2010 Industry Survey

Instead, finance leaders' focus will be on physician recruitment/retention, No. 1 at 37.5%; cost reduction, a close second at 35.5%; and patient experience/patient satisfaction right behind it at 33.5%.

High-Tech Hopes: It seems CIOs will have money to spend in 2010, as they are seeing larger shares of the organization's overall operating revenue. Those describing their share of the pie as 3% or less dropped by nearly 18 points to 53.13%, while those describing their portion of the budgets as 4% or more jumped about 18 points to 46.88%, compared to last year's survey.

Service Line Prospects: Physician leaders are optimistic about several key service lines. Asked to rate the potential for growth within their organization in the next three to five years, they said they expect growth of 6% or more in: geriatrics (selected by 29.20%), followed by orthopedics (24.14%), cardiovascular (22.90%), imaging (20.30%), and women's health (18.36%).

Quality Control: A consensus is taking shape as to why organizations are failing to achieve handwashing compliance. The No. 1 reason, according to 39.6% of quality leaders: lack of spine to self-police and report colleagues' violations. The second most cited reason, selected by 28.86%: lack of leadership to make it a priority. Interesting that the assessment is not that leadership is trying but failing, but that leadership does not see it as a priority. But when is the last time anyone was reimbursed for handwashing compliance?

Rural vs. Non-rural: While community and rural healthcare leaders face many of the same challenges as their non-rural counterparts, there are some differences in priorities. Top 3 among non-rural CEOs: cost reduction (45.7%), quality/patient safety (37.63%), and patient experience (32.8%). Rural CEOs were more concerned with physician recruitment/retention (44%), followed by quality/patient safety (40.57%) and patient experience (34.86%), while cost reduction ranks No. 6 (at 25.14%).

Health Plan Growth: Though health plan respondents agreed that the insurance market is a growth area and they plan to invest in the individual market, the majority of respondents have not yet taken action to invest in that market.

Health plan respondents said the best way to improve relations with healthcare providers is to speed up processing, fixing, and paying claims (31%), and increase reimbursements. (29%). This is different from last year when the top choice was pay for performance (29%), but that's now 25%.

Marketing Disconnect: Healthcare CEOs said marketing initiatives will be among the top four drivers of growth at their organization in the next five years. But there's a disconnect between their high hopes for marketing as a discipline and their opinion of their marketing professionals. Most CEOs (42%) described the qualiy of their organization's marketing as "slightly strong." But only 11.5% said it was "very strong." Meanwhile, 30% of marketers said the quality of marketing was "very strong." Another 41% called it "slightly strong."

—Philip Betbeze