August 2011

Show them the Money: HFMA Call for Papers

What does a world renown basketball coach, a finance executive, a healthcare executive and an author have in common? They keynoted at HFMA’s 2011 ANI Conference in June. The HFMA is the nation's leading membership organization for healthcare financial management executives and leaders, with more than 37,000 members.

The conference coordinators are already planning for next year’s event on taking place June 24-27, 2012, at the Mandalay Bay Resort and Convention Center in Las Vegas. You can submit speaking proposals until September 9.

Here are highlights from the 2011 conference keynote presentations and a few links to whet your appetite for 2012:

Peter Orszag, Former Director, Office of Management and Budget Vice Chairman, Institutional Clients Group, Citigroup, Inc., describes steps hospitals and health systems should consider to improve the value of care provided in Reforming America’s Health Care: An Insider’s Perspective

The IHI’s President and CEO Maureen Bisognano shares how one patient’s request restructured dialysis at a hospital — and improved quality of care while reducing costs – in her presentation titled, It Takes Quality Leadership to Produce Quality Results

Mike “Coach K” Krzyzewski, Head Coach, Duke University and U.S. Olympic championship basketball teams suggests that people “feel what they do in their hearts” in Victory through Teamwork and Leadership.

How can healthcare finance professionals help their teams reach their greatest potential during a period of great change, fear, and stress throughout the industry? Mark Thompson, former chief customer experience officer for Schwab, and author of Success Built to Last shared five principles for managing change in Success Built to Last.

And there were 150 speakers, who led 70 sessions, discussing a broad range of topics through case studies: Accountable care organizations (ACO), electronic health records, meaningful use, payment reform, revenue cycle management, financial management, legal trends and compliance, clinical transformation and ICD-10 readiness.

With four days of educational sessions, including early riser sessions and pre-conference workshops, the learning never stops and neither does the professional development. Attendees include CFOs, controllers and accountants at hospitals, vendors, consulting firms and academia. There were nearly two dozen high level media people in attendance, resulting in a flurry of news articles. The coordinators expect to meet or exceed that number in 2012.

Other opportunities include sponsored special events and the Conference Exhibit Hall with more than 400 top industry suppliers, the ANI Product Showcase, networking and chapter awards.

The Healthcare Financial Management Association (HFMA) provides the resources healthcare organizations need to achieve sound fiscal health in order to provide excellent patient care. With more than 37,000 members, HFMA is the nation's leading membership organization of healthcare finance executives and leaders. HFMA helps its members achieve results by providing education, analysis, and guidance, and creating practical tools and solutions that optimize financial management. The organization is a respected and innovative thought leader on top trends and challenges facing the healthcare finance industry. From addressing capital access to improved patient care to technology advancement, HFMA is an indispensable resource on healthcare finance issues. www.hfma.org

Modern Healthcare, the HFMA show daily, posted excellent interviews and videos recapping each day. You can view these videos here: http://bit.ly/oRGJdW

Have you started planning for HFMA 2012? Contact our Healthcare IT team at 781-684-0770 or healthcareIT@schwartzcomm.com to discuss your plans and gain some advice on how to get the most of out of the conference.

Tags: accountable care organization, ACO, clinical transformation, electronic health records, financial management, HFMA, ICD-10 readiness, keynote, legal trends and compliance, meaningful use, revenue cycle management, speaking proposals, trade show planning

Posted by Davida Dinerman on August 28, 2011 at 3:01 PM
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Social Media: Should I stay or should I go?

Pharmaceutical companies are starting to reel back on the social media front with Facebook's latest move to make pages more open by enabling comments. Facebook has made consistent strides to become an even more transparent platform, often to the chagrin of the legions of users. So, in some ways, why would they treat pharmaceutical brands any differently?

Is this impacting how pharmaceutical marketers view the value of Facebook? Absolutely. This week, there has been a fair amount of discussion and pre-emptive moves from pharmaceutical giants to remove pages. Once the new Facebook policy goes into effect next week, we will likely see an additional wave of conservatism sweep the pharmaceutical marketing landscape. Surprising? Probably not. However, the universe of social media users is only growing, not shrinking, so it becomes a real challenge to weigh the risk versus reward scenarios.

Our own observations indicate that pharmaceutical marketers have already been leery of entering the unknown foray of especially since there isn't any guidance from FDA on best practices and there isn't any plan to release specific guidance in the near term.

We conducted a survey of medical device social media gurus and marketers, which indicated medical device companies are actively using social media ahead of their pharmaceutical counterparts. There is a clear opportunity and need to share best practices in several areas that could even further accelerate medical device social media engagement.

If you haven't already done so, download our free eBook on social media for healthcare marketers. We offer some practical guidance on how marketers can engage in social media while FDA guidelines lag.