Taking responsibility for public health at Mehiläinen Länsi-Pohja

Mehiläinen Länsi-Pohja’s plans for the year changed on the fly in March 2020 when the first COVID-19 cases were diagnosed in Finland. Over the following three months, we operated in full crisis preparedness, making changes to our operations on a daily basis in broad-based morning meetings with supervisors. Mehiläinen Länsi-Pohja treated the virus in both primary and specialised health care, including a separate intensive care unit set up for COVID-19 patients. In 2020, more than a dozen patients required inpatient care at Länsi-Pohja Central Hospital, about half of them in intensive care.

Strong leadership and agility ensured success

In the rapidly changing and uncertain situations in 2020, our strengths as a company included decisive leadership and the agility to quickly agree on necessary changes and implement them with an open mind. Our employees were required to stretch to their utmost capacity and tolerate uncertainty and continuous change.

We were very successful in managing the COVID-19 pandemic in the spring – treatment outcomes were good, and the pandemic wave spreading in the Länsi-Pohja region was stopped through seamless cooperation between different actors. Emergency care was ensured for the population in all circumstances, while resources were focused on safe functioning amid the pandemic and providing quality treatment for patients with the severe form of COVID-19.

Experiences from the spring helped face the autumn’s coronavirus situation

The exceptional circumstances caused by the coronavirus continued in the autumn, when we worked hard to catch up with the non-urgent surgery we were forced to cancel in the spring to protect employees and customers. At the same time, we had to manoeuvre between making up for the care debt and managing the second wave of the COVID-19 pandemic.

The learnings and experience we had gained about the coronavirus during the spring of 2020 helped decision-making and planning our activities to prepare for a second epidemic wave. Throughout the autumn, we were able to reduce the queues for non-urgent services that accumulated during the spring due to cutbacks resulting from the coronavirus outbreak, and access to care was restored to a good level by Christmas, even in specialised healthcare.

Digital services also eased the situation in Länsi-Pohja

Providing healthcare for the population amid the COVID-19 pandemic was facilitated by our remote and digital healthcare services, which saw significantly increased demand due to the coronavirus. We were able to provide a significant amount of outpatient care as well as primary healthcare as a remote service via Mehiläinen’s Digital Clinic, which ensured that customers had safe access to services even amidst the pandemic. More than 11,000 discussions were initiated in the Digital Clinic in 2020, with over 8,000 customers’ service needs being resolved in the digital channel. The volume almost doubled from 2019.

Customer satisfaction reached a new high

Alongside the rise in digital services, our customer satisfaction rate also increased during 2020. Purposeful investments in a customer-driven approach as well as new service channels and personnel training to support this paid off in the increase of the Net Promoter Score (NPS) to 72 points in 2020.

Our successes amid the global COVID-19 pandemic in 2020 must first and foremost be attributed to our amazing personnel. Without the strong commitment and resilience of our employees in the face of crisis, we would not have survived this exceptional period. The personnel of Mehiläinen Länsi-Pohja deserve a big thanks for their effort.