EECP Implementation Program Plan

The ultimate success of any EECP Program is boiled down to two things: Outcomes, and Patients throughput. The Clinical Application Specialists team will assist you with the former. This packet will assist you with the latter. It is important to recognize there is no one magic answer to recruiting patients. You will have to carry out a variety of activities on a steady basis over time to produce a flow of patients. The key to success is to be consistent. The following is designed to give you some insight as to a variety of activities that you may be able to implement within your EECP Program in order to increase patient volume. It is provided in a checklist format so you can track your progress and check off activities as you complete them. Getting Started: This initial section is a list of groundwork activities that will assist you in your EECP Programs long-term success. Identify an individual to be Program Coordinator. This person is responsible for patient recruitment and program implementation. If not already done, identify a physician as the Medical Director who is strongly in favor and supportive of the therapy.
These first two items are the most important steps in order to assure success both clinically and fiscally! Without both of these in place, do not proceed.

Identify Marketing/Patient Recruitment/Public Relations individual if different from the Program Coordinator. Set up a dedicated telephone number with voice mail for your EECP Program. If you have the ability to put callers on hold, set up the hold time to promote your EECP program with upbeat patient related information. Decide on the name of your EECP Program. Many sites have chosen to name their programs EECP Center of/at. It is beneficial to use EECP in the name of your center since it is commonly associated with the treatment and will make it easier for patients to locate you.

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o EECP is a registered trademark of Vasomedical and can only be used with the written permission of Vasomedical. Since you purchased a Vasomedical EECP system from Vasomedical, you have been licensed to use the EECP name for the promotion of your Center. Print Business Cards with your centers name, logo, and contact information for each of the staff. Print stationary and envelopes for your Center. Print Patient Referral Cards for graduating patients to hand out to friends and family. Review the Patient Recruitment Kit provided in your Start-Up Kit. This kit contains valuable marketing information including sample referring letters, stationary, graphics, etc. The graphics can be customized using Acrobatic Reader. Review Vasomedicals marketing and patient education brochures, videos and reprints found in the Start-Up Kit. Request additional materials to supplement the initial Start-Up Kit. You can locate the marketing order form in the Start-Up kit. Print posters from Patient Recruitment kit for the waiting room, back of the doors in patient exam rooms, bulletin boards in office and other locations such as the Cath Lab, Cardiac Rehab, Waiting Rooms, general information boards, etc. Place patient education brochures in the lobby of your professional building and office labeled with your EECP Centers identification information on the space provided on the back. Play EECP Patient extended play informational video in the waiting room. You may order this video from the marketing department at Vasomedical. Include EECP Therapy on listings of services available on items such as o Stationary o Practice/Department brochures o Practice/Department Newsletters

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o Web Page  Create a page specific to EECP within your current shell with links from your main page.  Create hyperlink to Vasomedicals web page  Contact Vasomedicals Marketing Department to provide them with information on your web page so it can be linked from Vasomedicals web listing of your site. International EECP Therapist Association o Have all therapists join the association. It is an excellent network for a variety of information. 919-863-9481 www.ietaonline.com to become a member. Schedule an in-service for: o Physicians o Clinical Support Staff o Administrative staff within the practice/department. The more individuals within your organization that are familiar with the benefits EECP provide, the more patients you will have referred. Be sure to include:  Patient Benefits  Patient Inclusion and Exclusion Criterion  Your Centers experience if applicable Developing Contact and Patient Database The information gathered in these steps will be valuable in assisting you in long term and on going patient recruitment activities. Collect this data in a usable format that includes:      Type of contact Name Address Phone #s Other key demographic information

Patients o Review patient charts in your patient base and in other offices linked to your practice, specifically looking for patients with:  Patients taking Ranexa (ranolazine)  Prior bypass or PCI (stenting or angioplasty)  Persistent angina with co-morbid condition that would preclude them from surgical interventions including CHF, diabetics, renal, COPD, and elderly patients  Persistent angina despite optimum medical therapy  Persistent angina despite revascularization procedure

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Frequent hospitalization due to chest pain Failed stress test Persistent angina and are not candidates for revascularization procedures Anatomy not ideal or problematic for PCI or CABG

