinical analytics solutions require brand new software and hardware that an organization might not already have. With operational analytics software solutions, though, many are built to integrate with existing EHRs and systems quickly and seamlessly.
• Clinical analytics solutions tend to be more black box. One of the most challenging parts of securing buy-in for a clinical analytics solution is that the logic driving the technology is often unable to be seen by the end-user. When a program tells a doctor to do something without “showing its work,” earning trust there is a challenge. With operational analytics, though, the business logic driving the solutions is often simpler and much more transparent.