HT Klatzky & Associates

Got the “can’t keep up” flu?  Give a look to this week’s Weekly Roundup.

Retail clinics. They’re here.  They’re gone.  See the link to the Wall Street Journal’s health blog that says there may still be life in them yet.  Allina, Minneapolis-St. Paul’s largest group of hospitals and clinics, is partnering with CVS Pharmacy-owned Minute Clinics.  Wal-Mart will follow suit and partner with local providers according to the article.

If you want to get smart and I mean really smart about episode-based payments or what some refer to as “bundled payments” that many say will figure into the future of health care reimbursement, follow the link to Deloitte Health 3-Nov-09: Healthcare Marketing Weekly Roundup

photo credit: cjc4454

Welcome to the first edition of the HTK blog link round up. We will vet and pass along insightful healthcare marketing posts from various industry publications on a weekly basis for our readers. Have a look at them and feel free to lend some additional resources in the comment thread.  Also when possible we’ll note authors’ Twitter profiles addresses for easy following, as noted by the “@” sign before each name. 27-Oct-09: Healthcare Marketing Weekly Roundup

It was a reluctant audience at the SHSMD Senior Symposium session, Social Media 201: Advanced Tools and Advanced Ideas.

Senior Symposium attendees are individuals who have 20+ years of experience in healthcare and who are working in executive positions.Most of the audience looked like they were waiting for a root canal, and that they would prefer having one if it meant they could avoid having to “deal with” social media within their organizations. Others spoke of patients’ hardwired “need to share.”

Healthcare Social Media & The Double Edged Sword

photo credit: Andy G

The SHSMD session Best Practices for Building Profitable Growth and Measuring ROI was really two presentations rolled into one.  Both presenters, Preston Gee and Jeff Couzens are from Trinity Health, which is based in Novi, Michigan.

Gee’s portion was a well-articulated, tactical process for framing the discussion for and making the distinction between, profitless and profitable growth.  Read:  not all volume is good volume.  He provided the audience with a tidy system for “valuing” service lines based upon a set of criteria and targeting resources to those of highest value.  And before you ask, financials weren’t the only criteria. Good solid content. 9 Tips to Aquire & Retain Profitable Healthcare Patients

By 2020 there will be at least 10 percent fewer hospitals, a provocative statement or the bloody obvious depending upon your POV I guess.  And this was only the beginning of a presentation by Don Seymour, President of Seymour Associates in the SHSMD Connections 2009 workshop entitled “Hospitals 2020: How Fundamental Economics, Clinical Innovation, and IT will Reshape the Healthcare Delivery Model.”

This guy is no carnival palm reader in a tye-dyed dress either – in case you’re wondering.  He has been working as an adviser to hospital boards, CEOs and medical staff leaders for over twenty-five years and has served as the Executive Editor for Futurescan™ (AHA’s annual healthcare trends publication) since 2004. Hospitals 2020: The New Healthcare Environment

2,372 health care Twitter followers

If you follow health care social media on Twitter you are probably following Ed Bennett.  Over coffee with Ed this morning at SHSMD Connections 2009 we talked about what a “wow” it was to turn around and have 2,372 followers.  He just laughed.

Ed also comes with some street cred. He is the Director of Web Strategy at the University of Maryland Medical System and also maintains THE list of which health care systems are using Twitter.  This makes it easy for the rest of us to keep up with how the best and the brightest, along with the fearful and tentative, are using Twitter to engage with their public. Coffee with Reluctant Social Media Cult Figure Ed Bennett

Coverage from the Society for Healthcare Strategy & Market Development – SHSMD
As I write, I am jetting my way to sunny Orlando, Florida where I will be reporting from the SHSMD Annual Conference.  For those of you who couldn’t break away this week, I intend to be your eyes and ears, act as skeptic and convert, and yes, perhaps indulge in a few moments of fellowship (and those cocktails with the little umbrellas) with our colleagues from around the country.

Seven hundred attendees will be able to choose from 4 general sessions, 10 workshops, and 66 concurrent sessions over the next three and a half days.  I will be burning up the soles of my red Polo deck shoes as I report to you via blog, Tweet, and photo, the most interesting, provocative content I can find.  I will cover the strategic as well as tactical and you can count on hearing the down low on social media, engaging your patients, and how to deploy your limited resources in the smartest way possible. From Cool Minnesota to What’s Hot in Orlando