Tag Archives: technology

Celebrating Women’s History Month: Championing Diversity in Health IT

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What better time than Women’s History Month to highlight the many initiatives lifting up women in our health IT industry.

It has been 10 years since I started speaking out more publicly as a health IT professional about women’s issues though I am a long-time feminist having come of age during the women’s movement of the 1970s. In 2014, I was asked to do a keynote talk on a topic of my choice at a 200-person health IT conference. It was one of those vendor sponsored, invitation only events. I was the speaker during the first night’s dinner. I titled my talk: “Our Future Workforce – Unlocking the Potential”. I talked about the fact that not enough women were going into STEM (science, technology, engineering, and math) fields and the need to encourage and support women at all levels. Prior to the talk I wrote this post – Technology, where are all the women? – and afterwards I wrote this one describing the positive response to my talk – Women and technology, part 2 – from an audience that was probably 80% men!

When I launched this blog several months before that talk in 2014, I made sure to create a category called “On Women and Work” knowing I’d be periodically writing about women’s issues, and not just in March each year.

Fast forward to 2024. I am certainly not a lone voice in our industry. Many women focused initiatives have emerged. Here are just a few to highlight: Continue reading →

HIMSS24 from a distance

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I haven’t been to a national HIMSS conference since 2019. We all remember how the early days of the pandemic led to a last minute cancelled HIMSS20. Since then, there has been a multi-year transition in the conference approach. It was back to what appeared to be a pre-pandemic level of attendance at HIMSS24 this week. I sat it out again this year but watched from afar on social media.

On social media I saw the key vendor announcements, session highlights, and got a glimpse of the oh so valuable in person networking as many people shared pictures of reconnecting with one another.

Bill Russell’s This Week Health Newsday episode on March 8 – “HIMSS , Yes or No?” – asked are you going to HIMSS, should you be going? He aptly named national conferences like HIMSS as “carnival” type events. With over 1,000 vendors exhibiting at HIMSS, the description fits. But, if you are looking to meet with your vendors or research new vendors to solve real problems, the exhibit hall was the place to be. He also refers to “relationship” events – smaller conferences and events where there is an emphasis on the peer-to-peer connection we all value. That’s where I am putting my focus given my current work.

At any conference, networking is key. There are benefits to you and your organization as you build relationships and learn from your peers. It is not just about your own career journey which is often what people think about networking. In the past four years we’ve become accustomed to virtual connections and events, but I agree that there is nothing like in-person events for networking and renewing relationships.

Did I have FOMO this week? Maybe a little. But am I continuing to build new and nurture old relationships with colleagues and clients every day? Yes.

I look forward to reading the HIMSS24 recaps in industry publications and from attendees on their social media accounts to learn even more. Here are a few to start: Continue reading →

What do healthcare CEOs want from technology in 2024 and beyond?

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When do you stop wishing people “Happy New Year”? Probably soon if not yesterday. When do you stop reading recaps from 2023 and predictions/forecasts for 2024? It depends. When do you stop listening to what healthcare CEOs are saying is important to them? Never!

I’ve seen two pieces recently from healthcare CEOs that are worth sharing here.

First off a very powerful message from Michael Dowling, President and CEO at Northwell Health published in Becker’s Hospital Review on January 2 – “The most pressing question to start the year”.  He reminds us of our mission as we start the new year.

“Health is how we work together to build a sense of community. Having a healthy community also requires everyone doing what they can to tone down the political rhetoric and social media-fueled anger that is polarizing our society. Health is bringing back a sense of civility and respect in our public discourse, and promoting the values of honesty, decency and integrity.”

 The second is a piece from Becker’s Health IT published on December 19 – “Health system CEOs’ tech wish list”.  Here is what’s on the technology wish list for the next three years:

    1. Seamless care coordination applications
    2. Drivers of elite patient experience
    3. Automation everywhere
    4. Precision medicine capabilities
    5. AI-driven technology to support the workforce
    6. Health equity and population health boosters

Sound familiar? Does this align with what you are hearing from your healthcare executive team?

You may be wondering how you do this with limited budgets due to continued financial constraints and the workforce challenges of recruiting enough staff and the right talent. The job of health IT leaders is as challenging as ever but as exciting as I’ve seen in my several decades in healthcare. Finding ways to take costs out and create capacity, optimizing existing investments, hiring talent and retooling to ensure your team is ready to deliver on the new demands – those are some of the leadership challenges for 2024.

