Virtual Care News

Healthcare Workforce Shortages to Likely Continue for Next Few Years

The Great Resignation shows few signs of ending anytime soon for the healthcare industry, presenting challenges for executives.

Healthcare staffing

Source: Getty Images

By Kyle Murphy, PhD

- Healthcare talent shortages are expected to remain an ongoing challenge for healthcare organizations as a strained workforce looks for greener pastures elsewhere, barring significant changes to workloads and culture.

Record-High Resignation Rates on Healthcare’s Horizon

A new study published in Mayo Clinic Proceedings predicts that one in five physicians intend to leave their practice in the next two years because of employee burnout, increased workload, fear of infection, and stress associated with COVID-19. The findings indicate increased pressure on an already strained healthcare workforce.

Researchers surveyed 20,665 healthcare workers at 124 institutions between July 1, 2020, and December 31, 2020. The researchers examined worker intentions to reduce hours or resign from their position and their fear of viral exposure or transmission, anxiety or depression related to COVID-19, work overload, and burnout.

The survey results showed that the intention to reduce hours within 12 months was highest among nursing staff, physicians, and advanced practice providers (APP). The rates were lowest among clerical staff (13.6%) and administrators (6.8%).

Serval factors increased workers’ intentions to reduce work hours, such as fear of exposure, high reported rates of anxiety, burnout, and workloads. Physicians, APPs, and nurses who had more than 20 years in their practice were more likely to reduce work hours in the next 12 months or resign. Yet COVID-19 load was not associated with workers’ intent to reduce work hours or leave their practice. READ MORE

Moderna-Carisma Partnership Takes Aim at Genetic Cancer Therapies

Moderna and Carisma Therapeutics recently entered into an agreement to discover, develop, and commercialize in vivo engineered chimeric antigen receptor monocyte (CAR-M) cancer therapies.

Under the terms of the agreement, Carisma will receive a $45 million up-front cash payment and research funding and is also eligible to receive development, regulatory, and commercial milestone payments. Carisma will be responsible for discovering and optimizing development candidates, while Moderna will lead the clinical development and commercialization of therapeutics resulting from the agreement. Additionally, Moderna can nominate up to 12 target candidates for development and commercialization.

Gene editing has the potential to prevent and treat many diseases. Most research on genome editing aims to understand diseases using cells and animal models.

Therefore, in vitro and in vivo cancer models that resemble the challenges of intra-tumor heterogeneity are vital to understanding cells and the efficacy of new targeted treatments to a patient’s specific tumor. READ MORE

CVS Health, Uber Health Form Rideshare Partnership for Care Access

CVS Health has partnered with Uber Health, the rideshare company’s healthcare arm, to provide individuals in underserved communities free transportation when seeking access to medical care, work, or an educational program.

The initiative will be available to high-risk populations in Atlanta, GA; Columbus, Ohio; and Hartford, Connecticut.

Limited transportation is a top social determinant of health, hindering patient access to care. In addition, lack of transportation sometimes forces patients to delay appointments, leading to adverse health outcomes. The CVS Health and Uber Health partnership aims to eliminate the critical barrier to medical care and advance health equity in high-risk communities across the country.

This comes as part of Health Zones, CVS Health’s newest initiative to invest in programs to decrease health disparities in underserved communities. The Health Zones investments will address six critical social determinants of health: housing, education, access to food, labor, transportation, and health care access. READ MORE

Translators, Privacy Key to Virtual Care Adoption Among Non-English Speakers

Clinicians at Massachusetts General Hospital helped address virtual care disparities for patients with limited English proficiency by increasing access to telehealth platforms, ensuring privacy for immigrant patients, and including language interpreters in virtual visits, according to a paper in the American Journal of Managed Care.

Before the COVID-10 pandemic, the Boston-based health system’s Department of Interpreter Services offered interpretations for in-person outpatient visits. The most popular languages included Spanish, Portuguese, Arabic, Chinese, and Haitian Creole, and most of the interpretations occurred over the phone.

When the pandemic hit, the hospital transitioned to telehealth for most ambulatory care services. Following the transition, the number of interpretations over the phone increased by 57 percent, but video interpretations did not follow this trend. Researchers also found that patients with limited English proficiency were less likely to have a video visit.

To address these disparities in accessing telehealth, clinicians implemented three strategies within their virtual care platforms: increase access to technology, ensure privacy for immigrant patients, and include language interpreters in telehealth visits. READ MORE

Oscar Health Unveils Cost Estimator Tool for Price Transparency

Oscar Health has launched an updated cost estimator tool to increase price transparency around healthcare costs and help members plan for their medical bills in advance.

More than half of Oscar members reported that they would want to know their potential medical costs upfront, and 20 percent said they have concerns about being able to afford care, according to the payer.

The cost estimator tool generates a price estimate by first predicting all of the claims that could stem from the provider and service combination. The tool then selects the claim that best coincides with the member’s deductible, out-of-pocket spending maximum, and other health plan components.

Oscar Health members can access the cost estimator tool through their health insurance account either on their computer or smartphone, making it easier for members to receive timely estimates. They can receive cost estimates for visits and services that they received at a primary care office, specialist office, imaging center, ambulatory surgery center, clinic, or outpatient hospital. READ MORE

Strategic Partnership to Leverage Potential of De-identified Data

Truveta and LexisNexis Risk Solutions announced a strategic partnership that will use de-identified data to improve the quality of all health research and enable new insights on health equity.

It has been challenging for medical research to feature participants representative of the diversity in the US. In addition, traditional research rarely has access to social determinants of health data or mortality data since 65 percent die outside the hospital. 

The Truveta Platform will address these issues by linking national clinical data, medical claims data, socioeconomic data, and mortality data using the LexisNexis Patient Centric Token, which de-identifies any dataset to ensure patient privacy.

All Truveta health system members will have access to the integrated data for their medical research, population health studies, and health equity studies. READ MORE

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