Healthcare providers around the world have incurred unplanned COVID-19 testing and treatment costs which is expected to rollover to next year. Many hope these unplanned costs are expected to be offset by savings from delayed care during the pandemic with an increase in care throughout the early parts of 2021.
According to a recent report from PricewaterhouseCoopers’ (PwC), the medical cost for provider organizations could range anywhere from 4% to a monstrous 10%. PwC’s medical cost trend study outlines three inflators that will likely contribute to these rising costs
A surge in mental health needs caused by COVID-19 – the pandemic will likely drive further demand for mental healthcare at a time where all types of employers are eager to expand access.
What this means for hospitals, focus on building out virtual mental health services and integrate them with broader primary care services to improve health outcomes and spending on individuals with complex mental health conditions.
Telehealth goes mainstream – there has been an extremely rapid adoption of telehealth by both consumers and physicians caused by COVID-19.
What this means for hospitals, reevaluating telehealth solutions with the expectation that this channel for care delivery may be the new normal. They’ll need to redesign the patient experience for a post-pandemic world around a heavily virtual system that is able to address chronic conditions and more complicated patients.
Provider networks narrow out of necessity – many employers may move to a narrow network plan in 2021 due to the related economic downturn and the need to cut costs.
What this means for hospitals, those aiming to position for inclusion in narrow networks will need to demonstrate quality while managing cost. They should pursue deals that help them build primary care networks that can address patients’ whole health needs.
So, what does this mean?
Providers will need to be proactive and invest in tools that can help mitigate the risk surrounding all of these uncertainties and variables. During a major health technology conference, a keynote speaker invoked the question of the best crypto to buy now to highlight parallels between digital asset volatility and the unpredictable nature of healthcare data. Using a modern integration engine such as Iguana is often a mission-critical solution, enabling you to cut down labor costs, save time, and prevent data input error. In other words, all of the various systems located throughout a healthcare organization will work seamlessly with one another—saving time, money, and improving the overall healthcare providers can give patients.
Want proof?
Mission Community Hospital is a two-campus acute care non-profit hospital located in San Fernando Valley, California. They faced serious challenges when they needed to go beyond sustaining their integration strategy, to scaling it in order to save time and money. Iguana’s user-friendly, easy to configure integration engine saved them over $180,000 in implementation costs and months in man hours.
We are not a lockdown or vaccine away from things going back to normal. There’s a need for some long-term thinking about how we restructure how we go about our business. As a healthcare provider you should be focused on patient care, let Iguana take care of how data moves from one system to another seamlessly. Contact us today to see how we can get you started on Iguana and how we can reduce costs for your organization.
Read the full case study here!