Health Tech, SYN

Payers Can & Should Do More to Solve Providers’ Burnout Crisis, Health Tech CEO Says

Holon Solutions CEO Jon Zimmerman thinks more payers should invest in new technology to improve workloads for healthcare workers. The burnout crisis is too big for providers to solve by themselves, and many of the economic incentives for driving quality and efficiency in healthcare are housed within health plans and accountable care organizations, he said.

Providers across the country continue to suffer from a burnout crisis and major workforce shortage, and they are in dire need of AI-based technologies to make healthcare employees’ work more efficient, according to a survey released Thursday by healthcare technology company Holon Solutions. However, most providers are rather cash-strapped at the moment. How can they justify investments in shiny new technology?

Holon CEO Jon Zimmerman thinks health plans should step up to the plate and use some of their profits to give healthcare workers much needed relief in the form of new technology.

“The good news is that many of the economic incentives for driving quality and efficiency are housed within the health plans and accountable care organizations. There are no barriers for health plans to invest in new and helpful technologies to assist providers in their networks. In fact, the laws and regulations are actually structured to incentivize payers to invest in systems that produce better quality outcomes,” he said in a recent interview.

Many payers are quickly realizing that investing in new technology that improves workloads for healthcare workers is essential, especially in this environment, Zimmerman argued. 

He thinks payers have a responsibility to invest in this technology because health plans and providers are interdependent. You can’t look at an issue like burnout and expect healthcare providers to fix it alone, he declared.

“It’s the responsibility of all the major players in healthcare to address the burnout crisis, and investing in technology will help everyone do that. When providers have tools to relieve their burden, every stakeholder wins, including the patients,” Zimmerman said.

It’s well known that burnout is affecting healthcare workers at an unprecedented rate. Ongoing problems — such as low staffing rates and overly complex administrative tasks —have caused healthcare workers across the country to feel overwhelmed and joyless in their current positions, according to Holon’s survey. The report found that a majority of healthcare workers have considered leaving their roles or the industry altogether in the past year.

Holon surveyed nearly 700 healthcare workers for its report. They held a variety of positions, including nurse, physician, administrator and specialist.

“It really comes down to providers being asked to do too much with too little assistance from the information systems in their ecosystems. Redundant administrative work is taking time and energy away from care teams, making it harder to provide the quality patient care they got into the field to deliver. Burnout, in turn, has led to a cycle of resignations and cumulative staffing shortages, which is producing even more burnout for those who remain,” said Holon CEO Jon Zimmerman in a recent interview.

Survey respondents agreed that administrative work takes too much time away from treating patients. In fact, half of nurses said their top frustration over the past year has been not having enough time to spend with patients. 

Patient-facing healthcare workers reported that only half of their time is spent on patient care. The rest of their time is spent on administrative tasks (32%), education/training (12%) and other tasks (5%). 

The country is facing an anticipated shortage of tens of thousands of physicians and nurses in the next few decades, and the crisis will only be exacerbated if healthcare stakeholders cannot address the roots of clinical burnout, Zimmerman declared.

Photo: SDI Productions, Getty Images

Shares1
Shares1