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What health system execs are talking about |
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| Earlier this week, I swung by the American Hospital Association’s Leadership Summit in downtown Denver. |
| When I wasn’t giving out ice cream recommendations, I was trying to get a sense of what hospital leaders are focused on. Of course, we talked about some of the tech changes happening at hospitals, reimbursement headwinds from legislative changes and 340B payment challenges. But one topic that came up in my conversations almost unprompted was how health systems’ use of AI will impact jobs. |
| “AI can incredibly transform the care that we deliver without harming our employees and our care team members,” Dominica Tallarico, chief operating officer at Minnesota-based, 12-hospital Allina Health, told me. “I think we've got to look at upskilling or different-skilling our workforce.” She said she hasn’t seen a decrease in full-time employees at her organization. |
| Marjorie Bessel, chief clinical officer at the Arizona-headquartered, 33-hospital Banner Health, told me she expects the transition will be more focused on staff being assigned different tasks, rather than job cuts themselves. “We’re just going to be able to redeploy them to other needs that we have across our organization, and hopefully, other needs that would be more impactful to the patient experiential component, as well as to our overall business,” she said. |
| On the one hand, this makes sense to me: Healthcare jobs have been one of the consistently growing parts of the US economy. I tend to hear more about staffing shortages at facilities than I do layoffs. |
| But at the same time, there’s a lot of general anxiety around AI taking jobs. Healthcare, a place that’s readily accepting AI, isn’t exempt. |
| I’ve been waiting to see whether we’ll see layoffs hit healthcare attributed to AI, in the same way has happened at some tech companies. But so far, I haven’t picked up on any notable trends. Are you seeing something different play out at your organization? Let’s talk. |
| - Lydia |
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