Mary Beth Formby, CFO of Renton, Wash.-based Providence's North Division Puget Sound and Alaska Regions, has been in healthcare her entire career. It is a passion she takes into overseeing 15 hospitals and $8 billion in revenue.
"I really grew up in hospitals, so I got to know hospital finance and operations really well," she said in a Jan. 30 Becker's podcast.
With around 30 years of experience under her belt, Ms. Formby said one of the healthcare trends that has "leaped to the top" of her list is how the Trump administration will handle federally funded grants and programs and Medicaid.
On Jan. 29, the White House retracted a Jan. 27 memo that outlined plans for a temporary pause on agency grants, loans and other financial assistance programs after it was met with pushback from several state leaders and was ultimately frozen by a judge. However, White House press secretary Karoline Leavitt said the retraction is not a rescission of the federal funding freeze and that President Donald Trump's executive orders on federal funding remain in effect.
Despite Jan. 27 federal guidance that said mandatory programs such as Medicare, Medicaid and SNAP would remain active under the pause, states and lawmakers nationwide reported outages affecting Medicaid portals on Jan. 28.
"This is the most vulnerable population impacted by these federal programs, and in Washington state, there has not been a rate increase to Medicaid reimbursement for 22 years until last year when the SNAP program was enacted," she said. "There is a lot of uncertainty and confusion that has been stirred up, so there's definitely a lot of concern in this space."
Ms. Formby said the ability to meet future care needs with a shrinking workforce is another topic she is following closely.
To combat this, Providence's North Division has homed in on its nurse residency programs, reaching out to potential healthcare workers as early as high school to discuss career opportunities.
"Our nurse residency programs have been very successful, and we've seen a lot of growth in that space," she said. "When they come into our hospitals and have really intensive learning cohorts, our retention level for those nurses is very high."