Improving Patient Travel Services Experience
- UX Design
- Visual Design
- Prototyping
- User Research
- Patient Travel Services Team
- Engineering
- Product Management
Overview
Mayo Clinic serves over 1 million patients annually, many of whom travel long distances to one of its three Destination Medical Centers (DMCs). For these patients, travel is not just logistics. It is part of their healthcare journey. Yet travel often becomes a source of stress, disruption, and financial burden.
Mayo's Patient Travel Services (PTS) was created to alleviate that burden by assisting with booking (and rebooking), offering discounts, and addressing accessibility and medical travel needs. Despite its potential, the program is underutilized and undervalued.
The Problem
For many patients, traveling to Mayo Clinic adds a layer of stress on top of the physical, emotional, and financial strain they are already carrying. But today, too few patients are aware of Patient Travel Services and the value it offers.
"I was overwhelmed because I knew Mayo was the best place I could go, but I didn't know how to get hotels nearby or how to find my appointments."
Patient at Mayo Clinic
"Having cancer is just plain stressful enough. Having to determine what the best treatment alternative amongst multiple alternatives is not easy. What will insurance cover? What are the Costs for Logistics and costs for travel for treatment?"
Patient at Mayo Clinic
Goal
Get more patients to become aware and understand the value of Patient Travel Services, so they know we are available to support their travel needs and help them focus on what matters most: their health.
Outcome
- Increase awareness of Patient Travel Services
- Increase usage of Patient Travel Services
Research Findings
Because it is offered as a siloed service, separate from core moments along their healthcare journey with Mayo Clinic, the onus falls on patients to reach out.
Behavioral
- Only ~25,000 patients used PTS last year (out of 1M+ total patients)
- Less than 25% booking conversion rate
Cognitive
- Patients default to familiar tools (Expedia, Google)
- Low awareness of healthcare-specific benefits
- Frustration with repeating information across services
Internal
- Limited data sharing between departments
- Unclear ROI metrics
- Cautious investment in service improvements
Current Patient Journey
The Solution
To deliver on our opportunity, we first identified a target audience who stands to benefit most from Patient Travel Services: first-time, out-of-state travelers to DMCs.
We decided to focus primarily on patients who are traveling domestically, from out of state to get care at a DMC location for the first time. These first-time travelers have the highest uncertainty about the trip and are less likely to have heard about Patient Travel Services.
For our initial CX Quick Win pilot, we targeted a smaller subset of this group (Rochester General Internal Medicine/Cardiovascular patients) to prove success and garner support for greater investment. Regarding translation capacity, we focused on English-speaking patients for this pilot.
Solution Framework
Awareness
Proactively introduce PTS at key moments in the patient journey, starting with appointment scheduling
- Appointment confirmation emails
- Patient portal notifications
- Care team communications
Understanding Clearly communicate PTS value proposition and
healthcare-specific benefits - Medical travel expertise - Accessibility support - Integrated with care journey - Exclusive discounts
Consideration Make it easy to learn more and get started with PTS -
One-click contact options - Clear next steps - Simplified information sharing
Action
Deliver a seamless booking experience that builds trust
- Personalized recommendations
- Proactive support
- Connected to care team
Touch point: Text Message
Leveraging the existing Mayo Clinic text message infrastructure, we can identify patients who have confirmed appointments at the Rochester DMC and send them a text message offering Patient Travel Services for their journey to Mayo Clinic.
With this approach, we can target our audience of Rochester GIM/Cardiovascular patients to keep this pilot effort focused on increasing discoverability of the program without scaling too widely.
Touch point: Email
Similar to the text message entry point, we can also leverage the existing email / Eloqua infrastructure to identify patients who have confirmed appointments at the Rochester DMC and send them emails offering Patient Travel Services for their journey to Mayo Clinic.
Like text messages, this approach also allows us to target our audience of Rochester GIM/Cardiovascular patients.
Touch point: Patient Portal
Knowing that the Patient Portal is likely the primary platform accepted patients use to engage with Mayo Clinic, we can use this touchpoint to surface Patient Travel Services to patients we know are out of state and have upcoming appointments.
Similar to the previous approaches, we can also roll out this solution to our target audience of Rochester GIM/Cardiovascular patients first.
Touch point: Landing Page
As all traffic from the previous touchpoints will be driven to the Patient Travel Services Landing Page, we want to ensure that it clearly articulates the value and altruistic mission of Patient Travel Services.
On this new landing page, we optimized the narrative to be empathetic, connect with patients who are feeling the stress of travel for their upcoming visit, and assure them that the logistical burden of travel and accommodations can be handled by the Patient Travel Services Team.
The four key components that Patient Travel Services can support (flights, ground transportation, lodging, and dining) are introduced in a way that highlights benefits specific to patients.
Conclusion
Mayo Clinic serves over 1 million patients annually, many of whom travel long distances to one of its three Destination Medical Centers. For these patients, travel is not just logistics. It is part of their healthcare journey. By meeting patients where they already are (in their portal, inbox, and text messages), we created a path toward higher awareness and adoption of a service that directly reduces stress and improves the care experience.