Addressing Post-COVID “Lean and Mean” Healthcare IT Operations

By Sheryl Bushman, DO, FACOOG(D) SVP Physician Advisory

We all know COVID presented many challenges and changes to our home and work lives. For those of us in healthcare, the challenges were intense. We faced a new and unorthodox infection, treatment of critically ill patients, and healthcare workers risking exposure for themselves and their families. Not only that, healthcare systems had to survive with increasing expenses and decreased revenue, while healthcare IT had to keep up with urgent demands to create new systems. Supporting the needs for new treatments and reporting, online visits, and expanded telehealth options was a huge endeavor.?

These impacts were so tremendous the ripple effects are still felt in the healthcare industry today. Organizations face decreased healthcare IT resources, labor shortages, high turnover, and employee burnout. Now we must address this post-COVID “lean and mean” operational environment.

The Onset of “Lean & Mean” in Healthcare IT

Many organizations have seen IT analysts leave due to retirement, burnout, or job hopping (like the NCAA transfer portal). Most of these organizations find it challenging to find experienced staff replacements or, for budgetary reasons, have opted not to fill the open positions.?

The result is healthcare organizations operating lean and mean — with an emphasis on the lean. This would be ideal if the remaining workers had extensive cross-training. The reality is that the remaining experienced employees have likely advanced to leadership positions, and those operating on the IT frontline tend to have focused skills with less experience.?

Is Focusing on the Critical Enough?

In this new lean environment, the IT department must focus on the most critical items, such as EHR break-fixes, mandatory software upgrades, regulatory changes requiring software and hardware adjustments, and new user training.?

Unfortunately, this leaves little room for analysis of workflows to improve efficiency, reduce burnout and improve user experience. There is also little time to report analysis to discover treatment outliers, expense outliers, or outcome outliers or to provide direct feedback for improvement.?

Addressing Needs & Moving Forward

In our post-COVID world with this lean environment, how do we improve our patient and end-user experience given the resource constraints? Implementing a state-of-the-art EHR is the first step to improving care. Despite constraints, there needs to be more time dedicated to exploring major software enhancements. These may have been delayed in favor of critical tasks, but over time, these systems must be updated and modified to remain current and provide optimal services.?

One way to attack this problem is to cross-train staff and hire additional team members to support the vision. Given budgetary constraints, this may be impossible. A more cost-effective way to achieve this goal is to hire a consulting firm like Continuum Health IT for a short-term engagement.?

Continuum provides clinical, experienced, cross-trained consultants who, if given appropriate access, can provide a rapid analysis of your current state and most urgent needs so that your team can focus on the day-to-day needs of your organization. Once your team is presented with the analysis and best practice recommendations, you’ll have a powerful roadmap.?

Stay Ahead of the Curve

In this ever-changing, competitive healthcare environment, it is essential to remain current in the most cost-effective manner possible. Your IT department could implement any or all of the best practice recommendations if they have the bandwidth. If not, your team can use the support of a targeted build by experienced, cross-trained consultants.?