Strategic Planning

As healthcare executives look to the year ahead, one key to their growth strategies is pursuing merger and acquisition opportunities.

To be successful, a hospital must acquire physician practices able to work in a world that is essentially foreign to what they are used to. The 'new normal' is based on value, outcomes and patient satisfaction.

Strategy is the name of the game if you're a hospital CEO. For many, that includes a presence on social media. But is that a strategy every CEO should use?

The lure of rewards points is strong, as credit card companies will tell you. Use your credit card and points build up to be redeemed for gift cards, reductions on gasoline, even cash. One New Jersey hospital is using a rewards points program in the hopes of more effectively managing chronic disease patients.

Physicians aren't so much team players. Giving up decision-making control to someone else isn't in their DNA. But being an entrepreneur requires being a team player, giving up control, and managing people. It's a skill we have to learn.

For hospitals and health networks considering a development project or real estate transaction, engaging an advisor can provide numerous benefits. But how do you properly evaluate a firm in order to select the right advisor?

The Department of Defense has been testing patient-centered medical home models longer than most payers, and could offer lessons in team-based care for civilian providers.

Merger and acquisition activity within the healthcare sector was up in the third quarter of 2013, according to a report from M&A data publisher Irving Levin Associates.

With the advent of healthcare reform and the drive toward clinical integration, roles for physician executives have not only proliferated, they have broadened in scope.

The lure of data analytics is strong, but providers need to slow down in order to get the most out of it and not undermine what they're trying to accomplish with it.