TWAH Hospital
The TWAH is emphasizing on attracting and retaining human resource as an asset, it’s actively seeking to resolve and preventing high employee turnover. It aims at maintaining personnel turnover at rate below 15%. TWAH aims to achieve this milestone by providing conducive working environment for all its employees as well as offering attractive remunerations for their staff. This will act as a motivating factor since employees will feel valued; this will make them provide high quality services to all customers. Through provision of high quality services, TWAH will attract many customers and retain their existing customers, thus gaining a competitive edge in the market.
Financial projections
As a result of provision of high quality medical services, The TWAH hospital has been building a strong customer base as well as gaining financial stability. It aims at improving the health care services to patient satisfaction while still maintaining the Health care system’s financial stability. It aims to maintain an operating profit of above 25% on the revenue.
Growth
The TWAH growth plan aims at increasing the impatient days by a rate of 3 %, while increasing the OPD census by 3 % and the operating procedures of the hospital by the rate of 5 %. In its laboratory department, the hospital aims to increase lab procedures to 15 cath. Per month. The hospital also target to increase the number of MRI and CT scans by 5% through improvement of its diagnostic equipment.
Quality
The hospital aims at improving its upgrading the quality of its services in order to be accredited by the ACHS. In line with its quality improvement master plan, the hospital aims at having less than two unplanned re-admission into the high dependency unit, within 72 hours of discharge, reduce patients fall and bed sore incident to a rate that is less than 8 per cent per year. Furthermore, it aims to zero rate incidents of medication with adverse health event. Provision of high quality services will also enable TWAH to attract many prospective customers leading to increase in their customer share in the market.
Service
The hospital aims to provide services that enhance patient satisfaction by the rate of 2% percentage. This will help TWAH to retain its current customers and attract new potential customers.
Segmentation
The Tsuen Wan Adventist Hospital has segmented the Hong Kong healthcare market in the following ways:
Geographical
The main clients of the Tsuen Wan Adventist Hospital are the Tsuen citizen and the NT West Citizen. The strategy adopted by the TWAH is mainly to concentrate on the citizens of these two regions; Tsuen and NT west citizens. This is because it’s only the private hospital located in the NT West region
Demographic
The TWAH health care covers different ages. For children, the care is provided by the pediatrics department together with other specialty. For the adults and elderly, healthcare is provided by general care, priority care and other specialty. TWAH also provides healthcare that covers different genders. For the male, healthcare is provided by the urological department and for the female, it’s provided by the obstetrics and the gynecology department. Most of the Twah consumers are usually mid-level income earners who prefer to pay higher price for faster healthcare services.
Psychographic
Many people in Hong Kong Have joined the health care insurance scheme. Therefore, they normally prefer seeking health care from private hospital when they are ill. TWAH hospital is one of the private hospitals which are a choice for many people in the region.
Targeting
The target market for the TWAH is classified into three fonts. The first target is the middle class who normally prefer spending more money for better healthcare services. TWAH does not target the lower class people because they can’t afford the health care services without sponsorship from the government. Furthermore, it does not target the upper class because they normally seek health care services from the best hospital.
TWAH hospital normally targets patient who are protected under the health care insurance. This is because it is possible to claim payment for treatment from the insurance company. The last target is the Chinese patients; this is because most of them believe healthcare services at Hong Kong are more professional. Furthermore, they prefer private hospital to government hospital and TWAH is one of their best choices.
Positioning
TWAH was launched in the year 1964, and is the only private hospital in the NT West and it provides comprehensive health care services to those in need. The hospital has positioned itself as a middle grade private hospital in the Hong Kong market. It provides more affordable prices to patients compare to any of its competitor in the market. Their services are not limited to physical care but also provide psychological care. It extends its healing ministry of Christ through provisional of personal and professional health care. TWAH views every patient as a whole person in the total contexts of his beliefs, work, family and lifestyle, and seek to restore patient’s functional life.
Marketing mix
The TWAH hospital has integrated various marketing tools in attempt to pursue its marketing objectives. TWAH has continuously its marketing mix in order to catch a whole health care market in the region and beyond. The marketing mix employed by the TWAH include the four Ps; product, price, place and promotion.
Product
TWAH provides the following services to its patients:
Out Patient Service
The hospital’s outpatient department provides 24-hour a day, 365 days a year urgent service to its patients. In house, the doctors in the family medicine deliver the highest quality healthcare with the support of specialists of various discipline affiliated to the hospital. The hospital also provides specialty clinic to the clients. These specialties include: Allergy, Antenatal Clinic, Cardiology, Dermatology and Venereology, ENT, Internal Medicine, Mental Health, Nephrology, Neurosurgery, Obstetrics and Gynecology, Oncology, Ophthalmology, Orthopedics and Traumatology, Pediatric, Plastic Surgery, Respiratory and Sleep Disorder Clinic, Surgery, Urology, Dental and Oral & Maxillofacial Surgery.
In Patient Service
TWAH hospital provides a well decorated surgical, pediatric and obstetric ward with modern facilities to the patients. There are 3-5 beds rooms, semi-private 2 beds rooms and private single bedrooms for patients to select.
