10 High-Impact Initiatives for 2024 – The Board’s Role

by Mark Dubow, Director
and Meredith Inniger, Principal

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Leaders of hospitals and health systems continue to face several challenges from 2023 as well as an array of difficult new challenges as they move into 2024. Briefly, the challenges lying ahead include: Margins and cash position remain “weak” with slow volume recovery, constraining investment in new initiatives Clinical workforce shortages continue More competition from […]

10 High-Impact Initiatives for 2024

by Mark Dubow, Director
and Meredith Inniger, Principal

Open PDF file >

Leaders of hospitals and health systems continue to face several challenges from 2023, as well as an array of difficult new challenges as they move into 2024. Briefly, the challenges that lie ahead include: Margins and cash position remain “weak” with slow volume recovery, constraining investment in new initiatives Clinical workforce shortages continue More competition […]

Where Have All the Anesthesia Specialists Gone? Insights for Healthcare Leaders

by Karin Chernoff Kaplan, Managing Director
and Kelvin Polanco, Manager

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Anesthesia provider shortages aren’t new, and they aren’t limited to certain geographic regions, but they are getting worse—and it’s time to consider new responses. By 2033, the shortage of anesthesiologists nationwide is expected to reach 12,500, according to an often-cited American Association of Medical Colleges (AAMC) report. From 2016 to 2021, the number of anesthesiologists […]

AHLA Podcast: Physician Practice Employment and Acquisition: What Is Driving the Changing Landscape?

by Danielle Bangs, Director

When it comes to physician practices, the rate of employment, acquisition, and alignment activity among health care corporate entities like payers, payer-backed groups, private equity, and major vertically integrated retailers has outpaced similar activity among hospitals and health systems. Danielle Bangs, Director, Veralon, speaks with Mike Flammini, Chief Development Officer, Privia Health, and Eric Tower, […]

3 Threats to Hospitals—and What America’s Frontier State is Doing to Overcome Them

by Jeffery Adler, Managing Director

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Wyoming may be part of the nation’s frontier healthcare market, but the state is a reminder to hospital leaders everywhere of the challenges all hospitals face, no matter the level of sophistication or setting. It’s unmistakable: we’re all grappling with post-COVID’s three-headed monster of workforce shortages, externalities, and financial pressures. I was pleased to host […]

Determining Compensation for Super-Specialized Physicians: What to Consider

by Karin Chernoff Kaplan, Managing Director

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Before the early 20th century, there were virtually no physician specialists in the United States. Today, the list of physician specialties continues to expand as medical knowledge grows with new discoveries and advancements in technology. Now, healthcare leaders must consider: How does this super-specialization affect physician compensation? Specialization and Sub-Specialization Historically, physicians were generalists, but […]

Don’t Forget the Second Wave of WRVU Changes

by Karin Chernoff Kaplan, Managing Director

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The First Wave 2021 was the big year for WRVU changes associated with CMS’s extensive and far-reaching updates to the Medicare Physician Fee Schedule (MPFS). The changes, designed to ultimately be budget neutral, restructured reimbursement to increase payments to cognitive specialists (such as primary care and other medical specialties) and reduce reimbursement to procedure-based specialists. […]

Assigning Proxy wRVUs for Physician Activity: Pros and Cons

by Richard Chasinoff, Director
and Monica Nuñez, Manager

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As hospitals and health systems continue to evaluate how they compensate physicians, some have expanded upon their work relative value unit (wRVU) based compensation models to include activities for which wRVUs may not currently be assigned. We are seeing this trend applied to administrative activities—such as attendance and participation in committee meetings—and clinical activities that […]