You've Got the Data—Now What? A Strategic Guide to Qualifying High-Potential Patient Prospects
- Debbie Ferguson, CFRE
- Sep 10
- 5 min read
You wanted access to patient data, and now you’ve got it all: capacity-screened lists, top-tier prospects and more opportunities than your team can manage. However, none of these patient families have given before. They are not in portfolios. They are not in your CRM. They are unknowns with potential. So, how do you turn this flood of suspects into real, qualified prospects with whom your philanthropy officers can build relationships?
So, how do you turn this flood of suspects into real, qualified prospects with whom your philanthropy officers can build relationships?
Prioritize Prospects Without Overwhelming Your Team
Not every highly-rated patient will become a donor, and that is okay. The key is quickly and confidently focusing your team’s energy on the right individuals.
First, ensure you have the right tools to screen and analyze patient data to unearth the best prospects for both capacity and affinity. While wealth screening has long helped philanthropy teams gauge capacity, AI-powered grateful patient screening tools created by companies such as DonorSearch AI or London Automation now assess affinity, philanthropic behavior and other key factors to identify top prospects. If you are a smaller organization or do not have the resources to invest in more sophisticated screening tools, you can still use HIPAA-compliant patient information to prioritize your outreach.
After you have utilized the right data-screening tools, focus on the factors that matter most. If someone was recently in the hospital, received care in a service line tied to your health care system's philanthropic priorities, lives in your area and has significant wealth capacity, they should be near the top of your list. Those missing one or two of these elements may still merit outreach, but with lower urgency, while those further removed can be reserved for future engagement. Ultimately, it is about creating momentum. Start with the group most likely to be ready and begin there. Once your team gets into a rhythm, you can add layers of sophistication.
Make Qualification a Process, Not a Guess
Your team will only progress if qualification becomes a consistent and structured part of your work. Provide philanthropy officers with clear prospect assignments, next steps and a reasonable timeline. Assign each officer a manageable number of patient prospects to contact every couple of weeks, and give them a set window—such as 45 to 60 days—to reach out by email, phone or mail. Whenever possible, loop in a physician or care team member for a warmer introduction.
Your team will only progress if qualification becomes a consistent and structured part of your work.
Timing is of the utmost importance. While some grateful patients may experience feelings of gratitude for an extended period of time, it is safer to assume that calling a patient promptly after their care experience is better. Ideally, assign prospects for philanthropy officers to call no more than three months after the patient’s discharge date.
Additionally, to better prepare philanthropy officers for patient outreach, provide not only contact information but also HIPAA-compliant patient information they are legally allowed to access. Supplying this context equips officers with the understanding and confidence needed for more effective calls.
After prospective patient outreach, philanthropy officers should add successfully qualified prospects to a major, mid-level or annual giving portfolio and disqualify those that are not a good fit. Prospects unable to be reached can be disqualified depending on the situation. It is critical to ensure every name moves somewhere and nothing sits untouched. If your operations team adds these high-capacity patient names to your CRM, they should include simple tracking fields for assignments, outreach activity and outcomes. If that is not realistic, a well-managed spreadsheet can do the trick. Your operations leader can support you by providing your team with the most meaningful data points while adhering to the HIPAA Minimum Necessary Standard. Consistency is more important than complexity.
Support Philanthropy Officers with the Right Tools
Good qualification requires visibility and feedback. Philanthropy officers should know which prospects have been assigned to them, when they received the assignment and what the outreach expectations are for those patients. Managers should be able to see who is progressing, who is stuck and what the outcomes are. Therefore, it is essential to track basic information like contact dates, results and disposition decisions. Over time, patterns will emerge that help refine your strategy.
What matters most is making the process transparent so people feel supported and not overwhelmed.
You do not need a sophisticated dashboard to start. Weekly check-ins and simple reports can go a long way. What matters most is making the process transparent so people feel supported and not overwhelmed. Your prospect management leader can facilitate the momentum by providing supportive tools to track interactions and qualified vs. disqualified patient prospects. Leadership will need to see where things are working and where there are gaps in the process.
Start Small, Pilot and Refine
Before rolling this model out to the entire team, start with a small pilot. Choose a few philanthropy officers and give them a manageable number of top-priority names. Run the process for about six weeks and review what happens. How many people did they reach? How many were open to learning more? How many made it into a portfolio?
Use this insight to refine your criteria. Maybe visit recency is a more vital factor. Maybe some departments yield better responses than others. Whatever you learn, use it to shape your next round. Pilots build buy-in and reduce the risk of burnout. Your data and patients are as unique as your foundation and health care organization. The insights you gather may differ from your aspirational peers, which is okay.
Build a Long-Term Strategy
Once the core qualification rhythm is in place, you can build additional strategies for the rest of your prospect pool. For those not quite ready for direct outreach, consider a light-touch engagement track, such as an email newsletter or a stewardship postcard campaign that keeps your organization top-of-mind. It is a good way to stay visible without overwhelming your team.
Most importantly, build close ties with clinicians and allies who are natural philanthropy partners. Their insights can help you identify which patients might be more open to a conversation. And remember to keep your list fresh. Capacity ratings change. So does engagement. Re-screen your pool every few months and re-prioritize accordingly.
Ultimately, you got what you asked for: access to capacity, data, new names and new possibilities. But the real opportunity lies in what you do next. With a thoughtful, focused strategy, your team can turn this flood of suspects into a steady stream of qualified major gift prospects.
You do not need perfect data. You do not need AI yet (but it sure helps to have it!). You need a good plan, a straightforward workflow and a supported team to take action.
Start with what you have. Pilot, learn and scale.
About the Authors: Debbie Ferguson, CFRE, is a Senior Consultant for Philanthropy Operations and Data with Accordant. She specializes in best practices for data solutions, integration and governance as well as patient program evaluation, creation and development. She can be reached at Debbie@AccordantHealth.com or through LinkedIn. Erin Stitzel, FAHP, is a Principal Consultant for Accordant and a leader in building robust clinician partnerships to advance philanthropy. You can reach her through email at Erin@AccordantHealth.com or through LinkedIn.
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