Colleagues o Referring base of physicians including:  Cardiologists  Primary Care Physicians  Internal Medicine Physicians  General Practitioners  Cardiovascular Surgeons  Family Practitioners Medical Organizations o Local Hospitals department contact and key person in the:  CCUs  Cath Lab  Cardiac Step Down Unit  Cardiac Rehab  Cardiology Residents (list of all)  Cardiology Fellows (list of all) o AHA  Find local chapter at http://www.americanheart.org/affili/ o Mended Hearts  Locate your local chapter at http://www.mendedhearts.org/localchapters.html o AACN  Locate your local chapter at www.aacn.org.  Identify the Chapter president o AACVPR  Locate your local chapter at www.aacvpr.org or call 608.831.6989  Identify the Chapter President o Bloodless Surgery Centers  Locate Centers at http://www.bloodlessprograms.com/  Identify the Director o EBT Scanner Sites  Locate Centers at http://www.imatron.com/customer_usa.htm Media o Local Newspaper  Identify the Health/Lifestyle reporter o Local Network Television Stations  Identify the Health/Lifestyle reporter

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o Cable Television  Identify if there are any Health Programs o Senior Citizen Newsletters/Publications o Radio  Identify the Health/Lifestyle reporter  If any Health Programs  Stations catering to the seniors o Hospital Publications  Focused on Seniors  Targeted to geographical area  Do they allow inserts into their billing statements to patients  Cardiac Rehab  Cardiac Patients  Staff o Practice Newsletters/Publications (your practice and/or referring base) Local Community Organizations can typically be located through the local yellow page directory o Community Wellness Centers o Health Clubs o United Way o Local American Diabetes Association chapters  Visit http://www.diabetes.org/ and click on Local info o Religious organizations  Jewish Community Center  Jehovah witness o Senior Centers  Locate the nearest by calling 800.348.4886 o Shoppers Guides o Rotary Clubs o Shriners o Knights of Columbus o Elks o Chamber of Commerce Target Marketing This section will utilize the contact database you created in the previous section. There are a variety of different activities in this section for you to choose. You may wish to implement several of these at a time. In implementing any of these activities, it is important to measure and track the success of the specific activities undertaken. Some centers have found it quite beneficial to track the cost per lead generated in order to identify the most cost effective and best lead generating activity.

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Have accounting include a small insert into every statement mailed for one to three months announcing the new service offered. This will generate a variety of leads from many unlikely sources. Letters o Introduction Letters-find samples of various letters in the Patient Recruitment Kit and Reimbursement Manuals.  Colleagues y Include patient selection criterion, patient benefits  Referring Base of physicians y Include patient selection criterion, patient benefits and a Physicians Guide to EECP found on the marketing order form.  Insurers y Inform of your new service y Include clinical studies and outcome data found on your marketing form. y Include inclusion criterion y Include how much you plan to bill  Potential Patients y Include patient information that detail benefits, brochures and maybe a patient video. y Invitation to come and visit for free screening  Media Contacts y Send Press Release (see Patient Recruitment Manual for samples) y Include Patient Brochures and video y Information specific to your center and experience y Follow-up with each by phone to assure receipt of information and answer questions. y Do follow-up Press Release to those who provide media coverage. Include original story.  Medical Organizations y Send information packet and video introducing your new Center y Follow-up with each by phone to assure receipt of information and answer questions. y Request an opportunity to present at an upcoming chapter and/or regional meeting.  Local Community Organizations y Send information packet and video introducing your new Center y Follow-up with each by phone to assure receipt of information and answer questions. y Request an opportunity to present at an upcoming chapter and/or regional meeting.

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Mailings o One time mailing  Include a slip of paper (plain or fancy) into every billing statement. The slip should announce your EECP program. Even though some may not be potential patients, they might know someone. (This is a very inexpensive mailing since you are already paying postage for the statement). o Do repeat and follow-up mailings to:  Target contacts  Physicians that are potential referral sources to keep informed  Other sources that produced referrals o Stager the mailings o Consider sending new Journal Reprints as soon as they are published found on the marketing order form. Advertising o TV 

 

Vasomedical has an already produced 30min infomercial that can be ordered through the marketing department tagged with the specifics for your EECP center for a nominal fee. y You will be surprised how inexpensive cable time for advertising is actually ($200-800 per run) Have ads run approximately12 times a month at varying times Inquire about ROS (Run of the Station) time. This is time that becomes available last minute due to cancellation. This could be prime time or very earlier in the morning but is typically the least expensive. Vasomedical also has a 30 sec commercial pre-produced and can also be customized with your EECP Centers specific information.

