Why Digital Signage Is A Good Prescription For The Healthcare Industry

February 5, 2018 by guest author, Dan Dawson

Guest Post: Richard Murton, Display Technology

Richard Murton

The healthcare industry sees large numbers of people walking in and out of their doors on a regular basis, and of course, each and every one of them is completely different to the next.

With patients and family members all with their own issues, and employees all with their own individual roles, it is important to have a way to communicate with them all, as well as giving everybody messages suited to them. Not only is digital signage a fantastic way of communicating with a vast amount of people, but it also provides you with a whole host of different opportunities in relation to the content and the way in which it is delivered to the audience.

Why Should Healthcare Organizations Use Digital Signage?

First, one of the biggest reasons for healthcare organizations to use digital signage is that it allows them to reach large numbers of people, showing them relevant content. By doing this, people are able to see things that are happening within the industry, within the hospital and also any other information that may be relevant to people.

Digital signage provides a fantastic platform for both internal communications and communication with visitors.

Improving Staff Morale

Digital signage is a very good way to improve the staff morale within hospitals and other healthcare locations.

First, you can introduce a sense of belonging to your staff by giving them regular updates and announcements about what is happening within their working environment. This creates the feeling that everybody is included and that everybody is up to date with everything happening around them. As well as this, you can also promote to them anything positive that within the workplace, such as patient feedback, as it again reinforces the positive feeling that they get from working within the organization.

The use of digital signage within the healthcare industry also improves staff morale by providing them with reassurance of their safety. Through digital signage, you can display a variety of different things relating to safety and security, both informing and helping members of staff.

The signage could display safety procedures, reminding members of staff of what they should do in the event that there is a fire, a security breach or anything else that could potentially put them at risk. It could also be used as an alert system, alerting members of staff of something that is currently happening that again may pose a risk to them and their patients.

By doing this, the overall safety of the staff is much better.

Best Practises

Capture Attention

When using digital signage within any environment, it is essential that you are able to capture the attention of the audience, regardless of who you are targeting. Firstly, an important part of this is the fact that digital signage works much more efficiently in busier areas, simply because there is a higher number of people able to view your content.

With this in mind, when targeting patients and visitors with your content you should consider placing the digital signage in waiting areas, lobbies, nursery rooms, cafeterias, receptions and anywhere else that experiences a high amount of traffic. For communication with staff, you should look to place the signage within staff rooms, locker rooms, offices, reception areas and anywhere else that staff may be on a daily basis.

Once you have your digital signage situated in prime locations, you should ensure that your content is fresh and captures the audience as soon as they lay their eyes on it, bringing them in to spend more time processing it.

Create Targeted Content

If you have a good quality system in place, you will almost certainly be able to display different pieces of content on different screens. If this is the case, you can create pieces of content to be shown on specific screens, particularly based on who is likely to see the content.

For areas heavily occupied by visitors to the hospital, shop advertisements and cafeteria menus may be appropriate, whereas staff specific content would be located in areas where only staff is allowed to access, such as staff rooms and locker rooms. The targeted content would be more relevant and more appealing to each target audience, meaning that it is likely to be more effective, too.