Related Post:

From reflection to action – preparing for 2024

 

From reflection to action – preparing for 2024

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It’s that time of year when you can find 2023 recaps and 2024 predictions everywhere you watch, listen to, or read content. In health IT, we are no exception to this. My StarBridge Advisors colleague, David Muntz, has written our final blog post of the year that health IT leaders may find useful – “12 Steps to Prepare for 2024 – Big Challenges – Bigger Opportunities”.

David is one of the kindest people I know. It is a true pleasure to have been on this StarBridge venture with him for the past 7 years and to have known him far longer than that from when we were CIO colleagues. It is no surprise that he starts his post by talking about how important it is to model kindness, mercy, and compassion in all that we do. He notes the workforce challenges that organizations face and the importance of recognizing that healthcare is a people business. He goes on to address specific opportunities in DEI, digital health, AI, security, and much more.

He closes with a call to make the best of these opportunities in 2024 to improve health and care in our communities, our nation, and our world. After all that is our common goal! I encourage you to add his blog post to your end of year reading list.

All the best to you in 2024! May it be a healthy, peaceful year filled with kindness.

Beyond Cost Cutting: Health IT’s Role in Financial Health

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Health systems continue to face complex financial challenges. Industry articles highlight the few that have strong operating margins while also noting the many facing continued operating losses. Becker’s Hospital CFO Report published the article, “25 factors that could affect health system performance in 2024”, by Alan Condon on September 8th. It is a comprehensive list and worth reviewing.

What do these financial challenges mean for health IT leaders? I talk to many CIOs who are faced with cost cutting targets and dealing with very limited budgets yet long lists of priority projects. It’s no surprise. Health systems often fall into the trap of relying solely on cost-cutting measures, particularly in the realm of IT and staffing.  While trimming expenses is essential, it’s just the starting point.  Organizations must carefully consider all the impacts on operations and especially morale.

At StarBridge Advisors, we advocate for a comprehensive approach that goes beyond mere savings, encompassing revenue growth, digital transformation, and effective change management. This multi-faceted strategy promises swift improvement to your bottom line, operational efficiency, improved staff morale and progress toward the goals of the Quintuple Aim.  IT enablement is often essential to these activities. You can use these opportunities to leverage the IT investments that have already been made.

In a recent series of four blogs written by Principal, David Muntz, we offer practical and pragmatic guidance on each crucial aspect of this approach.  The benefits are tangible and span from immediate gains to long-term sustainability.  Our expertise empowers your organization to undergo both tactical and strategic transformations, ensuring uninterrupted top-tier patient care without compromising on IT performance or security.

We can help your organization hardwire the Quintuple Aim. Partner with us to revitalize your health system’s trajectory, creating growth opportunities despite financial constraints.  I hope you’ll take time to review the series and let me know if we can help you and your organization.

StarBridge Advisors blog series:

 

Divided opinions on AI in healthcare

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Are you and your doctor ready for AI? While patients may be getting more comfortable with AI, how healthcare professionals embrace AI is critical to its evolution and eventual use.

Boston Children’s Hospital and Harvard Medical School conducted a poll in May among 3,317 adults age 18 and over in the U.S. and included a sample of 357 healthcare workers who were asked about how AI is already affecting their jobs, and how it might continue to do so in the future.

So how comfortable are healthcare professionals with AI? According to the study, “Healthcare professionals are somewhat divided in their opinions of AI: 23% think the use of AI in healthcare will help more than it hurts, 33% think it will hurt more than it helps, and 42% think it will equally help and hurt.”

Another interesting but not surprising poll result is the age differentiation. According to the study, “Younger adults express more comfort with AI-led healthcare, with 40% of those 18-34 saying they would be comfortable with a primary care appointment led by AI, vs. just 24% among those 65 and older.”

A Becker’s story, published June 29 by Giles Bruce, “Where Americans want and don’t want AI in healthcare: 7 things to know”, provides the following highlights from the study:

    1. Two-thirds of Americans believe AI will play a bigger role in healthcare five years from now.
    2. 34 percent expect AI to be better than healthcare providers at treating patients without bias.
    3. 1 in 4 are comfortable with AI-led therapy.
    4. 22 percent expect AI to be better than medical professionals at diagnosing conditions.
    5. 12 percent said their healthcare providers currently use AI to augment treatment, diagnosis or communication.
    6. 83 percent of medical professionals don’t currently use AI.
    7. A third of healthcare providers say AI will do more harm than good.

AI is already being used in many ways in healthcare and will continue to evolve. IT leaders need to stay current as it evolves, leverage their existing vendor partners, carefully assess the new niche players and their claims, develop AI skills within their teams, partner with clinical and operational leaders to find ways to experiment that make the most sense for their organization, and learn from other organizations who are more advanced users of AI.

