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Healthcare Reform Puts Pressure on Hospital HR Execs

 |  By Chelsea Rice  
   September 19, 2013

Human resource executives at hospitals and health systems say planning for healthcare reform is their top priority, but the majority of them feel challenged by too many competing initiatives.

With less than two weeks to go until health insurance exchanges , also known as marketplaces, open for business, human resource executives at hospitals and health systems are preparing for a raft of changes that will affect healthcare workers and HR processes.

From improving patient experience to reducing costs, human resource departments are implementing mandates laid out in the Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act by putting them at the top of their hiring, recruitment, and retention priorities.

Survey results released Wednesday tell the tale. The American Society for Healthcare Human Resources Administration (ASHHRA), the professional membership organization of the American Hospital Association, and HealthcareSource, a talent management software provider, collected responses from nearly 500 U.S. healthcare HR professionals and executives in July 2013 about their top HR initiatives. (The report itself won't be released until next month.)

When asked about their top priority for the next 12 months, 64% of senior healthcare HR executives said that planning for the effects of healthcare reform is their top priority, up 10% from last year. Eighty percent of C-suite level executives, 64% of directors and managers, and 56% of HR general staff said preparing for healthcare reform is a top HR initiative.

"Certainly the biggest unknown [for healthcare reform] is the influx of those newly covered patients. Since we don't yet know what the workforce need is to match this, many healthcare organizations' processes are becoming more streamlined so that they have the flexibility to cover more and more people, while continuing to provide high quality care," said Stephanie Drake, MBA, senior executive director at AHA Professional Services, in a media statement.

In fact, 73% of respondents, which represented a range of C-suite executives, directors, managers, and individuals, said their top strategy to reduce costs is streamlining HR processes.

With labor costs representing more than 60% of hospital budgets, the primary focus of hospital human resource professionals to prepare for healthcare reform is to reduce costs.

"There are two sides to the coin. One is cost cutting initiatives, so everyone including HR has to tighten their belts, whether that's in managing their own department or working more broadly with other managers," said Adam Higman, vice president of Soyring Consulting, a clinical and operational consulting firm for acute care hospitals.

"The other side is [that] everyone is still hoping that once the exchanges go up, you'll have a larger patient volume that can also pay for their services. HR folks need to be more efficient now, but also need to plan for the hiring frenzy that's going to occur once that higher patient volume starts to come in," Higman said.

The quality of those hires matters, as well. With the reimbursement structures of the PPACA more aligned with patient experience and the quality of patient care, hospital HR executives are figuring out strategies to not only recruit at a high volume, while keeping costs low, but to make strategic decisions with the patient experience in mind.

When asked about current HR initiatives to improve patient satisfaction 80% of respondents said they are working to improve employee satisfaction, followed by 78% who said they are working to create a culture of employee accountability, and 70% who said they are focusing on improving the patient experience (70%). Survey respondents could choose multiple answers.

To improve patient safety, another key element of the PPACA, 79% of hospital HR professionals said one of their initiatives was to improve workforce education and development, followed by 66% who said they are working to improve employee satisfaction.

The biggest challenge to achieving their HR initiatives is the perception that there are too many competing initiatives 72% of respondents said. Slightly fewer, 65%, said there isn't enough time for projects.

Chelsea Rice is an associate editor for HealthLeaders Media.
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