2022 Agenda Themes

The Strategics:

Where to Place Your Bets

The demand for technology to help providers address challenges in care delivery, quality and outcomes is surging, directly leading to record-breaking investments into this space. Valuations are booming, check sizes are increasing and health systems’ are going all in on integrating tech into core operating plans. How should health organizations best position bets to match tech needs with investment capacities? Assess all the odds to determine if the investment gamble is worth the payout.

Solving for X:

The Access Equation

Can we find the answer to the convoluted care access equation? Technology is one prominent variable, yet often widens the digital divide, pushing people further outside the care continuum. The methods to decipher X may be different, but health innovators are plugging in new variables derived from digital sources to solve this crucial conundrum of care delivery.

No Free Lunch

Who's Paying for Health?

In the U.S., high medical bills account for over 62% of all personal bankruptcies. Proposals for alternative health system models continuously filter through Washington D.C. while expenditures are approaching $4T, premiums are skyrocketing and drug prices are increasing. The intense national dialogue around health care funding poses the question; who is really paying for health? What new models will actually deliver a more sustainable environment for health’s future?

Diving into Deep Data:

Discovering Hidden Treasures

Deep data has been aggressively accumulated in warehouses and lakes across the healthcare landscape and mining this data has resulted in direct improvement of quality of care. Additionally, findings within this data treasure-trove have uncovered some unexpected gems. Discoveries have demonstrated that like the deep blue sea, there is still a lot to learn. Join us on a deep-dive into the success and failures of expeditions into deep-data.

Extreme Makeover:

Care Continuum Edition

Both vertical and horizontal consolidation and integration across the care continuum has remodeled the health industry as we know it. “Growth at all costs” has been the mantra over the last decade, but what exactly is the cost of this increased activity? Let’s take these growth strategies down to the studs and uncover the sometimes good, often bad and occasionally downright ugly consequences for health systems.

AI's Power Play:

Leveraging the Advantage

The rise of machines in all industries has come with both promise and fear as we see AI taking over more and more tasks traditionally handled by humans. Promise is outplaying fear as AI has proven itself as a talented healthcare recruit to aid clinical decision making, research and backend operations, to name a few. What will this advanced technology really deliver in the next year - and will we leverage the advantage it provides us or miss this scoring opportunity?

Breaching the Walls:

Cybersecurity Mounting a Defense

On the health battlefield, organizations are forced to retreat due to strong advances by phishing, ransomware and other malicious attacks. Neither the internal response nor support from law enforcement has slowed this onslaught. When the castle walls are crumbling, how do you mount an effective defense against the invaders? New technologies and tactics in cyber defense are moving us into a more secure future. No Trojan horses here!

Life in the Fast Lane:

Clinical Innovation Acceleration

Moving clinical breakthroughs from the laboratory to patients’ bedside takes time, sometimes too much. How can technology step in to bridge this gap and ensure patients are benefiting from scientific breakthroughs in the near term? With bottlenecks often stemming from inaccurate data, poor clinical trial design and regulatory barriers, we’ve been stuck in the slow lane. Now, let’s pick up speed. Health leaders are revving up their engines to accelerate clinical innovation to the fast lane.

Health Policy:

The Judge and The Jury

Policy and innovation have historically been on different sides of the courtroom.You can’t execute health breakthroughs without the support of regulation, and regulation won’t change without convincing evidence of real world outcomes, resulting in a hung jury. Innovators and policy-makers have started to speak the same language in the throes of a global pandemic, so how can we keep this unanimity going? New technology, new care models and new leaders with fresh perspectives can change the verdict in innovation’s favor.

Getting Personal:

Custom Tailored Care

Our differences are what makes us unique! And boy how unique is our individual health. We are recognizing and embracing that every person comes with a brand new set of circumstances impacting their health, whether that be their background, current geography, socioeconomic realities, or genetic predispositions. We are custom-tailoring care to provide not only personalized medicine, but a holistic approach to care that recognizes patients as individuals with distinct needs, leaving off the rack solutions behind.

Lights, Camera, Action:

Home Care Takes Center Stage

There’s no place like home! Over 75% of our adult community would prefer to receive care at home, so why have home health models been slow to adopt at scale? Technological innovation over the past decade has won over the critics. The tech is ready, the audience is waiting, and the data proves that outcomes remain high or even better in these models. Let’s edit the home health script to be ready for the big screen!

Paint by Numbers:

Connecting the Data Dots

While interoperability is a favorite buzzword and rallying cry of most data leaders, the reality is that it’s insufficient. Data in isolation or data en masse does not provide true insight into operational, clinical or financial processes. Our true point of clarity will come once we connect the data dots to link common standards and process flow. Will health data’s Bob Ross come from within the traditional ecosystem or is this a job for big tech? The beauty within the data is yet to be seen!

Manual is so Last Season:

Let's Get Automated!

Human error is inevitable, but not the best look. Process automation holds the promise not only of risk reduction, but efficiency enhancement- how vogue! Why expose your organization to errors via manual processes when there are AI, RPA and NLP solutions available to seamlessly accessorize your operations? Bespoke intelligent automation tools are ready for the runway!

The Greatest Show:

Health Tech Spectacular

Come one, come all, to the health tech show! Technologies at the bleeding-edge of innovation are stepping up to the center ring. Discover solutions that will dazzle and amaze from the ringmasters themselves! There is room in this big tent for all acts promising to deliver innovative solutions that will change the future of health. These performers are pushing the limits of what we thought was possible. Safety nets optional!

Techquity:

Harnessing Technology for Health Equity

The future of health is automated, but is it equitable? Inclusive and representative technology innovation and policies can facilitate equal access and care quality for marginalized people, and even combat discrimination. But health tech has a dark side: exclusion, bias, elitism. Is technology doomed to perpetuate society’s ills, or will we harness tech to reflect the better angels of our nature? Explore the frontiers of technology’s capability to facilitate health equity across lines of culture, demographics and systems.