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If you work in healthcare, we don’t need to tell you how difficult the past few years have been. Your bravery and strength to see through the worst pandemic our world has seen in over a century has not gone unnoticed by those outside your sector.
As we start to navigate life in a post-COVID world, the health industry continues to face residual challenges which are likely to linger for some time. However, where there are challenges there are also opportunities. It may require some ingenuity to harness them, but the present situation calls for a new mindset that could ultimately be very different to what we knew in the past. In hospitals across Australia, there are three key challenges which are currently having a profound impact. In this article, we look at what those challenges mean and the ingenuity that could be applied to solve them…
Challenge # 1: Workforce 
High levels of burnout leading to mass resignations, coupled with soaring demand for health services in the wake of COVID, has put healthcare worker shortages at near crisis levels.
According to a 2021 study by the Australian Primary Health Care Nurses Association, 80.4% of nurses said they felt exhausted and almost a third planned to resign within 5 years. Health Workforce Australia estimates there will be a shortage of over 100,000 nurses by 2025, while the Australian Medical Association (AMA) predicts a shortage of more than 10,000 GPs by 2031-32.
A lack of immigration and difficulty attracting new people to the sector has further exacerbated the problem – for both of which there is no quick or easy fix.
With the demand for health services also set to increase due to our nation’s ageing population, Australian hospitals cannot afford to maintain a pre-COVID approach to operations in a post-COVID world. Change is necessary to improve the quality of life for people who work in the sector, as well as the level of care for those who depend on it.
Applying ingenuity to worker shortages
At least for the foreseeable future, hospitals need to say goodbye to the traditional approach of relying solely on recruitment efforts to meet demand or replace workers who have resigned. Instead, leadership teams must focus on driving efficiencies in their organisation in ways they may never have considered possible before. From roster creation through to delivering patient meals, setting up a taskforce to audit and report on opportunities to improve efficiency across the board is a great place to start. Once you have this information, you can then consider how to:
- streamline processes to reduce wasted time
- eliminate activities that add no value
- double down on activities that free up resources
- let technology take care of repetitive and manual tasks
If we look at rostering, driving efficiency would mean utilising a fit-for-purpose platform that leverages AI to match staff availability, skills, qualifications, and award types to create optimised schedules and rosters. The same applies to insurance claims, where clever systems are able to automatically extract relevant data and enter it into a claim – reducing human error, improving processing and claim turnaround times, and freeing busy staff to focus on higher value work.
Another way to boost efficiency through technology is with telehealth services. Where appropriate, these can free up doctors to see more people and attend to more serious cases requiring physical examination faster. Telehealth may also enable greater flexibility for those who might otherwise decide to leave the sector in search of roles that allow for shorter work days or remote work. In a similar way, virtual care services are another emerging opportunity with massive potential.
Although it may seem futuristic, the technology is already here – it’s simply waiting for the industry to invest in and implement it. Wearable medical devices and remote health monitoring are capable of revolutionising the entire health system by freeing up hospital beds, reducing the need for so many healthcare staff, and giving patients the ability to manage their illness or recovery from the comfort of their own homes.
While it may require a period of adjustment for both providers and patients, just as we saw with telehealth it could quickly become a preferred option. Lastly, solving the challenge of worker shortages may require health providers to build stronger networks with other providers in their region. This could potentially allow for sharing of resources, such as dividing a full time staff member’s time between two locations – thereby reducing the burden on each location and providing the worker with more variety so they are less inclined to resign (such as a nurse who works in theatre in one location and nursery in another).
Challenge # 2: Patient waitlists
While serious wait times in emergency departments appear to have resolved in many states and territories this year, extended waitlists for elective surgery continue to persist. According to the AMA, over half a million Australians could be waiting for elective surgery by mid-2023.
Although not considered an emergency, patients can still be living with tremendous discomfort as they await elective surgery procedures such as hip replacements, ligament repairs, or cataract extractions.
Addressing these wait times amid worker shortages and increased demand for other health services is no easy feat. Hospitals have already done a tremendous job in catching up on waitlists post COVID, but there simply aren’t enough staff and hours in the day to see everyone.
Applying ingenuity to patient waitlists
In continuing to work through the backlog of elective surgeries, hospitals may need to explore new scheduling models that would potentially place less stress on an already overburdened system. One idea would be to create specific teams for specific surgeries in specific locations – and then have those teams move steadily through the waitlist. For example, a team and location that focussed exclusively on hip replacements would remove the need to take up beds in general hospital wards (similar to what we saw for COVID patients during the pandemic).
It would also centralise all services for that one specialism, including post-care such as physiotherapy, which would serve to streamline the process and experience for care providers and patients alike.
Challenge # 3: Financial management 
The pandemic created a massive squeeze on hospital budgets, with many spending much more than anticipated. Government support at the time provided much needed relief, however that spending has since been repealed despite hospitals still being expected to pick up the pieces post-pandemic.
This period of transition will be difficult for some hospitals, especially as we head into winter and other factors come into play – such as vacancies, planned leave, and unplanned leave (i.e.: sick or personal leave) being covered by locums or agency staff at higher rates.
Applying ingenuity to financial management
For a hospital under financial pressure, effective financial management will be key to weathering the next 6 to 12 months. Underpinning effective financial management is data – including the ability to access a single source of truth from which to make informed decisions about spending. While you may not have the budget for a complete systems overhaul, you will want to ensure that you’re optimising every capability and possible integration in the financial and operational systems you do have. Shared services is one possible avenue for achieving cost reductions in activities such as finance, IT and payroll.
Many regional hospitals have already seen benefits in taking this approach, as they seek to focus exclusively on primary deliverables and allow external parties to manage the rest.
Driving efficiency throughout your health organisation will allow you to reduce costs in a sustainable way, rather than taking a haphazard approach with short term gains that end up costing you more in the long run. Out-of-the-box thinking will be crucial for hospital leadership teams, who may find that their best course of action is something they least expect but that quickly solves their biggest challenges and places their organisation well ahead of the game.
Engaging experts to help navigate post-COVID challenges 
From the utilisation of physical space to the exploitation of all things digital, it’s time to put the ways of old under the microscope and ask: is this really the best way to do this? Often, having a third party to guide you in reviewing challenges and uncovering opportunities can help to:
- accelerate initiatives that have an immediate and lasting impact on your organisation
- establish proper foundations so new initiatives are set up to succeed
- ensure effective financial management in all decision making
At RSM, our dedicated Health Services team comprises experts in all areas of healthcare – from hospital and medical to pharmacy and public sector health services. As the sixth largest audit, tax and consulting network in the world, we are well positioned to guide your health organisation through any and all challenges you may be facing as we move through this post-pandemic period.
While it certainly hasn’t been an easy few years, we see a robust and highly efficient healthcare sector capable of meeting all Australian’s health needs into the future. All it takes is a little time and ingenuity to navigate the current paradigm shift, and the sector will be perfectly placed to achieve it.
For more information
Please contact your local RSM expert to find out more information regarding advisory for your tourism business. For a confidential discussion, contact our Health Services Team – Hospitals division – on (03) 9286 8000.
