Attended an ACHE meeting on 1/15/2009 where John Ferman of Health Policy Alternatives presented a session called Funding and Reimbursement Challenges of Healthcare Providers. Ferman described the impact of the recession, and the reaction by the health care industry.
My concern is: will hospitals be "penny wise and dollar foolish" with regards to clinical support services. For example, by eliminating lower paying clinical support service personnel who deliver food trays, hospitals will be passing on the labor of tray delivery to higher cost nursing personnel. This will leave less time for nurses to do actual patient care. The result would be a decline in clinical proficiency. In addition, nurses will be less satisfied with their work, and the result would be an increase in nurse staffing turnover. Thus nurse recruitment costs would increase.
I'm interested to hear how organizations are adapting to the recession with regards to clinical support services.