Quote:
Originally Posted by sebastian_dangerfield
Money is a commodity. And it should be spent wisely and fairly in this situation. I understand some admin is needed. But there are some admin making some pretty crazy salaries who are not as important as docs.
Here's why: If docs or nurses should be overwhelmed or get sick, the next line of people to bring into the hospital are other people with medical training. An orthopedic surgeon might not be the best replacement for an ER doc, but he's all you've got if all the ER docs are sick.
I know in our area nurses in specialty areas have been told if they should be needed, whatever their specialty, they'll be brought back out of furlough to deal with covid patients.
Why are we not paying these people at least something while they are on standby? That seems fundamentally bizarre while we continue to pay some admin of questionable value very fat salaries.
Maybe I'm nuts, but if I ran a hospital, I'd cut all non-essential admin and divvy their salaries up and give them to docs and nurses I'd want to keep on standby.
I'd also give all the docs and nurses facing this thing in the ERs and ICUs enhanced pay. Nobody signs on for what they're seeing. They deserve every extra dollar we can throw at them.
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We are keeping our non-Covid-speciality docs in reserve should shit go sideways (it hasn't here yet). In the meantime, we're working on fast tracking a lot of initiatives that would have taken a year or more because docs are busy and getting meetings with them organized is hard. So your ENTs and ortho guys are now sitting in a lot more meetings than they would have had they been able to do stuff on patients.
As for admin people, more of them are on-site trying to keep this ship running than not. I can't imagine our environmental health and safety people have slept more than a few hours in a month. The communications staff as well, because every day something changes and we need to tell 15,000 people in a way that doesn't panic the shit out of them and THEN communicate with a public that is schizophrenic about how we should be reacting. We've had to totally launch a telemedicine practice in a three week period that would have taken a year or more. Our revenue cycle people are trying to figure out how to keep us afloat when no one is billing, plus the payment rules are changing with the new telehealth world we're living in. The procurement folk are trying to figure out ways of getting supplies in a way that doesn't bankrupt us but also keeps us safe. IT hasn't slept either, because of the telmedicine, the telework, everyone and their mother trying to get new software to get this shit going, and the strain on our systems of 8,000 new remote users.
And that's just the healthcare side of things. Research and education are also still a priority, and we are having to figure all of that shit out on the fly too.
