If you work in healthcare, you need to read this book. It is well worth your time and shows quite effectively how one person can create and cause change that can ripple through an industry. All it takes is someone with a passion to serve, and to listen while doing so.
One reason I found this story so compelling is that I’ve spoken with the subject, Sister Anne Brooks of the Tutwiler Clinic, several times. She was a force while there — powerful, sincere and so engaging. What a blessing to the people she served!
The following information on the University Press of Mississippi website is taken from the description of “The Power of One: Sister Anne Brooks and the Tutwiler Clinic,” a book written about the longtime Delta physician.
For 34 years Sister Anne Brooks, a Catholic nun and doctor of osteopathy, served one of the nation’s most impoverished towns and regions, Tutwiler, in Tallahatchie County in the Mississippi Delta.
In 1983, she reopened the Tutwiler Clinic, which had remained closed for five years, as no other physician was willing to serve in Tallahatchie County.
Starting with only two other nuns and regularly working 12-hour days, Brooks’s patient load — in a region where seven out of 10 patients that walked in her door had no way to pay for care — grew from 30 to 40 individuals per month her first year to more than 8,500 annually.
Sally Palmer Thomason tells the powerful story of Sister Anne Brooks, beginning with her tumultuous childhood, the contracting and overcoming of crippling arthritis in early adulthood, and her near-unprecedented decision to attend medical school at the age of 40.
The healthcare system simply wasn’t ready for COVID-19, and the pandemic has exposed the system’s weak links. The situation has become exacerbated by an ongoing workforce shortage. Not only are a growing number of clinicians nearing retirement, but also burnout — already a problem prior to the pandemic — has become what many are calling a parallel pandemic.
And this isn’t surprising. Nurses have been working overtime week after week, seeing tremendous loss of life firsthand, and now are being asked to support the vaccine rollout – to the tune of 11 million doses per week.
The most pressing question for healthcare tech right now is how can we curb nursing burnout in 2021?
This is a question we’ve been asking since the early days of Health IT, but new responsibilities over the last few months and growing rates of nurses leaving the profession have raised the alarm for technology companies to do more.
Healthcare leaders, clinicians, and educators have responded by developing innovative workforce solutions and education strategies to keep pace with changing care-delivery models. Specifically, around the vaccine rollout, we can ensure nurses have access to rapid, virtual education around administration best practices and patient education.
We also need to streamline the alerts going to these providers so they only receive the most actionable and important information at the point of care. These providers do not have the time to review every new study that comes out around COVID treatment options. Instead, we can leverage digital tools to provide evidence-based information that is actionable and available at the point of care.
This helps eliminate confusion around what action should be taken, and ensures all members of the care team feel empowered to care for their patients. For on-the-job training, as artificial intelligence becomes more refined and its use expands, algorithms could surface insights much earlier that generate mini-lessons, clinical updates, remediation, and reminders within existing workflows.
DocSpace, a digital health commerce platform that helps clinicians start, manage, and grow tech-enabled private practices, announced $1.2 million in seed funding led by Slauson & Co. The round includes other notable investors Precursor Ventures, Acrew Capital’s Scout Fund, SputnikATX Ventures, and Angel investors Nathan and Sonia Baschez, Nikhil Krishnan, and Eliana Murillo. The seed funding will support the build out of DocSpace Pay, an integrated one-click checkout healthcare payments experience for patients and clinicians.
DocSpace offers a turn-key solution to help more than 4.5 million therapists, dentists, physicians, and optometrists automate their entire private practice formation process from end-to-end. DocSpace’s HIPAA-compliant infrastructure provides everything a clinician needs to form a new business, from digital health storefronts with custom themes to back office management tools like scheduling, video conferencing, banking, payroll, and bookkeeping.
DocSpace was co-founded by CEO Dr. Mario Amaro, a physician and U.S. Navy Veteran who served in both Operation Iraqi Freedom and Operation Enduring Freedom, and CPO Miles Montes, a seasoned operator and expert in platform product management, previously at ADP and ShopLatinx. Since launching in March 2020, DocSpace has helped hundreds of clinicians build and launch their practices from the ground up.
