2022 Healthcare Trends: 6 Defining Areas

With the New York Times summing up the predominate feeling of 2021 as “languishing,” 2022 begins with a mix of uncertainty and concern but also optimism. Healthcare and society at large are eager for a positive post-pandemic future. Moving into this next phase, 2022 healthcare trends in six areas stand to shape healthcare delivery and policy and patient and provider experience moving forward: health equity, patient safety, staffing, care delivery, COVID 19, and payment and payers.

但在行业层面上，“前进”意味着什么?如果到2022年及以后，医疗保健行业将跟随其他行业的步伐，领导者将强调长期战略(如10年计划)，优先考虑消费者和数据驱动的决策。

Healthcare’s 2022 Strategy: Following the Lead of Other High-Performing Industries

Multinational beverage conglomerateAnheuser-Busch InBev(AB InBev), which projected growth between10 and 12 percentin 2021 and continued expansion between 4 and 8 percent in 2022, is taking a consumer-centric value approach into 2022. AB InBev has stated a commitment to a “future with more cheers,” which the company describes as “a company-wide purpose to dream big about the future we want to shape and how we can do our part to realize it.”

The organization plans to realize this future by moving from a traditional growth strategy around cost management and generation and mergers-and-acquisitions (M&A)-driven growth to new consumer-centric approach. AB InBev’s revamped purpose focuses on superior value for customers, largely enabled through digital technology that will sell directly to the retailers and the consumers.

Other high-performing brands in 2021, according to theDrucker Institute ranking, include top-five companies Microsoft, Amazon, Apple, IBM, and Intel. These organizations have survived the pandemic well and share a commitment to innovation. Health Catalyst sees companies prioritize high-value data with the following understanding:

• 集成数据可以解锁最高价值的用例。
• 可重用数据会使数据值相乘。
• 透明的数据建立信任，避免了对数据的“黑盒”不信任。
• 聚合数据支持基准测试。
• Application data is highly valuable and should be reusable.
• Data quality is foundational to trust and the use of data.

How Will the Healthcare Industry Excel in 2022? Six 2022 Healthcare Trends to Watch

As healthcare organizations work to embrace some of the key drivers of success behind top-ranked brands, such as a consumer-centric approach and a commitment to high-value data, trends in six areas will differentiate the highest performing health systems from the rest.

#1: Health Equity

In 2019,25 percentof healthcare organizations ratedhealth equity这是他们的首要任务之一。In 2021, health equity rose to 58 percent, while other measured areas (safety, health, value, improvement, science, and joy in work) were relatively stable—placing equity as a frontrunner in industry priorities for 2022.

为此，各组织正在制定强有力的框架，以建立和维持公平。For example, the following two frameworks place health equity firmly in the workflow:

• TheBay Area Regional Health and Equities Initiative(左上，图1)框架关注和衡量圈内的区域，社会和制度的不平等和生活条件。
• Another framework, aCommunity Health Needs Assessment (CNHA), identifies key community health needs and issues through systematic, comprehensive data collection and analysis. This example comes fromUPMC(右下，图1)该框架着眼于一个三年计划，包括人口统计和社区需求评估，重点是慢性疾病、行为健康、健康获取和预防。

Figure 1: Healthequity framework examples.

The above frameworks focus on understanding community needs—a key driver in health equity. And many organizations are making similar priorities. For example, more than 75 companies have signed theDigital Health Equity Pledge, an initiative by健康创新主管，将其视为包括无障碍、多样性、尊重和相关公共政策在内的公平问题。

CMS has also joined healthcare leaders with a focus on health equity and is helping drive related trends. For example, in the finalized2022 Inpatient Perspective Payment规则规定，CMS要求利益相关者就未来可能报告的结构性措施发表意见，以评估医院领导层对卫生公平绩效数据的参与程度。换句话说，CMS已经告知利益相关者，他们将评估ceo和其他领导人在多大程度上密切关注卫生公平，并利用它来推动和改善绩效。CMS最终将把股权评估与推动医疗保健业务的支付系统结合起来。

此外，CMS已经定位了数据，以支持卫生公平优先排序。Like many payers, CMS supports usingZ codes. Payers use these ICD-10-CM codes to document social determinants of health data (e.g., housing, food insecurity, and transportation) to understand community needs and opportunities for change.

