When we talk to CV program leaders about their growth strategy, one important piece of the puzzle that is often missing is a focus on building patient loyalty. Many CV programs interested in growing their service line often start by evaluating new services and marketing to new patients, instead of investing in strategies to retain existing patients.

We know that patient loyalty is important—and challenging to gain—but what does that mean for your CV program?

Many patients are not loyal to a particular system

An Advisory Board analysis revealed that 80% of patients use multiple health care systems over five years. Even Medicare patients, often considered a more loyal patient population, are using three different systems on average for health care needs over five years. This is particularly bad news for CV programs that rely heavily on downstream service revenue.

What this means for CV programs

A few years ago we quantified what a cardiology patient’s loyalty is really worth by tracking downstream service utilization from new cardiology patient visits. When we researched CV growth strategy last year, we wanted to go a step further and understand the impact of loyalty for CV patients following a procedure. We get questions all the time asking “what is the ratio of caths to PCI” or “the ratio of PCI to CABG,” and now we have some answers.

We analyzed downstream utilization following diagnostic cath and PCI for Medicare fee-for-service patients in the six months immediately post-procedure. The analysis revealed that almost one in three patients who undergoes a diagnostic cardiac catheterization receives a PCI within the next six months. For more advanced procedures, like CABG and valve, the utilization rates six months after diagnostic cath are lower (3.7% and 5.5%, respectively).

Conversely, after a PCI, downstream utilization of CABG and valve procedures within six months is substantially lower—less than 1% of patients undergo CABG and only 0.4% undergo a valve procedure.

This was big news to us and the CV leaders we shared this data with at our national meeting—particularly the fact that one third of patients who receive a diagnostic cath receive a PCI within the next six months. It’s clearly important to make sure that patients are continuing to choose you as their provider of choice following any CV service, and now we know just how important.