“Turn and face the strange ch-ch-changes
Pretty soon now, you’re gonna get older
Time may change me, but I can’t trace time
I said that time may change me, but I can’t trace time”
With 2015 coming to a close here shortly in the next few weeks and as always, we look to the next coming “New Year” with anticipation and excitement. What will 2016 bring to the healthcare landscape we serve as HTM service professionals? What “2016 changes” will be the “hurdles” as a profession or in your daily work environment that you anticipate needing to be “cleared” without faulting?
Good questions we always ask ourselves as the calendar year flips and the holiday season party comes to a close. As I “gaze out”, here are a few of my 2016 “thoughts” for the HTM service professional to ponder on:
- The Affordable Care Act (ACA) patient billing reimbursement reductions take full effect – Look for more hospital consolidation and expense pressure cutbacks.
- It is estimated approximately 450 HTM service professionals will retire “out” of the industry – Will their “job vacancies” be back-filled? Can they be “back filled”
- Downward pressure on internal biomedical departments to become more responsible and accountable in medical equipment “service lines” they have never prepared for will continue to ratchet up – hospitals will strongly consider “outsourcing medical equipment service departments”.
- The need for “new” talent coming into the HTM industry will still continue to be greater than the supply – the “gap” in the “next generation” of HTM professionals will continue to widen.
- Will the HTM service professional realize they are becoming a function of the IT department?
- And finally will this be the year the majority of the HTM hospital based departments will “get out of the basement” and into the “carpeted hospital administration areas” bringing visibility of their crucial critical role they provide?
You may or may not agree with some or all of my 2016 HTM service professional challenge thoughts above. I would love to hear your thoughts but more importantly your “solutions” as to how HTM service professionals will liberate themselves in the “New Year” and turn the “corner” with a healthcare industry “change” that already has made the bend!