By GUS MALEZIS
It’s no secret that healthcare providers are among the
hardest working of all professionals – their skill and intelligence are matched
only by their creativity and commitment to their patients. But the healthcare
IT sector, while it has made an effort to assist, has failed to support our
providers – doctors, nurses and caregivers – with technology solutions that
meet the increasing demands for better, faster, more efficient patient healthcare
delivery. Instead, we have cast these providers in the dark, forcing them to
function blindly, devoid of necessary information, pushing many of them to the
brink of what they can withstand as professionals, pushing them to burnout.
The thing about providers is that, in addition to being
hardworking, dedicated, and outstanding professionals, they are incredibly
creative and innovative, willing to embrace new technologies and workflows – as
long as they can add value to their patients. So how about we – the broader healthcare
IT solutions vendor community – focus on delivering technologies that don’t
force them to compromise care and efficiency for the sake of security, or
compliance and access to data?
We need to do so to address an industry crisis. Physician
burnout is on the rise, and it’s increasingly clear that overworked providers have
reached the breaking point. They spend valuable minutes battling technology on
virtual desktops, mobile devices, biomedical equipment, and clinical SaaS
applications – typing in usernames and passwords, loading various apps, and
more. All the while, standing beside a patient that is desperately seeking
their assistance.
Right now, nearly one-half of all physicians (44 percent) report
having feelings of burnout (according to Medscape‘s 2019 National
Physicians Burnout & Depression Report). While these numbers should
alarm everyone, what the healthcare IT industry should be especially concerned
about is that a leading cause of this physician burnout are tools that hinder provider
productivity. Instead of simplifying work for doctors and nurses, technology
tools are having the opposite effect. Isn’t technology supposed to make things
easier?
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