DIGITAL SIGNAGE APPLICATIONS FOR HEALTHCARE – Industry Report

02 Nov DIGITAL SIGNAGE APPLICATIONS FOR HEALTHCARE – Industry Report

Read our HEALTHCARE REPORT here!

HEALTHCARE GETS A WIN-WIN WITH DIGITAL SIGNAGE

The patient can spend valuable time waiting for appointments. Digital signage allows this time to be value-added by helping to educate, inform and assist those in a healthcare environment spend their time meaningfully. Hospitals, clinics, Doctors waiting rooms and community health centers can use video, graphics and bulletins to reinforce messages and inform patients of important health issues, treatments and news.

With easy-to-use templates and scheduling features, clinic administrators can update signage displays in patient rooms, lobbies, waiting rooms and hallways.  Patients and visitors may have mixed needs. Your digital signage can be tailored to the viewer using multi-screen systems that keep the message relevant.

INFORM, ADVERTISE, NAVIGATE & INTERACT

Digital signage solution gives your healthcare facility a dynamic communication solution that not only attracts the attention of your customers, but also offers you a unique method to break through the clutter of boring paper signs and get your message noticed. Here are some common uses:

• Facility mapping
• Patient information
• Donor wall recognition
• Workforce communications
• Educational health messaging
• Advertisements and promotion

IMAGINE … highlighting specials and linked product promotions … promoting sales, discounts and featured lines … sharing news about forthcoming events, special opening hours, seasonal offers.

Digital Signage can keep Patients and Visitors educated and engaged – say goodbye to out-of-date paper-based magazines and kids corners. Interactive digital sign will reduce the boredom of waiting. Interactive kiosks are ideal for the young at heart!

MESSAGE EXCHANGE – KEEPING PATIENTS INFORMED

Healthcare Administrators are in Control. Waiting room magazines hold some patients over but only go so far. Digital signage displays provide an information and entertainment opportunity that can help doctors communicate better with patients while they wait.  As digital signs are ultimately flexible … they can operate in ‘real time’. Would you like to be able to tailor messages according to the situation of the day? Or display emergency updates in the event of a health crisis?

Let digital signs help differentiate your medical facility from others. Make the waiting game an entertaining one … and engaging visitors whilst promoting health messages, upcoming news, ancillary services, cafeteria menus and hospital specialties.

• Direct patients & visitors
• Provide building information & directories
• Market hospital and medical centre specialties
• Promote healthy living messages and medications
• Provide ADA accessible signage
• Differentiate your medical facility
• Promote your surgeon & physician practices
• Decrease the cost of static signs
• Entertain waiting patients and friends – videos, health tips, etc

Ideal locations for screens, kiosks, tables or displays include:

• Building lobbies
• Check-in & registration areas
• Emergency rooms
• Waiting rooms
• Elevator banks
• Cafeteria
• Donor recognition areas

IMAGINE … promoting health messages to patients and visitors … displaying special clinic opening hours … announcing new healthcare breakthroughs or endorsed products.

WAYFINDING – A KEY FEATURE OF DIGITAL SIGNAGE

Navigating made easy – Digital signage network is far more than signs on the wall.

With built-in wayfinding technology, you can efficiently direct people throughout your healthcare hospital, aged care home or doctors clinic with interactive digital touchscreens. Getting people where they need to be is no easy task in a large complex environments. Interactive signage offers powerful solutions to relegate that awkwardly folded, printed map or handout to the pages of history.

From any point in the healthcare space, wayfinding tools can be utilised to create the perfect fit for your visual mapping needs plus:-

• Step-by-step directions: Similar to popular online mapping solutions, with directions to allow you to provide your users with enhanced functionality that will guide them to their destination.
• Path Drawing: Intuitive back-end functionality allows a directional path to be drawn from one point to another, giving your users visual directions to their destination.
• Dynamic Wayfinding: A link between your surgery/rooms/ward and map allows you to find your way with an animated icon on the map.
• Static Mapping: Digital maps are an eye-catching addition to any digital sign and are proven to attract the attention of your users over standard, printed signage

When designing content, the messaging is king. The success of a digital signage network depends entirely on the content. By design, digital signage content must follow your overall healthcare and patient charter. It must complement the other patient orientated services and must be current, relevant, meaningful, interesting, motivating and sympathetic to needs.

The good news? Digital display signage is easy to configure, boasts HD picture quality, and allows for the management of multiple display boards from one central location. That means your content can always change when it needs to, and unlike information on paper signs, it will never fray or be torn down.

It’s also important to get the length of messaging right. The type and length of your messages depends on the location where these will be delivered eg a busy waiting room versus a quiet patient rest area. Long messages will never work in emergency areas and highly trafficked areas as visitors will not be able to take them in. Call-to-actions, such as ‘’scan this QR code for today’s gift shop specials’ are ideal for places where patients or visitors spend more time – waiting rooms, café etc.

LOCATION, LOCATION, LOCATION!

Is the position of digital signs important? Yes! As in most things, location of signage is critical.

One of the first questions you will need to ask yourself before deploying a signage system is where should the screen(s) be located? The answer is simple: in those key areas where your target audiences – such as patients, visitors and healthcare workers – are likely to be found most often. Identify daily routines and traffic flows to identify the most appropriate locations. Usually, these are:

• Entrance: First impressions really matter. It’s important to present key facts about room changes, emergency information, and staff achievements in this area.
• Consultation Waiting Rooms: Ideal areas for health messages, videos, medical cross promotions and news.
• Feature Displays: Touchscreens to interact with patients and visitors – ideal for navigating around a large hospital or health complex.

IMAGINE … easing waiting room uncertainty by posting a patient queue and estimated wait times. Remove patient frustration. No print poster can do that.

Digital signage allows your healthcare practice to obtain a financial advantage by selling advertising space to medical specialists and pharmaceutical providers to give tailored messaging direct to patients. This income stream is too good to be ignored!

SOCIAL MEDIA, TRADITIONAL MEDIA & DIGITAL SIGNAGE

Social media is at the heart of people’s communication nowadays and ignoring it means losing immense opportunities of connecting to them and bridging generation gaps. In the Healthcare environment, people are increasingly relying on digital technology to guide them.

Digital signs, far from being a communication medium on its own, can be used to complement your healthcare space’s social media presence. Patients and visitors want, need and expect fresh communications – changing digital images and message will make screens more attractive to watch, transforming them into important sources of information that customers consider value viewing.

IMAGINE … stream live tweets to patients either at your location or remotely … use videos to spread health messages … engage with customers – not bore them!

Summarising the Case for Digital Signage

Benefits Galore Include:

• Influence your customer decision by health promotions
• Change your appointment scheduling remotely, easily and in minutes
• Adapt your offerings automatically at different times of the day
• Use eye-catching videos to make waiting a pleasurable experience
• Decrease your printing costs
• Automate wayfinding with interactive kiosks

Why Yap!digital?

• 100% dedication to digital signage
• An end to end service with a focus on ‘’ease of use’’ for the customer
• Competitively priced
• Trusted professionals in digital signage

Explore the possibilities: connect to a Yap!digital Consultant today!

From the creative brief to execution on site we facilitate the entire process, making it streamlined and efficient for our clients. Call us on +61 8 9274 5151 or email tim@yapdigital.com.