On the organizational level, organizations can follow six action items around equity prioritization in 2022:

1. Review the organization’s CHNA.
2. 确保目标有意义。
3. 确定合作伙伴。
4. Evaluate value-based contracts and review the measures tracked.
5. Track metrics and measures that impact the community.
6. 报告上述结果，并从错误和成功中吸取教训。

#2: Care Delivery

Significant shifts in care delivery in 2020 and 2021 will continue into 2022. Notably, the healthcare model moved outside the walls of the hospital and intovirtual care settings, as facilities met capacity during COVID-19. In 2020, CMS issued awaiverfor acute care at home, and as of fall 2021, approved 175 hospitals to provide at-home acute care.

The shift to at-home care appears to be gaining momentum. For example, early in 2022, major healthcare organizations, includingKaiser PermanenteandMayo Clinic, invested$110 millionin a company calledMedically Home，方便和协调高敏锐度患者在家中的治疗。

咨询委员会进一步支持预期的护理提供转移到医院以外的工作。The consulting firm predicts that between 2022 and 2027,outpatient knee surgerywill expand from 6.5 to 36 percent of cases, 20 percent of the current outpatient medical visits will be virtual, and home-based hospital care will increase from 1 to 30 percent.

Consistent with the site-of-care shifts in 2020 and 2021 has been growth in the telehealth space. CMSwaivers在2019冠状病毒病期间临时扩大了远程医疗服务。While overall part B Medicare population care declined11 percentin volume from 2019 to 2020, telehealth visits went from 840,000 to 53 million in that same period.

With digital technology and workflows rising among stakeholders (from payers to pharma), patient-centered care becomes more critical. Actions around care delivery in 2022 will center on engagement:

1. Know the customer, or patient, engagement strategy.
2. 考虑如何刺激客户，简化医疗服务，改善病人健康。
3. Identify key metrics to track for patient engagement efforts (e.g., increase in number of telehealth visits).
4. Understand what drive a better consumer experience.
5. 制定计划评估患者的病情，引导患者采取正确的干预措施。
6. 确定哪些投资将在正确的地点(如医院或家庭)为该护理提供更好的护理。

#3: Patient Safety and Quality

COVID-19 dramatically impactedpatient safety and quality. By the fourth quarter of 2020, the number ofhospital-acquired infections增加了——尤其是中心静脉相关的血液感染(增加了47%)，导管相关的尿路感染(增加了近19%)，以及呼吸机相关事件(MRSA)和其他事件的显著增加。

The above increases make sense, as patients have been sicker during the pandemic, with more people on central lines, catheters, and ventilators. Concurrently, volumes have overwhelmed staff and lowered clinician-to-patient ratios. And with many people avoiding routine care, preventive appointments, such as cancer screenings, have declined. For example, breast cancer screening was down almost91 percentfrom 2019 to 2020. To what extent COVID-19 undermined cancer prevention in 2020 remains to be seen but will likely impact healthcare in 2022.

另外，手术部位感染在大流行期间有所下降，部分原因是选择性手术的减少。Meanwhile, hospital-acquired Clostridioides difficile (C. diff) has also declined in conjunction with COVID-19, with a decrease in people admitted with community C. diff.

Moving forward, the United States has work ahead to bridge its safety and quality gaps—regardless of the pandemic. Relative to countries with similar socioeconomic status, the U.S. spends close to17 percentof its gross domestic product on healthcare, which is nearly double what the rest of the industrial world spends. And at the same time, objective measures of quality are lower in the United States.

Moving the cost and quality dial in 2022 will require health systems to leveragedataandanalyticsand an adaptive problem-solving approach. At the same time, organizations can take the following action around patient safety:

1. Re-enforce infection prevention practices.
2. Leverageaugmented intelligence(AI) and predictive models in risk prediction.
3. 重新设定目标，更新新协议。
4. Gathering information and closing gaps.

#4: COVID-19 Response

WithCOVID-19’svast changes on the world overall and healthcare, the pandemic has reshaped many areas of society and the industry. With ongoing waves of variants and health systems still confronting capacity issues and predicted losses for hospitals in 2021 reaching$54 billion, COVID-19’s economic impact will shape healthcare through 2022 and beyond. The pandemic also drove an increase of almost10 percent国家医疗支出和联邦支出的36%增长。

Looking forward into 2022, inflation is at7 percent, the highest in 40 years. Meanwhile, M&A revenue was up25 percentin 2021 from 2020, with more anticipated in 2022 Significant organizations, such as, Oracle, Cerner, and HCA are acquiring new entities while others are merging to accommodate new care delivery models, such as the growth in ambulatory surgery.

