August 27th, 2008

Several doctors’ offices and hospitals in the Lehigh Valley are considering or already testing out using self-service kiosks as a check-in option for patients, reports the Morning Call today:

Lehigh Valley Physician Group, an affiliate of the Lehigh Valley Health and Hospital Network — already has launched a pilot program, using kiosks in two of its practices.  Pocono Health System is evaluating the technology.

According to the article, the kiosks are ideal for practices where individual patients are seen fairly routinely; by allowing patients access to their records with a swipe of a driver’s license, scan their insurance card or a credit card and pay a bill in minutes.

To find out more about the kiosks– including where they probably won’t be used, and how they will actually heighten face-to-face interaction in doctors’ offices– read the Morning Call’s article.