“Existing practice management software requires clinicians to manually self-navigate the expensive and complicated business formation process before they’re able to utilize any of their product services,” said Dr. Mario Amaro. “When you require clinicians to do all the hard work of starting a new business then force them to purchase expensive software, it’s no surprise that fewer clinicians have the opportunity to build new businesses in their communities.”
Dr. Amaro continued, “This is why we were inspired by Shopify’s business model and the infrastructure they created to empower retail merchants to be small business owners. We are building the first clinical practice operating system that provides clinician entrepreneurs the opportunity to seek practice independence, helping them get to market faster, while leveling the playing field so they can compete against large hospital systems and other VC-backed healthcare startups.”
“Making it easier for clinicians to start new businesses is critical to decreasing clinician burnout, giving more choices to patients, and reducing the amount of administrative and overhead bloat in delivering health services. We should treat clinicians like entrepreneurs and reduce the barriers to them striking out on their own,” said Nikhil Krishnan, the founder of Out-Of-Pocket and advisor/investor to DocSpace.
The COVID-19 pandemic exposed the true costs, human and otherwise, of health disparities, as low income and minority populations suffered disproportionately from the virus. Blacks, Native Americans and Hispanics were 2% to 3.3% more likely to be hospitalized or die from the virus compared to non-Hispanic Whites, primarily because of a higher prevalence of underlying disease states (hypertension, obesity and Type II diabetes) caused by relative lack of access to the so-called social determinants of health: good paying jobs, healthy food, safe housing, and transportation, among others.
As with so many aspects of the pandemic, supply chain is front and center in the fight, which is playing out on their home turf, literally. Once again, supply chain is also getting noticed in the executive suite, as the boards of trustees for America’s hospitals prioritize health equity in preparation for taking on more risk for the populations they serve under value-based reimbursement programs. Here are few ways they are making a difference.
1. Bringing Diversity Home
Supply chain professionals have long sought to increase their spend with diverse suppliers, defined primarily as those that are women, minority, veteran, or LBGTQ-owned. That data is tracked and often used to support grant applications. More recently, transparency around that spend is being mandated. In California, for example, Assembly Bill 962 (AB 962) requires all hospitals meeting a certain threshold to report how much they spend with diverse suppliers each year.
But for many health systems, diversity is not enough. They want to make sure they are using their purchasing power to support the health and well-being of local communities where the patients they serve live. Spending in local communities has a multiplier effect. For example, investing in a local business supports job creation; in turn the wages for those employees generate local tax dollars and increase their ability to spend and generate wealth in their own communities.
Approximately 15% of people in North America have some type of communication and hearing disorder. The issue affects people of all ages, but especially in the elderly population, both hearing and communication problems tend to increase. Hearing and speech are both fundamental for good health and can have a significant impact on a person’s quality of life.
Given the prevalence of speech and hearing disorders, it’s no surprise there’s a demand for speech and hearing specialists. Healthcare professionals qualified in this area can help evaluate and screen individuals with hearing and speech problems and assess other associated problems such as difficulty swallowing and lack of balance.
Here is a quick overview of degree programs for people who are interested in pursuing a career in this specialty:
By Mike Pietig, vice president of healthcare experience, Avtex Solutions.
Many healthcare organizations today offer a multichannel engagement approach, presenting online and mobile access to services and even care. Adopting digital channels is a great first step toward meeting your consumers’ expectations, but is just the starting point.
Consumers today expect to be given choice in their healthcare engagement and care channels – via mobile app, on their computer, over the phone, in person – and they want these interactions to feed into a connected, seamless omnichannel experience that is simple, intuitive, and personalized to their needs. Today’s digitally integrated economy requires an approach to healthcare that puts consumers’ needs first and engages them at every relevant touchpoint along their journey.
Many healthcare organizations are turning to a digital front door to facilitate this kind of digitally optimized, omnichannel experience. A digital front door sets the foundation for a stronger, more consistent omnichannel experience that enhances every connection, increases loyalty, reduces friction, and drives competitive advantage.
Our healthcare experience experts have identified the five components needed to build a Digital Front Door strategy that meets consumer expectations and strengthens the omnichannel healthcare experience:
1. Alignment
At Avtex, we often talk about the need to define your “North Star” to ensure that every aspect of the consumer journey aligns with your organizations’ overarching philosophy of the best possible experience. A Digital Front Door ensures there is alignment with this desired healthcare experience, from goals to governance.