o Radio  Health Programs y Contact director/producer and offer to do live broadcast discussing EECP y Call in programs are best  30 Sec spots y Create your own and make sure you give motivation for the individual to call such as free screening y Target stations with mature audiences. If you locate Paul Harveys news, try to buy airtime before, during or after his program. He has a large following of your target patient population. y Try different times and stations o Newspaper

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Ads
y y

These are only good if you are consistent. Try different sections on different days Stay away from Sunday, as there are too many flyers already. Monday is usually the best to make your flyer stand out. Choose specific zip codes to target at a time Motivate the reader to an action o Staying away from strictly informational. o Invite to Free lecture o Invite for free screening

Flyers
y

y y

Open House o Plan open house and invite specific targets from contact data base o Choose an early evening mid to late week o Provide hors doeuvres and beverages. o Call key individuals and invite personally o The day before and day of, call as many invitees as possible to remind/confirm Presentations o Grand Rounds  Choose facilities that you have privileges  Choose high profile facilities  Determine the time, date, location  If possible, request registration to gauge audience size  Assemble needed items y EECP handout packets y EECP Center brochures y EECP clinical presentation on slides or PowerPoint can be ordered through the marketing department. y When applicable, provide Vasomedicals CME or CEU packet to entice attendance (Contact Kasia Smigielska at 800.455.EECP ext 152) o Journal Clubs  Cardiology, Internal Medicine, Family Practice. o In-Services  Cardiac Cath Labs  CCU  Cardiac Step-Down Units  Cardiac Rehab  Cardiology Residents and Fellows o Schedule Presentations with identified:  Medical Organizations  Local Community Organizations o Patient Lecture

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Advertise and make sure they realize it is Free Choose an easily accessible well know location and target those zip codes in your advertising Determine a time and date that would be suitable for the target audience. Mid week and mid morning with continental breakfast is usually the best time. Request registration to gauge audience size Assemble needed items y EECP patient slide presentation can be ordered through the marketing department. y EECP handout packets y EECP Center brochures Avoid extensive A/V presentations because this always puts them to sleep. Make the presentation conversational and allow the attendees to interrupt with questions. Provide free screening to attendees Follow up with each attendee after the presentation to personally invite for a screening, those who may be candidates. Also ask if they know and would be willing to recommend anyone as a potential candidate.

Maintain a Clipping File o Reprints o Newspaper articles about you Center o Videos of News broadcasts about your Center o Place copies in your waiting room o Post copies in key locations On Going Activities Monthly activities in patient recruitment will assure a constant flow of patients throughout the year. Here are some different ideas that may be one time activities or activities that are repeatable several times a year. Updating your referring physician on medication changes and progress of patient. This should be done at the time of the consideration of the medication change and bimonthly on the progress of the EECP therapy via telephone. Have your medical director dictate a follow up report to the referring physician at the completion of treatment. You are developing a relationship with your referring physician, which will promote a continued flow of patients. EECP patient parking o Create one or two spots if space permits. Radio Advertising o Repeat activities in Target Marketing section

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Giveaways for graduates. These are advertising for your center. Make sure you include Centers name, logo and contact information Graphics may be used from the CD ROM in the Patient Recruitment Kit. o T-Shirts o Coffee mugs o Water Bottles Sponsorship of youth, seniors or hospital sports team. Choose one with a lot of contact in the community. o Softball o Soccer o Basketball o Bowling Newsletter o Do updates on your Centers outcomes and distribute to:  Patients  Referral Sources  Media Contacts, etc. o Include patient success stories. Health Fairs o Participate in local Community and Hospital Health Fairs. o Provide free screening o If able, have a give-away specific to heart disease and tagged with your EECP Centers name and contact information. Follow-up Cards to graduates to let them know you are thinking of them. This reminds them to tell others and gives you additional stories to share with prospective patients. Consider sending on: o Birthdays o Anniversary of their graduation Bulletin Board o Create a bulletin board to post pictures of graduates doing various activities after their successful treatment.

Make sure that whatever activity you choose to implement, you keep a record of which activity has brought in leads. Track your lead conversion rate. Both of these will assist you in assuring that when you do an activity, it is the most productive for the time and money invested.

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