There is an update waiting for you...

Healthcare is changing, and it should. Exploding costs, shortage of skilled personnel. Over the past 6 years, I have been visiting the conference  Exponential Medicine of Singularity University in the iconic Del Coronado Hotel and have been faculty since 2011. I actually brought groups of up to 40 to the conference every year to experience first hand the speed and breadth of all the developments in the technological field. And although technology is only one part of the solution, it is an important one. It can be the lever needed to get beyond the tipping point. 

650 innovators, physicians, nurses, data-geeks, investors, corporates and patients from ALL over the world in a 3-day rollercoaster, hosted by my friend Daniel Kraft. Many times once technology had a breakthrough I had seen it first at #Xmed 1-2 years prior. 

This conference has helped to scope the approach and strategy for many in my travel-parties on i.e. how tech could help making working in healthcare more 'sexy' again. Knowing the huge shortages in the workforce for healthcare, we really should take good care and attention to make healthcare a ‘sexy’ place to work again. With all the sentiment (including the press) of the past years about healthcare in budget cuts, long hours, high administrative burden and a lot of stress, youngsters choosing for healthcare as a career might decrease at an exponential pace. The responsible use of technology can relieve some of the burdens of working in healthcare and also delocalize it bringing more 'freedom' to patients. 

Also, the conference helped in creating awareness of the change happening. Some think everybody already is aware of this, but the reality is different. I actually think that innovation itself and getting the message across is a sort of a cost cascade model. Once you get aligned with a certain group that starts to act/implement innovations, you really need to address the second group. And then you need to do the same for the next group. It is NOT a sequential model; these are processes running in parallel. Innovation is not a project that one can plan and schedule in chunks, blocks or hard ‘cut-off’ points, it is neither about process or technology; but it is about constantly changing the culture of your organisation. Some time ago I described this in my ‘innovation bulb‘.

Next to patients attending and taking the stage, as they adopted the #patientsIncluded charter. also, more and more nurses are part of the attendees and faculty. (#nurseincluded). Where it is no question doctors are part of the discussion on innovation, the number of times nurses are able to sit at that same table is remarkably low. Even attending conferences, easily done for physicians, a nurse attending one mostly requires a management team decision. While the ideas that nurses often have to change their own work including that of others, all to the benefit of the patients, are ofter as pragmatic as impactful. So why not make this a focus area. They know first hand what works and what doesn't, they are innovative by nature and... they are with many.

I've seen many ideas, connections, partnerships, and projects come to life at and after visiting this conference in the groups I've hosted.

If you want to know about the use of drones, DNA sequencing, AI, digital health, robotics, all of the 'omics' in healthcare then Exponential Medicine is your conference. Looking forward meeting a lot of alumni, old faculty-friends, new attendees and new speakers and to get my yearly update ;-)