Like any successful customer experience strategy, the digital front door must align with and improve upon existing patient and member experience strategies to digitally transform your organization. Activities like journey mapping and CX process mapping can help uncover pain points and clarify how a Digital Front Door plan can support your overall North Star.
2. Understanding
A 360-degree view of your consumers is necessary to build a strong digital experience. Building a complete, holistic understanding of your consumers’ experiences will help you to identify gaps and opportunities to elevate this experience and create a more rounded, consumer-centric environment. For example, you may consider developing a voice of the customer (VOC) program to gain new insights, or you may decide to perform persona mapping exercises to help understand your target segments better so you can better meet their identified needs.
It’s also important to prioritize gathering employee feedback and data, as these insights provide invaluable information on needs, preferences, trends, and pain points – both at the individual and group level. We’ve learned that improving the employee experience will lead to a measurable improvement in the consumer experience.
By Dr. Madhavi Vemireddy, co-founder and COO, CareTribe.
Millions of Americans live with chronic health conditions every day, sometimes even debilitating or disabling health conditions. When our physical health fails, it inadvertently impacts every facet of our lives: social, financial, interpersonal, as well as professional. As a result, millions of Americans are enlisted to support their loved ones struggling with their health each year. Within the healthcare industry, we refer to the former as “family caregivers ” and the latter as “care recipients.”
Today, more than 53 million Americans can be described as family caregivers.
Family caregivers commonly find themselves scrambling to solve problems for their afflicted loved one, often at the expense of their job, their family, and friends, and sometimes even their own physical and/or mental wellbeing. The average American caregiver spends four years or more in the role of a caregiver, spending approximately 24 hours per week dedicated to supporting their loved one with their out-of-pocket spending as a caregiver costing on average more than $7,000 per year.
Unfortunately, caregivers typically find themselves providing this level of care for a loved one with very little expert support. Usually, caregivers tap into their network of friends and family members for advice or assistance. Because of the chronic stress that the role of caregiving brings, caregivers are twice as likely to suffer from adverse health effects like depression, hypertension, diabetes, pulmonary disease, and other ailments–all while carrying the responsibility of caregiving for their loved one.
Creating a Community Centered on Caregiving
These reasons are why my husband and I founded CareTribe to support the millions of Americans struggling to support their loved ones who are afflicted with chronic health conditions, the ramifications of those conditions, and the impact they hold on the overall quality of life for both care recipients and caregivers alike.
In creating CareTribe, our mission was to provide family caregivers with an innovative technology platform driven by artificial intelligence (AI) that combines condition specific pathways, relevant benefits, curated products and resources, and human experts to provide personalized support, regardless of what stage caregivers are at in their journey to assist their loved ones.
One of the greatest health concerns of modern society is nursing shortages in different states across the world. The prevalence and impacts of the recent Covid-19 pandemic have taught the world that professional nurses and physicians are pertinent to providing quality healthcare services. As the pandemic continued to expand, it became evident that frontline nurses suffered the most, causing an unpredictable shortage of professional healthcare workers at such a poor timing in history. Predictions indicate that by 2030, there will be a shortage of more than 50,000 nurses in certain states.
This trend explains why nursing programs and professionals embrace technology to help in the ideal recruitment, retaining, and monitoring process. Here is how technology helps to counter nurses’ shortages in the healthcare system.
Specialty Preference Over Facility
Gone are the days when nursing and other healthcare job vacancies filled the print media pages. Around a decade ago, influential healthcare policymakers decided that the system would evolve from print journals, specialty publications, and newspapers to social media, website optimization, and email marketing. This strategy would facilitate analytical and metrical monitoring to promote nursing by specialty rather than a facility.
Electronic Scheduling
Many nursing training processes take place virtually. Several nurses get assigned to different shifts based on their competence skills and preference areas. Electronic scheduling helps solve the nursing shortage challenge by facilitating trading shifts among professional healthcare workers and establishing a stable balance between work and personal lives.
If you work in healthcare, you need to read this book. It is well worth your time and shows quite effectively how one person can create and cause change that can ripple through an industry. All it takes is someone with a passion to serve, and to listen while doing so.
