The new booking platform is set to offer a significantly enhanced experience for dialysis holiday makers, who can now apply a number of filters to their search, select payment options in advance and have real-time visibility of treatment availability across Diaverum’s network, in 24 countries worldwide.
Two years after the pandemic started to reshape the way we live, we are only now just beginning to think of travel once again. According to Kirsty Bashforth, Chief Business Officer at Diaverum: “If travelling has been difficult for everyone, it's been particularly so for dialysis patients, who have had to consider the many complexities around treatment plans, not least vulnerability to serious complications from COVID-19. For this reason it has been an especially important time to develop the d.HOLIDAY digital platform, to help make the dialysis holiday booking process simpler, quicker and easier, and in turn, to empower more patients to be mobile and live out their dreams of travel.”
The holiday booking platform represents the latest step in Diaverum’s focus on digitalisation to unlock an unprecedented level of personalised, standardised, efficient and high-quality care. This latest news follows on from the launch of the Diaverum Travel Guide in July last year, whetting patient’s appetites for some of the world’s most popular holiday destinations.
How it works
The platform allows patients and caregivers to explore treatment options and book what they need in just three simple steps:
- Enter destination and select dates of their journey
- Apply filters to their search, including treatment options, specific medical requirements and desired facilities
- Select their clinic, register and book their slot, with availability being confirmed via email within 72 working hours
The platform, however, offers more than just online booking options. Crucially, it also offers dialysis holiday makers:
- information on holiday destinations, including its own Travel Guide
- tips on how to plan their holiday around their dialysis treatment needs
- guidance regarding documentation and medication
Commenting on the launch, Michaela Blomstrand, Director of Patient Experience and Community Affairs, who leads on the global d.HOLIDAY programme, commented: “Travel has already for some time evolved into a digital-led industry, and will continue to lean on digital innovation as it seeks to find agile ways of recouping its losses from the pandemic. Our strategy for d.HOLIDAY and our booking platform has been developed in line with this prediction”.
She added: “Chronic disease patients' dreams of travel – whether a short trip, or an exotic, overseas adventure – come from a basic, human need to move freely. For them, this movement has to be plotted around the treatment that is critical to their survival. That's why at Diaverum, we are committed to ensuring our patients can enjoy this fundamental right with our dialysis holiday offerings”.
The booking platform is being officially launched today, 3 May 2022, during the d.HOLIDAY conference, which is being held in Rome, Italy.
About d.HOLIDAY
d.HOLIDAY is Diaverum's holiday dialysis programme. It gives CKD patients access to high-quality renal care through its global network of clinics in 24 countries worldwide, allowing them easy access to dialysis care in another city or country, making it possible to visit family or go on holiday. The company’s clinic staff help patients at all steps of their holiday planning, from defining an itinerary to ensuring continuity of care at their destination.