Becker's Hospital Review

20 INNOVATION How leaders rework systems to retain nurses By Ella Jeffries H ospitals are in a bind. As workforce shortages deepen and pay pressures mount, health systems are increasingly turning to technology to help retain their nurses. Many are piloting virtual nursing initiatives, ambient documentation and other AI- enabled tools designed to ease workloads. But ask chief nursing informatics officers where they are seeing results right now, and the answers are more straightforward. e biggest impact, they say, is coming from removing the small daily frustrations that make nurses' jobs harder than they need to be. At Philadelphia-based Jefferson Health, CNIO Colleen Mallozzi, RN, has spent the past year examining how nurses use the electronic health record. Her team found unnecessarily complex flowsheets, cluttered order sets and alerts that had lost their effectiveness. ey streamlined documentation, reduced required fields and cleaned up pathways to make the system easier to navigate. "Right now, retention isn't about the obvious plays — virtual nursing, ambient, AI — at least not yet," Ms. Mallozzi told Becker's. "Fewer clicks and smoother navigation mean more time with patients—and that's what supports nurses' well-being and keeps them here." Her approach reflects a shi happening across many health systems: before investing heavily in new tools, hospitals are reworking the digital infrastructure nurses rely on every day. At St. Petersburg, Fla.-based Johns Hopkins All Children's Hospital, CNIO Aruna Jagdeo, BSN, RN, said her team recently overhauled documentation workflows to remove redundancy and speed up routine charting. ey have integrated bedside equipment to reduce manual data entry and started using real-time staffing data to help managers advocate for support on the floor. e changes are not flashy, Ms. Jagdeo said, but they are meaningful. By cutting down on inefficient tasks, the hospital hopes to give nurses more time to focus on patient care. Some leaders are also looking ahead to a new generation of tools. At Charleston, S.C.-based Roper St. Francis CNIO Jared Houck, RN, pointed to the potential of "smart rooms" — hospital rooms equipped with sensors, ambient technologies and real-time data connections that can automate parts of documentation and patient monitoring. e technology is still emerging, but Houck believes it could fundamentally change the way nurses deliver care. "Combining AI-driven ambient and computer vision technologies, integrated sensors, real-time EHR data and intelligent automations together will redefine how nurses deliver care and how the patient experiences it," he said. For now, though, the most immediate gains are measured in minutes saved: fewer clicks, a workflow without workarounds, a system that helps rather than hinders. In a profession stretched thin, those changes can make a difference — both in how nurses work and whether they choose to stay. n Why Epic doesn't negotiate prices By Giles Bruce Epic doesn't negotiate prices for its EHR software, surprising — and delighting — some health system clients. The company used to let healthcare organizations haggle over price but stopped the practice in the early 1980s after many clients didn't, founder and CEO Judy Faulkner recalled in an Oct. 13 blog post. "They were such nice people, and they didn't know to negotiate," she wrote. "And the hardest negotiators, who were often not the nicest people, got the best deal, and that didn't feel right." Still, that doesn't mean some customers don't try to get a better price. Ms. Faulkner recalled a large organization that tried to negotiate. She stood firm. "They came back six months later and said, 'Judy, you never called us back up, you never looked back. You said goodbye and you walked away!'" she wrote. "It amazed them." Epic informs clients that if its prices are unreasonable — and the company can confirm — it will adjust, Ms. Faulkner said in the post. "People [have] also told us when our price was not high enough — usually after they signed the contract." n Mayo, Cleveland Clinic invest in augmented reality startup By Giles Bruce R ochester, Minn.-based Mayo Clinic and Cleveland Clinic have invested in a $24 million funding round for augmented reality startup MediView. The company, which was founded on intellectual property developed at Cleveland Clinic, has created an FDA- cleared augmented reality and AI platform that gives surgeons a 3D view of a patient's inner anatomy during a procedure. GE HealthCare led the series A investment, which also included Edge Ventures, the venture capital arm of Green Bay and La Crosse, Wis.-based Emplify Health. n

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