Bill Russell’s This Week Health podcasts often cover AI so it’s a great resource for keeping up and hearing what the issues are and how it is being used in different organizations. One of the newest episodes is TownHall: The Potential and Unknowns of AI and Emerging Tech in Healthcare, Part 1, a conversation between Dr. Brett Oliver, Family Physician and Chief Medical Information Officer at Baptist Health and John League, Managing Director, Digital Health Research at Advisory Board.

As my favorite television news anchor likes to say, “watch this space”.

Related Posts:

AI and AI – Use them Responsibly

AI in healthcare – is 2023 the breakout year?

Navigating the AI landscape in healthcare: HIMSS23 recaps and more

Unlocking the power of time: insights from an inspiring leader

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Today is the longest day of the year and the official start of summer. This longest day leads me to reflect on how we spend our time.

I recently had the pleasure of interviewing Saad Chaudhry, Chief Digital and Information Officer at Luminis Health, for a Townhall episode on This Week Health. Saad is an inspiring leader on so many levels so preparing interview questions was easy. I had heard Saad talk in the past about what he calls his Manifesto of Time, so I wanted to make sure we discussed it in the interview. For Saad, looking at the number of hours the average person has in their lifetime means looking at how we choose to spend it and whether we give or take time from others.

As a health IT leader, he says we are in the business of time. He is committed to giving time back to staff and patients. He asks in his manifesto – “Does a process/technology/policy steal time from a fellow human? Is there a better alternative to simplify the experience?” He challenges us to make systems and processes easier for patients and staff, giving time back rather than taking more time from them.

I can’t say it nearly as well as Saad, so I encourage you to read The Manifesto of Time and listen to the short clip on time from our interview – Spending Time: Why It’s Important to Maximize Giving Back Our Most Valuable Commodity. We covered much more in the full interview if you are interested and willing to spend 30 minutes of your time listening – A Realigned Role, Generational Diversity, and Giving Back Time.

I know your time is precious – thanks for reading and listening!

ACP – addressing the digital divide

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“We need to advance health equity in a sustainable way – not with charity care and not performative health equity”, said Dr. Alister Martin, ED physician and CEO of A Healthier Democracy in the closing keynote at the annual NEHIMSS chapter conference last week. One of the many initiatives of A Healthier Democracy is Link Health which focuses on connecting patients to the Affordable Connectivity Program (ACP) to close the digital divide.

Listening to Dr. Martin last Thursday, I decided to use this week’s blog post to amplify this important initiative and help raise awareness among health IT leaders about the ACP and its importance for healthcare. As they say, timing is everything. June 14-22 is the ACP White House Week of Action and June 16 is the ACP Healthcare Day of Action.

Here’s some background on the ACP taken from the Link Health website:

COVID-19 Accelerated A Massive Shift To Telehealth.

The COVID-19 pandemic ushered in widespread acceptance of telehealth and other digital innovations in medicine and dramatically increased the use of telehealth as an intervention to reach patients.  A recent HHS study shows a 63-fold increase in Medicare telehealth utilization and 32-fold increase in behavioral health care through telehealth triggered by the pandemic.

Access To Broadband Internet Is A Social Determinant Of Health.

Despite widespread internet usage in the United States, 15–24% of Americans lack broadband internet connection, a foundational requirement for telehealth and the bevy of other services that underpin the social determinants of health. In fact, access to broadband internet has been considered a “super” social determinant of health (SDoH).

The Affordable Connectivity Program Expands Broadband Access But Needs Help From Healthcare.

The Bipartisan Infrastructure Law created the Affordable Connectivity Program which provides a subsidy of up to $30/month for lower-income households ($75/month for households on tribal lands) on participating internet service plans and a one-time $100 subsidy for a connected device. 51.6 million households are eligible for the ACP, yet only 25% have enrolled. 38 million more households are potentially missing out on money to pay their internet bill. Importantly, only 13% of patients with Medicaid have signed up for the ACP.

Link Health is partnering with the White House, Civic Nation, and leading healthcare organizations on the ACP Week of Action to leverage the health sector to connect patients to the ACP and close the digital divide. There are resources at this site if you are ready to be part of the action and amplify the message through your organization and in your community. Continue reading →

Inspiring the next generation of healthcare heroes

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It’s Health Technology Management Week, a time to celebrate and thank all the biomed technicians and clinical engineers who make up the critically important HTM teams in our hospitals. Not being involved in AAMI as I was over the past decade, I thought I didn’t have anything new to say this year. And then I saw a social media post that inspired this week’s topic. What better way to celebrate and acknowledge the work of our HTM teams than to highlight the need for more HTM professionals in the future.

