We spent the first 1-2 years of the pandemic hailing doctors, nurses and frontline workers as heroes, but not enough has been done to actually address the challenges frontline workers continue to face.
That lack of action is taking its toll. Our 2023 Compass Study of healthcare CIOs and other senior healthcare leaders found that their top concern heading into 2024 is provider burnout (41%). This continued burnout is leaving hospitals short-staffed and putting even more stress on the remaining doctors and nurses.
Adding to the issue is that too often, healthcare organizations are bogged down with disparate point solutions that suck up time and productivity. Today the majority of U.S hospitals work with 50 or more systems to run healthcare operations.
I was shocked to find some healthcare systems work with more than 100 different vendors to manage their tech stack. Such overload is draining our workforce and contributing to burnout.
Tech overload is the ball and chain we need to shake for better operations and patient care. Working with inefficient and siloed technology complicates healthcare workers’ jobs and prevents clinicians from practicing at the top of their licenses, exacerbating burnout. The reality is that our healthcare industry is bleeding out its most talented professionals. We don’t have enough nurses and physicians to meet the patient demand we have today, and these shortages are set to get worse as two in five active physicians will reach retirement age in the next decade. To create a more productive and efficient healthcare system that benefits both patients and healthcare workers, we need to simplify workflows and use technology that frees up time for clinicians to spend on the most meaningful and rewarding aspect of their jobs—providing patient care.
Clinicians redirect more time to patient care
The Compass Survey revealed that clinicians can reallocate their time to patient care by integrating healthcare operations software onto a single platform. Eighty-four percent of participants said that their clinicians could redirect at least 10% more time to patient care. Many clinicians said they could redirect at least 20% more time, equivalent to one whole day out of a five-day work week. These findings are validated by a 2023 report published by McKinsey & Company, in which researchers found the potential to free up 10-20% of nurses’ time through “digital approaches that automate tasks.”
This could be a game-changer for our overworked healthcare workforce, but some estimates say that this number needs to be even higher. During my conversation with CHIME President and CEO Russell Branzell, he shared that one nurse told him they need to get rid of 60-75% of non-essential work. Doing this will require radically changing the way technology is used in health systems to enable care.
Free up time for value-added tasks
If the concept of consolidating technology to give clinicians time back feels too vague, let’s break down what that could look like.
For nurse managers, including floor supervisors and chief nursing officers, a significant portion of the day is spent on non-value-added tasks like scheduling, quality outcomes reporting, payroll, peer clinical communications, and shift handoffs. A study done by The American Organization for Nursing Leadership (AONL) found that 60-80% of nurse managers’ time is spent on recruitment, staffing, and scheduling. Working with disjointed software makes these processes a bigger time sink than they need to be. Just for staffing and scheduling alone, many nurses use six to eight systems. This translates to countless hours spent navigating siloed software that could be spent delivering direct patient care.
Enterprise workforce management technology is key to reducing the time and administrative burden of staffing and scheduling. We know based on research done by Hobson & Company that when hospitals use symplr solutions to automate attendance, staffing, and scheduling processes, there is a 50% reduction in time spent on these tasks. This opens up more time for healthcare organizations to spend on value-added tasks such as staff development and care delivery and coordination.
Communication barriers are the roadblock
Consolidating tech and software to free up time and reduce administrative burden can’t be done in a week or a month. Hospitals and health systems must break down communication barriers across the organization—particularly between frontline clinicians and the IT professionals and CIOs who manage and implement software. Breaking down communication barriers starts with encouraging hospital and health system employees to talk to each other and be inquisitive about the day-to-day experiences of frontline clinicians. Only then will they be able to move forward with technology that reduces burnout and enables the highest quality patient care.
Download the 2023 Compass Report to learn more about how aligning IT and clinicians and consolidating technology can improve clinician retention and patient care.