The pulse of the healthcare industry: key themes from ViVE
The pace of change in healthcare shows no signs of slowing down. The continued fight against a global pandemic, on-going challenges around healthcare worker burnout and a growing labor shortage are just a few of the macro-level issues that remain at the forefront of the industry.
Facing these and other headwinds, many of the best minds in healthcare recently gathered with focused optimism in south Florida to continue charting a path forward. Olive was a title sponsor of the inaugural ViVE event, which spanned four days and included multiple panel sessions, tech talks and networking events from which several key themes emerged.
PARTNERSHIPS ARE KEY
There’s a clear recognition that healthcare’s problems are too big and too complex to be solved by any one company or organization. In recapping ViVE, HealthTech Magazine aptly noted that “healthcare is a team sport.” There is growing momentum around collaborative partnerships that ultimately improve the patient experience.
“We know how to deliver care, we are great at healing,” Dr. Patty Grinton, a pediatrician and the on-demand virtual care medical director at Atrium Health, recently told Olive. “And we’re going to have some incredible partnerships in the future that will elevate us.”
Olive’s recently announced alliance with NTT DATA is one example. The two organizations will work to fast track the creation of new healthcare solutions to transform the health experience for humans — both in the traditional healthcare setting and at home.
INTEROPERABILITY REMAINS A BIG HURDLE
For too long a siloed, point-solution approach to healthcare technology was the norm. That’s resulted in significant barriers when it comes to interoperability. Systems and software are often disconnected and don’t share data without significant human intervention. This leads to a disjointed, frustrating and impersonal care experience for members and patients. It’s also a leading cause of healthcare worker burnout as over half of administrative staff reported seeing an increase in the amount of manual data entry in the past 12 months, according to the Internet of Healthcare Report.
Olive’s chief medical officer, Dr. YiDing Yu, shared with ViVE attendees how much the industry mindset has changed over the past several years.
“You can’t block information,” she said during a panel. “You have to unleash it. You have to give access to the information, whether it lives in an EMR or through another vendor. You have to bring it through.”
The good news is interoperability solutions continue to mature and are becoming powerful tools for streamlining healthcare data.
AI AND AUTOMATION CONTINUE TO MAKE IN-ROADS
Today, virtually every part of a health system, from clinical services, to revenue cycle, to supply chain, to pharmacy and beyond, is benefitting from advances in AI and automation technology.
“When I think about automation, I think about freeing humans to do the work that really matters,” Dr. Yu said at ViVE. “And that is much more than automating a couple clicks or just automating a couple of processes.”
The real value is unlocked when automation is deployed as part of an enterprise wide strategy, connecting previously disparate processes and workflows in such a way that the human experience for payers, providers and patients is dramatically improved.
“Automation should integrate with providers through FHIR and APIs,” she said. “It should connect with payers automatically through EDIs. It should SMS patients for engagement. It should read clinical notes with natural language processing, and identify your high-risk patients with artificial intelligence.”