Hospitaloperating marginsfell in 2021, withmore lossespredicted in 2022, while theCARES Actprovided some relief to hospitals between 2020 and 2021—at least$70 billion. In Figure 2, from the Kaufman Hall December 2021National Hospital Flash Report, the yellow bar shows operating margin with CARES Act dollars, and the blue bar is without CARES money. As the graph shows, margins are coming back but haven’t yet returned to pre-pandemic levels.

Figure 2: National margin results—with and without CARES dollars.

Another notable COVID-19 healthcare business impact has been the cost of not getting vaccinated. According to theKaiser Family Foundation, insufficient vaccinations as of June through November 2021 cost U.S. hospitals almost$14 billionin waste—waste meaning hospitalizations that could have been avoided and the societal impact, lost work, lost family, and mortality related to not getting vaccinated.

Moving into 2022, healthcare can take the following actions to navigate COVID-19’s ongoing impact:

1. Take a proactive approach to revenue cycle management and cost (know true costs to provide services).
2. Performfinancialforecasts on shorter time frame, with the ability for rolling forecasts as the environment changes.
3. Perform a capital allocation review.
4. 结合临床和经济结果。
5. Double down on patient safety.

#5: Staffing

Healthcare is facing a crumbling workforce coming into 2022. September 2021 saw the highest quit rates among U.S. worker, with4.4 millionleaving their jobs. In healthcare, estimates saytwo in five nurses and one in four physicianswant to exit the profession in the next two years.

At the same time, demand for healthcare workers is projected to grow by45 percentbetween 2020 and 2030, forcing healthcare to evaluate its workforce supply strategy. Organizations must look closely at data-driven labor management to predict and manage labor needs and improve workforce experience.

Along with labor management, actions organizations can take around staffing in 2022 include the following:

1. Listen to workforce needs and concerns.
2. 共享和交流数据。
3. Consider what flexibility options for the workforce (e.g., schedules, roles, care models).
4. Prioritize workforce retention (including address burnout and ensuring team members feel valued).

#6: Payment and Payers

On the payment andpayersfront,ACAenrollment has exceeded14 million. CMS is reviewing its payment models, with no new models expected before 2023. Alternative payment models are stable, withMedicare AdvantageandMedicaidgrowing.

Organizations can expect to see CMS policy support five strategic objectives behind a health system that delivers equitable outcomes (Figure 3):

1. Drive accountable care.
2. Advance health equity.
3. Support innovation.
4. Address affordability.
5. Partner to achieve system transformation.

Figure 3:Five strategic objectivesaround payment and payer.

此外，CMS将对度量值进行更改，调整计算和使用某些度量值的方式。例如，CMS将COVID-19患者移走以进行质量评估，在某些情况下，不根据肺炎再次入院等与大流行相关的事件来确定资金来源。CMS还将在2022年增加孕产妇健康报告要求，以鼓励医院参与合作项目，改善孕产妇结果。

由于医疗成本仍然很高，领导者可以预期CMS将继续或扩大其对数据的审查，并与基于质量的支付建立联系。CMS将继续沿着以价值为基础的医疗、提高负担能力和减少支出的道路前进。根据图3的战略目标，2022年的一个显著转变将把卫生公平纳入这些努力。

Payers appear to be working closely with providers to best serve their communities. Such consumer-centric approaches include legislation aroundprice transparency, such as theNo Surprise Act, which took effect January 2022. CMS will also continue to enforce penalties for price transparency violations (i.e., organizations that don’t publish all their services and costs by mid 2022).

Health systems can navigate the 2022 payment and payer landscape by taking the following actions:

1. Align all parties.
2. Review value-based contracts.
3. 积极与支付者合作。
4. Focus on improved health with measures for cost and quality.

From Languishing to Flourishing: Healthcare Can Thrive in 2022

While languishing was a tough diagnosis to close 2021, the healthcare industry has a clear path for a thriving 2022. Trends in health equity, patient safety and quality, care delivery, COVID-19 response, staffing, and payers and payment are positioned to support continued recovery, rebuilding, and growth across the industry. Furthermore, as healthcare follows the lead of top performers in other industries with a long-range, consumer-centric, strategy the prioritizes high-value data, patients and providers stand to benefit from improved outcomes and better experiences.

Additional Reading

Would you like to learn more about this topic? Here are some articles we suggest:

• 2021 Healthcare Trends: What Leaders Need to Know from COVID-19 to New Administration Policies
• 2021 Asia-Pacific Healthcare Trends: Growing Digitization, Universal Health Coverage, and More
• Healthcare Trends During COVID-19: Top Five Areas to Watch
• The Top Three 2020 Healthcare Trends and How to PrepareValue-Based Purchasing 2020: A 10-Year Progress Report