Recently, Force Therapeutics brought together health system leaders to examine a persistent misconception: that implementing a robust Patient-Reported Outcome Measures (PROMs) program requires long timelines, big budgets, and significant internal lift.
Featuring insights from Sauk Prairie Healthcare and East Alabama Health, the discussion revealed a more practical reality. Successful PROMs programs are less about transformation at scale and more about disciplined and thoughtful execution across a handful of critical phases. Below are some of the most important insights from the webinar. Access the full recording here.
Are You Collecting Data But Struggling to Use It?
A central theme throughout the webinar was the distinction between collecting PROMs and being able to put them to good use. Many organizations already gather patient-reported data, but they struggle when it comes to trusting and using the data, whether to improve care quality, participate in registries, or secure accreditations and preferred designations.
Because of fragmented systems, manual workflows, and inconsistent processes surrounding data collection, hospitals often have to put in a great deal of manual work to synthesize data from different sources, clean it up so it's in a uniform format, and sometimes double check it across the original sources to ensure accuracy. This isn’t just inefficient; it also takes away time from care teams that could be spent directly on patient care.
For many hospitals, PROMs are collected, but the processes behind it are inefficient, error-prone, and unsustainable. Manual data entry, disconnected systems, and unclear ownership created operational drag rather than value. Even more importantly, these processes create risks, whether surrounding the ability to meet regulatory PROMs requirements or by simply not maximizing the capture of patient-reported outcomes, both of which undermine compliance and the ability to make informed clinical decisions.
Ultimately, PROMs only deliver impact when they are thoughtfully embedded into workflows and existing information systems, not layered on top of them.
Recognizing the Need for Change
Interestingly, both organizations began the process of modernizing their PROMs program due to external pressures combined with internal constraints. Specifically, the mandatory THA/TKA PRO-PM (which requires both preoperative and postoperative PROMs collection) and the Transforming Episode Accountability Model (TEAM), coupled with tight deadlines and preexisting internal inefficiencies, led both organizations to seek out better ways of ensuring regulatory compliance, improving patient care, and being prepared for the inevitable expansion of PROM-based requirements in the future.
At Sauk Prairie, the urgency was immediate:
“Historically, we were using another vendor for our patient navigation and also for our PROMs collection. It was a very manual process, and we didn't have clear visibility into our collection rates. It was an expensive and ineffective model that we were using. And one of the big things was the patient education that was provided by this other vendor was not evidence based. And because we have such a high patient volume and one nurse navigator, it was very laborious for her to try to do all of that herself.
And then very recently, we were also identified as being a hospital that was going to be participating in the TEAM payment model. So we needed to partner with somebody that had that figured out as well. So all of that combined is what made us decide that we really needed to do something different.”
These types of pressures reframe effective PROMs and patient engagement from “nice-to-have” into clinical and operational imperatives. As PROMs are increasingly used to measure care quality and performance, their impact on reimbursement and reputation will grow. Already, 25% of Medicare annual payment updates are at risk for hospitals that fail to comply with the THA/TKA PRO-PM, and reconciliation under TEAM will be directly impacted by hospital performance on PROM-based measures, such as the Information Transfer PRO-PM. This trend is set to accelerate within Orthopedic care and across different specialties.
While many organizations often seek out solutions exclusive to immediate problems, those who think ahead, like Sauk Prairie and East Alabama, can implement integrated and thoughtful processes rather than solve crises reactively, positioning themselves for seamless transformations and effective long-term solutions that improve the patient experience.
Internal Alignment Is a Process, Not a Step
A defining characteristic of both organizations’ success was how deliberately they approached internal alignment: as an ongoing, structured process that evolved alongside the initiative rather than a one-time approval checkpoint.
In this context, alignment began with how the problem itself was framed. Rather than escalating inefficiencies in isolation, leaders translated operational pain points into organizational risk and opportunity:
“When you have a problem, [leadership stakeholders] expect you to fully understand it and then come to the table with a few possible solutions.”
This is seemingly insignificant but produces an outsized impact. It builds credibility with leadership and accelerates decision-making by shifting the conversation from whether to act or how to solve a number of different issues to how to act in a way that solves all of the ongoing problems while providing additional value.
From there, alignment expands intentionally and inclusively. Both organizations resisted the temptation to limit discussions to executive or IT stakeholders. Instead, they brought in cross-functional teams early, including clinicians, nursing staff, therapists, and operational leaders:
“We included all stakeholders right down to the support staff in the decision-making process and made sure that anyone that was directly affected or might have resistance to change was included in the process.”
This reflects a critical insight: resistance is not something to manage after decisions are made. It is an inevitable feature of the process that must be proactively managed through inclusion, communication, and involving the right voices early on.
Equally important was the role of continuous communication. Alignment was maintained through regular updates, structured meetings, and visible progress tracking. These touchpoints ensured that stakeholders remained informed, engaged, and connected to the broader objective.
“We held regular meetings, provided updates to staff and surgeons, and always had the patient at the center of every decision we made.”