Like many healthcare professions, HTM faces staffing shortages now and into the future. Educating young people about health careers and building a pipeline is one aspect of addressing those shortages.

“Ollie the Biomed” by Chace Torres is a new children’s book that describes what a biomed technician does. Like other children’s books about different jobs and careers, it makes the life of a biomed technician exciting and attractive. And it is written from the firsthand experience of a proud biomed tech and dad who is well aware of the staffing shortage in this field. Torres is the lead technician for Texas-based medical equipment manufacturer SPBS Inc.

AAMI featured the book in this May 2, 2023 article: “Meet Ollie, the Biomed ‘Device Doctor’ Who’s Teaching Children About Fixing Problematic Medical Products”. An excerpt from the article:

Torres, who also shines a light on the HTM profession via an ongoing podcast, says it’s more important than ever that young people are exposed to a “profession struggling to build awareness, [because] the majority of the workforce is set to retire within the next decade,” he wrote in an overview of his book.

The book is “about inspiring those who are younger and letting them know that there are other jobs out there besides those found in a typical children’s book—the standard professions that all kids see, whether it’s a police officer, firefighter, or doctor,” Torres said. “Many people have reached out to me who have purchased the book or have bought it for somebody else, and they will say, ‘My son, or my daughter, or my grandchild had no idea what I did as a biomed, but after reading the book, they understand and loved it.’”

The book description on Amazon provides more background:

This children’s book is a depiction of the profession known as Biomedical Equipment Technician, AKA “Medical Device Doctor.” Ollie the Biomed experiences a work day repairing, calibrating, and solving real world problems found within the everyday job of a Biomed. It illustrates the complex but rewarding career filled with so many devices used in healthcare today to treat patients. Biomeds are directly responsible for inspecting, repairing, calibrating, and managing all aspects of any medical device found in hospitals today. I wrote this book for my son to learn exactly what his dad does and why I love what I do each and every day. I hope to inspire kids across the world to seek out more information and become Biomeds because it is truly rewarding and fun.

Torres is an advocate for his profession in other ways. Since 2021 he has hosted “Bearded Biomed”, a podcast that drops twice a month. Some of his recent topics: Women in HTM, the 2022 HTM Salary Survey, and Dealing with Biomed Burnout. Continue reading →

Amplifying the voice of nurses

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May 6-12 is National Nurses Week. Nursing has been the most trusted profession for the past 20 years according to a Gallup Poll. That’s no surprise when you think about the nurses you have interacted with as a patient or as a colleague.

I’ve written a post about nurses almost every year since I started this blog. Do I have anything truly new to say this year? Yes, in that I want to highlight how the past three years has taken a toll on all our clinicians, in particular nurses. The public health emergency is expiring. Health care providers are adapting their policies as they continue to deliver care. We have entered a new phase for healthcare organizations, staff, patients, and families.

Staffing challenges are at the top of the list of concerns for many health executives – staff shortages and clinician burnout. There are no easy solutions. The toll of the past few years on our nurses was highlighted in a May 2nd NPR article by Jaclyn Diaz – “Nearly a third of nurses nationwide say they are likely to leave the profession“. The article starts with some sobering findings from the 2023 Survey of Registered Nurses conducted by AMN Healthcare. The survey examined the impact of COVID-19 on the career plans, job satisfaction, and mental health and wellness of more than 18,000 RNs. Key findings:

  • Close to 1/3 of nurses nationwide say they are likely to leave the profession for another career due to the pandemic. This level is up 7 points since 2021.
  • 89% of RNs said the nursing shortage is worse than five years ago, 80% expect that to get much worse in another five years.
  • Younger generations of nurses are also less satisfied with their jobs compared to their older counterparts.
  • 80% of nurses experience high levels of stress at work, an increase of 16 points from 2021.
  • 77% of nurses reported feeling emotionally drained, up from 62% in 2021.

Of all the blog posts I’ve written about nurses, this one from five years ago has the strongest message – “Celebrate nurses, but more importantly listen to them”.  This is true now more than ever. From the bedside to the boardroom we need to listen, amplify, and prioritize the voice of nurses.

IT leaders won’t solve the staffing challenges. But we have a role to play. The systems and solutions we provide and support as health IT leaders and vendors must help nurses do their job more easily and efficiently, not make it harder. We need to reduce the burden on nurses and ensure they are integrally involved in decision making, prioritization, and design processes.