The American Hospital Association (AHA) Annual Membership Meeting addressed the challenges faced by the healthcare industry during the COVID-19 pandemic, such as financial instability, workforce shortages, and cybersecurity threats. The meeting featured discussions on various topics including the importance of the 340B Drug Pricing Program, integrated care as a solution to behavioral health crises, and the need to prioritize cybersecurity to protect sensitive data. The speakers also emphasized the importance of innovation, community partnerships, and access to care in addressing the healthcare industry’s challenges.
At the 2023 American Hospital Association’s Annual Membership Meeting, Rick Pollack, the AHA President, and CEO, outlined three crucial messages that Congress must listen to. He began by emphasizing the need to stabilize the financial situation, strengthen the workforce, and secure the ability to continue serving the communities. While speaking to attendees, he highlighted the unprecedented challenges that hospitals and health systems have continued to face after the COVID-19 pandemic. Pollack urged attendees to reinsert themselves in the conversation and “sound the alarm,” both with the public and with lawmakers, in the face of a shifting public narrative on the importance and role of hospitals.
At Sunday’s Evolving Systems of Care for the Future session, healthcare leaders, including AHA board member Tina Freese Decker and Jennifer Havens, CEO of UnityPoint Health-Grinnell Regional Medical Center, discussed how smaller organizations can remain viable by refusing to remain complacent in their daily work, and instead facing new challenges head-on. Decker expressed her desire to move forward with innovative ideas that would transform the healthcare system and address health equity and affordability, quality and safety, and accessibility. Former Federal Trade Commissioner Noah Phillips also discussed antitrust law and the FTC’s scrutiny of mergers, with labor questions driving many compelling arguments in favor of combining hospitals.
The panel discussion focused on behavioral health, and panelists Patrice Harris, M.D., CEO and co-founder of eMed and past president of the American Medical Association, and Arpan Waghray, M.D., CEO of the Well Being Trust at Providence Health and past chair of the AHA’s committee on behavioral health, considered challenges and solutions for communities in a wide-ranging discussion. The panel discussed solutions such as pairing with community partners and local schools, greater transparency from insurance companies, and better integration between mental and physical health. Harris said that the only way forward now is integrated care, and it’s critical to make those connections between primary care and behavioral and mental health.
At the annual meeting opening plenary, Stacey Hughes, AHA’s executive vice president of government relations and public policy, discussed several key issues with Frank Sesno, former Washington bureau chief for CNN. The healthcare workforce, the 340B Drug Pricing Program, and the end of the COVID-19 public health emergency are at the forefront of the AHA’s discussions with lawmakers. Hughes stressed the importance of investing in faculty and innovative apprentice programs that provide alternative ways for people to enter the healthcare field. She also emphasized the AHA’s commitment to the 340B program, which provides vital aid to hospitals and health systems across the country.
During a fireside chat with Ashley Thompson, AHA’s senior vice president of public policy, Jonathan Blum, CMS principal deputy administrator, and chief operating officer, emphasized the agency’s concern with alleviating the tremendous stress throughout the nation’s healthcare system. Blum said that CMS is rethinking its payment policy, rules, and overall structure as it works to present a better reimbursement landscape for healthcare providers.
At the federal plenary session, Sen. Mark Warner, D-Va., discussed healthcare cybersecurity with moderator Frank Sesno. Warner called for a clearer chain of command at the federal level when it comes to healthcare cyber policy, a “bill of sale” to make medical device software more visible to patients and providers, and minimum mandatory cybersecurity standards for the healthcare field. He said that putting cybersecurity first is the best way to protect sensitive data, just like washing your hands before you go into the OR.
According to research presented by Lisa Goldstein, Senior Vice President for Kaufman Hall, hospitals are under pressure to perform poorly in all three areas of business management. Goldstein said hospitals should focus on how they can preserve the cash they have on hand, particularly in uncertain times.