Notably, focusing conversations surrounding the added value for patients served as a unifying principle across both organizations. Clinical teams, administrators, and executives could align more easily when decisions were consistently anchored in patient impact rather than departmental priorities.
The speakers also highlighted the importance of aligning around future-state thinking, not just current inefficiencies. For example, the recognition that PROMs requirements would expand over time helped justify investment in scalable solutions:
“This is not going to be the only PROM measure, [so] it had to be something that was user-friendly, easy to maintain, and scalable.”
By framing alignment around long-term sustainability, leaders can avoid short-term fixes that can quickly become obsolete.
Finally, alignment extended into the pre-implementation phase, where both organizations ensured that expectations, workflows, and roles were clearly defined before moving forward. This upfront rigor minimized downstream friction and enabled faster execution once decisions were made. For long-term success, alignment is not just about agreement or approval. It is about shared understanding and active participation.
Deliberate Planning Enables Speed
One of the most counterintuitive insights from the webinar is that speed comes not from cutting corners, but from adding thoughtful and effective steps in the process at the right time. Sauk Prairie’s use of a formal vendor evaluation rubric is a clear example. By defining criteria upfront and scoring each option systematically, the team was able to move through evaluation of 5 possible vendors to a decision in two weeks:
“We developed a rubric to score each of our solutions based on different criteria. Scoring was from one to four, one being that the criteria was not present to four being that it was exceptional. And then the criteria started with our must-haves, like PROMs collection, evidence-based education, HIPAA compliance, TEAM preparedness, being able to brand or co-brand with the Sauk Prairie identity. And then also looking for somebody that had what we call the nice to haves, which were remote therapeutic monitoring (RTM) and being able to two-way message with our patients.
We used that rubric during all of our product demonstrations to see where each candidate fell in terms of the guidelines that we had created. Force stood out from the beginning in all of those areas.”
Similarly, East Alabama focused on thorough pre-implementation validation processes, including technical and third-party security assessments, which prevented delays later in the process. A clear pattern can be observed here: clear criteria, defined processes, and upfront rigor reduce downstream friction.
Implementation Works Best When It Aligns with Existing Workflows
A key misconception addressed in the webinar is that new technology requires entirely new workflows. In practice, both organizations succeeded by doing the opposite, mapping new capabilities onto existing processes:
“We didn’t adjust the workflows; we took our current workflows and applied them to the Force solution…Force helped us just transition that information from the way that we had it stored into the Force platform and that was very helpful.”
This approach minimized disruption, reduced training needs, and allowed teams to adapt rather than overhaul operations. At the same time, automation replaced the most burdensome manual tasks, such as patient enrolment and data entry, freeing up staff capacity:
“Our previous system did not allow for automatic enrolment of patients. And so we had someone specifically designated for that within the clinic. So we had to adjust workflows based on the automatic patient enrolment now, and also had worked really hard to discontinue some heavily manual processes. So [the adjustment] was just aligning with everybody in the department, making sure people understood what the expectations were.”
In an effective process, implementation should enhance and augment workflows, not replace valuable processes wholesale.
Monitoring to Ensure Immediate and Continuous Value
Finally, the webinar highlighted the importance of demonstrating the value of digital solutions for the organization quickly, through added benefits to patients and care teams. Both organizations reported immediate benefits following deployment, ranging from improved patient engagement to stronger compliance support.
Additionally, a clear impact on discharge rates and length of stay was observed:
“We've also used [Force] to improve our same-day discharge process and length of stay, which is something that, in the TEAM payment model, is going to be very important. And so we were able to utilize the risk assessment and prediction tool (RAPT) scoring, assessing our patients on the front-end to see which patients would be the best candidates for same-day discharge based on a scoring system.
And then once those patients were identified, it allowed us to eliminate having to do physical therapy with those patients prior to discharge. So it removed that barrier from same-day discharge because historically, physical therapy is only available at certain hours of the day. So if somebody has an afternoon surgery and physical therapy is not available until the next day, but they’ve met every other criteria for discharge, they'd still have to spend the night just to see physical therapy in the morning. So this removed that barrier and has allowed us to move towards same-day discharge for a lot of our patients, which obviously is reflected in the bottom line as well.”
These early results were critical for both validation and for sustaining momentum and reinforcing organizational commitment:
“We had some staff who were initially hesitant…but they were pleasantly surprised to see the level of engagement.”
From Initiative to Infrastructure
The experiences shared in this webinar demonstrate how swift deployment of effective PROMs and patient engagement programs are possible. What was once considered a multiyear undertaking to implement a point solution is increasingly viewed as essential infrastructure that supports regulatory compliance, improves patient outcomes, and enables more efficient care delivery. A partner that can deliver this level of value effectively and rapidly is a critical component of the process.
The organizations that succeed are not those with the most resources, but those that can:
- Identify when current processes are no longer viable
- Align stakeholders around a shared problem and solution
- Apply effective structure to accelerate decision-making
- Design for real-world patient behavior
- Focus on early, measurable impact
Interested in learning how Force Therapeutics can help you deliver patient value with an effective PROMs and patient engagement solution? Contact us below:
