To start, health systems need to enhance payer-provider collaboration and fine-tune value-based measures. But to optimize value-based care, hospitals also need to sharpen their efforts in building organizational agility -- in everything from processes to shared mindsets. Value-based care can no longer be separated from the quadruple aim; rather, it should drive patient experiences, population health, cost reduction and caring for the caregiver. Leaders’ aim to recuperate lost revenues might create an excessive focus on cost-cutting. This is bound to cause serious disruptions to employees and patients. The best hospitals will continue to prioritize an integrated strategy that promotes the quadruple aim through constant review and improvement of the patient and employee experiences. Prepare To Be Constantly Disrupted. COVID-19 has accelerated the healthcare industry’s erstwhile sluggish digital transformation journey. Even before the pandemic, technological and macroeconomic factors were steadily reshaping healthcare, from heightened venture capital interest in healthcare tech to organizations such as Amazon acquiring a supply license for pharmaceutical drugs. Post-pandemic, the evolution of healthcare delivery will increase -- far beyond the increase in virtual healthcare. Consider, for example, distributed healthcare -- urgent care clinics, free-standing emergency setups, retail clinics. Research has shown a higher return on invested capital (ROIC) for these alternatives compared with conventional hospital systems. But to effectively deal with disruption and stay on the cutting edge of innovation, healthcare must also invest in top talent. Recent Novartis research showed that 83% of technology professionals would consider working in the healthcare and pharmaceutical industries, with 72% more likely to consider it compared with six months ago. As these industries evolve -- both as a consequence of COVID-19 and other industry forces -- leaders need top talent to effectively integrate new delivery models and capture new market opportunities. The trouble is, in a dynamic time when talent has never been more crucial, retaining and acquiring talent that drives innovation is arguably more challenging than ever before. To secure their organization’s future, leaders need a proven, research-based talent attraction strategy. But acquiring the talent to accelerate innovation is just the beginning. Retaining and developing talent are equally important to performance and patient outcomes. An estimated 1.4 million health jobs were lost in March and April -- and there is likely to be further turnover due to the pandemic, especially among RNs and physicians. Healthcare providers need greater sophistication in management and leadership development for two reasons:
1.Managers are central to team engagement and retention, so retaining and developing great managers supports exceptional workplace performance. 2.With physicians playing a more central leadership and business role, physicians and nursing leaders must enhance
their capacity to thrive in uncertainty. Embrace Virtual Healthcare.
It is not surprising that the pandemic has ramped up virtual healthcare. The Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services (CMS) loosened telehealth and HIPAA guidelines for Medicare, and commercial payers are following suit. The president recently issued an executive order to permanently expand some telehealth services in rural areas beyond the COVID-19 pandemic. Gallup recently published our perspective on virtual healthcare in American Journal of Managed Care. In a 2019 survey, we had found that only 14% of Americans said they had used telemedicine in the past year, and only 17% said they anticipated using it in 2020. But in March 2020, we found that 34% of Americans reported having used telemedicine, and nearly half (46%) said they are likely to use it in the future -- almost three times greater than approximately six months prior. And while telehealth usage rates may have declined from their peaks in the early
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February 2021 | The Business Review
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