Cardiac Assessment
The hospital is well equipped with state-of-the-art digital imaging equipment; the CCIC in TWAH provides a range of diagnostic and therapeutic procedures for cardiac patients. The CCIC is staffed with a full team of expert cardiologists, technicians, radiographers and nurses all highly experienced in this field. It allows cardiologists to care for their patients with greater speed and precision. Well-equipped operation rooms and a 24-hour emergency interventional service are available for life saving procedures, including percutaneous coronary intervention.
Breast Health
Many diseases of the breast usually mimic cancer. Research figures showed that if detected early, breast cancer has a five-year survival rate of over 95%. Because of this reason, TWAH treats every patient with top priority by scheduling a prompt appointment with the breast specialists who would work towards providing a definite answer as quick as possible. Other than the diagnosis and treatment for breast cancer and other breast diseases, the Breast Health Center offers a full spectrum of screening services and risk assessment against breast cancer.
Surgical care
TWAH has a well-equipped theatre suite. It provides great surgical care by highly qualified and experienced nursing staff and specialist surgeons.
The two newly renovated operation rooms are equipped with Control Systems that can control the lighting and operating tables, with capability for imaging handling, data exchange, and storage. The new OT has also been specially designed for ambulatory procedures. There is a recovery room with six beds for close observation and a day-case waiting area furnished in a homely environment. Patients can arrive only on the day of the procedure and return to the comfort of their own home to complete the recovery process on the same day.
Day Case Services
There is a recovery room with six beds for close observation and a day-case waiting area furnished in a homely environment. Patients can arrive only on the day of the procedure and return to the comfort of their own home to complete the recovery process on the same day.
Diagnostic Imaging services
Other than state-of-the-art diagnostic equipment such as MRI and CT scan machines, the newly installed Digital Subtraction Angiography (DSA) apparatus expands the realm of diagnostic radiology to interventional radiological procedures.
Rehabilitation Centre
TWAH offers a wide range of rehabilitation services for both adults and children. It helps patient to achieve their maximum functioning level through stat-of-the-art equipment.
Price
Pricing is an important strategic issue because it is related to product positioning. Also, pricing affects other marketing mix parts such as promotion, decisions, and product features. TWAH always tries to keep a reasonable price for patients. To compare with the clinic, the price of TWAH is higher. Patients usually paid a fixed price to see the clinic doctor and can also have a few days medicine. For TWAH, the consultation fee and the treatment fee is separated. This price strategic helps patient use the affordable price to get the best treatment. In comparison with other private hospitals the prices in TWAH are comparative low. The hospital offers promotional discounts each as some body check discounts. It also joins the government allowances each as elderly allowances, elderly vaccination subsidy scheme, etc.
Place
TWAH located in Tsuen King Circuit. Since the location is not convenience for non-Tsuen Wan Citizen, it is not easy to attract more patients.
Promotion
In the past one year, TWAH advertise TWAH services through mass media, each as TV health program, newspaper health column. They also advertise its service with social networks like sending some promotion post card to old patients and some Tsuen Wan citizen. In addition, TWAH besides made some events such as walkathon to promote its brand.
Recommendations
For TWAH hospital to attract and retain its human resource, as well as reduce the rate of employee turnover, it must provide a good working environment. TWAH can provide good working environment by addressing the issues such as employees’ health and benefits and offering attractive remuneration. Moreover TWAH Hospital can create good working environment by providing rewards to higher performers, as well as providing training and development for its employees. This will motivate the staff and they will provide good services to customers leading to customer satisfaction.
In order for TWAH hospital to meet its financial projections, it must give priority to their customers’ needs, wants and welfare. This can be achieved through provision of high quality medical services. This will result to customer satisfaction and in turn, many customers will feel valued by the hospital. This will help TWAH to build a strong customer base in the market because it will be able to retain its existing customers, as well as attract new customers. This will make TWAH gain a competitive advantage in the market, enhance performance, increase its profit margins and improve its financial stability.
For TWAH to realize its growth plan, more funds should be allocated. This is because the growth plan includes expansions, purchase of more equipments and increasing the number of employees to deal with expected increase in the number of customers. This implies that more funds will be needed to support this growth since additional expenses must be paid for.
In enhancing the quality of TWAH Hospital services so as to be accredited by the ACHS, it requires the contribution of both the management of the hospital and employees. This is because for any hospital to be accredited by the ACHS, it has to meet certain standards, and those standards cannot be achieved by the management only, but it requires the contribution of all stakeholders. Therefore, the management should design strategies that will define what each employee is supposed to do towards the attainment of that goal. Eventually, this will enable TWAH to gain a competitive advantage in the market and become more profitable than other hospitals.
Although TWAH Hospital provides good services compared to other hospitals, it must upgrade their services due to increased competition in the market. This can be achieved through performance appraisal to determine the performance of employees in provision of medical services. This will enable TWAH Hospital to have high quality workforce, and it will also help TWAH Hospital to retain its customers and attract potential customers.
Conclusion
Comprehensive integration of the above research driven marketing recommendations and strategies in the TWAH marketing plan will ensure that the TWAH brand its services to the target audience in the NT West region. Besides, Implementation of above healthcare strategies will ensure that TWAH successfully create awareness and change the perceptions of the resident of NT West and beyond. The recommendations are remarkably feasible since they use extensive knowledge of marketing operations in the healthcare structure. In addition, these strategies recognize all the obstacles that need to be eradicated in for the TWAH to be successful in marketing its product and services.