Healthcare Sector in Need for Urgent Change

Continuous change is inherent to many industries. Healthcare is no exception. Actually, worldwide the healthcare sector has been subject to some disruptive changes. In England, for example, in 2013 the NHS underwent a major transformation affecting over 1.6 million healthcare workers and catering 54 million of people1. In USA the introduction of the Affordable Care Act has accelerated the rate of change and the level of uncertainty that confronts this sector2. CEOs in the healthcare sector realise they are facing numerous challenges: the pressure to provide better, faster and cheaper care is mounting as the world evolves demographically, socially and economically. Patients are also becoming more demanding, as consumerism takes hold.

As a result of these challenges the healthcare sector has been pushed towards adopting a business model. Healthcare payers and providers are beginning to manage their operations as organizations in other industries do. Most sectors are also using ‘disruptive’ technologies, such as mobile devices and the Internet, to engage with consumers in new ways. Likewise, healthcare payers and providers are following suit. Secondly, healthcare is becoming a precision-based industry. More specifically, the healthcare industry is moving away from population-based care to personalised care. Precision medicine is still in its infancy. But it will eventually allow practitioners to prescribe drugs based on patients’ genetic profiles, thereby eliminating inappropriate or unnecessary treatments, reducing the incidence of adverse reactions, and ultimately, improving health outcomes3. In sum, the healthcare industry is struggling to manage with these disruptive changes and the sector will only be successful at managing these revolutionary changes if all it's organizations develop the capacity and agility required to lead during the disruption. However, to build such capacity starts with knowledge about the climate for change and creating an awareness of the need for change. Our OCQ-CPR, a tool that was validated across several major hospitals in Belgium, offers you a great platform to assess your hospital’s readiness for disruptive change. Also, using the tool we developed a workshop to increase awareness for organizational change.

For more information about the tool please consult this page.