Good things can happen when physicians and hospitals collaborate.
Take the case of a small rural hospital that was on the brink of closing until it attracted two new doctors by understanding their needs and offering four-day work weeks, limited on-call commitment and time off to pursue international service work, says Jay Bhatt, the American Hospital Association’s senior vice president and chief medical officer.
Fostering that kind of collaboration is the reason behind the AHA’s launch of the new AHA Physician Alliance, Bhatt writes in an AHA article about the alliance.
The association hopes to bring together physicians and their hospitals and health systems to transform care and solve problems such as how rural and underserved regions can attract physicians.
“When physician and administrative leadership unite, powerful change is possible,” said Melinda Estes, M.D., an AHA board member, president and CEO at Kansas City-based Saint Luke’s Health System and chair of the AHA taskforce that set up the alliance.
The AHA has been working for the past year on how to best involve physicians and ensure the clinical voice is heard, writes Bhatt.
The Alliance will provide new resources, services and experiences on a range of issues including resilience, leadership, management, population and community health and team-based interprofessional care for physicians within AHA-member organizations.
The Alliance will focus on three values:
- Lead well by improving the health of the organization and developing collaborative teams.
- Be well by improving the health of clinicians and address the problem of burnout.
- Care well by making better health for patients and communities a priority.
It will support physician leaders and offer immersion experiences, virtual expeditions and webinars, podcasts, issue briefs, guides and toolkits, as well as dedicated educational tracks at AHA flagship meetings, the AHA said.