#itlab

Return to Executive War College 2021: More Important Than Ever

July 27, 2021

We’re in. Are you?

On November 2-3, we will be in San Antonio for the in-person meeting, greeting, networking, and learning opportunities that comes with each Executive War College conference. I urge you to register today and plan on joining us because frankly, the stakes are too high to miss this one. That’s why we quickly signed on as one of its sponsors.

Post-Pandemic Success

We’ve long been supporters of this gathering, but there is a sense of urgency for this year’s meeting. The theme is mission-critical: “Preparing Your Clinical Laboratory and Pathology Group for Post-Pandemic Success.” We’ve covered this topic several times in the U.S. HealthTek blog, but here, through panel discussions and seminars, laboratory and pathology managers and trend experts will explore what the post-pandemic world might look like. You will want a peek.

Topics to be covered include:

Understanding the changes to the U.S. healthcare system triggered by the pandemic;
Exploring new opportunities for labs and pathology groups (our “5 Ways to Be Prepared” article might help as well); and
Discovering opportunities that can generate new sources of revenue.

Changes Accelerated by the Pandemic

Also, to be explored are several trends that began in the Before Times, which the pandemic accelerated. One I’ve written about advocates for labs to prepare for a move toward a Direct-to-Consumer Model. Then there is the trend of working remotely – something I’ve promoted for decades (you’ll find an example of how successful this can be in “Virtual CIO Success Stories”). Finally, as the younger generation grows into adulthood, we certainly saw that the acceptance of telehealth and virtual doctor visits were trending. The pandemic has really shifted this movement into overdrive.

All these transformations are going on now, and the labs that can pivot for these changes will be the more successful and profitable ones.

Cristy and myself on the way to the U.S. HealthTek sponsored Grand Reception at the last Executive War Conference.

Critical Networking Opportunities

As I write, Robert Michel of the Dark Report and the rest of the team at the Executive War College are still putting together the full agenda. He writes: “you can count on us to schedule sessions and speakers from those labs that have identified the new needs of physicians, patients, and hospitals and are now delivering relevant lab testing services while generating new sources of revenue. We are gathering the best and brightest in our profession so that you get as much value from networking opportunities as you do from the top-flight sessions and speakers.”

Believe it.

Yet one aspect will remain the same: The networking. The casual conversations that happen in line for coffee and the meeting person-to-person are going to be especially refreshing and professionally satisfying. But it won’t be completely COVID-less, as following CDC directives will mean it’s a smaller gathering than what typically happens.

Oh, and it’s held at the Hyatt Riverwalk Hotel, which is a great location. We’ll be trying to fit in at least one walk along the river. I hope you’ll join us for all of it.

Clinical Lab Services Market Growth: 5 Ways to Be Prepared

April 29, 2021

By Bryan Firestone

Our industry is slated for growth, and a lot of it. PR Newswire reports that the global clinical lab services market will be seeing exponential growth through to at least 2025. I do not have to look any further than my inbox to confirm that we as an industry are already well on our way to a busier future.

There are several reasons for this, including lab services technical advancements, spread of infectious ailments, and, as we’ve written about, more labs are becoming more DTC forward-facing. More specifically, the PRN article cites the increase in our geriatric population, a group that typically has weaker immune systems, and “this will also affect the clinical laboratory services market on positive grounds.”

Another report published this past February from Grand View Research predicts growth as well: “The global clinical laboratory service market size was valued at $200.3 billion in 2020 and is expected to expand at a compound annual growth rate of 4.7% from 2021 to 2028.” They point to the increase of chronic diseases and “growing demand for early diagnostics tests which are expected to be high impact-rendering drivers for market growth.” This is something we are experiencing firsthand: technology is fueling growth, including the demand for the early detection of diseases.

Some may have mixed feelings about this, but I’m curious about the fact that at least a portion of growth won’t exactly be organic, as marketing firms are “engaged in introducing new services to serve the unmet demand of patients.” I’ve always seen our industry as a whole to respond pretty quickly to any new needs from patients without a marketing firm’s involvement, but let’s see how that pans out.

Finally, let’s throw in two more points that are very real. The first is the increasing use of at-home testing kits:

The clinical chemistry segment dominated the market for clinical laboratory services and accounted for the largest revenue share of 51.5% in 2020, owing to the presence of numerous clinical chemistry tests, the introduction of new technologies, alternative sampling methods, and the emergence of point-of-care testing methods.

The second is toxicology testing:

… the toxicology testing services segment is expected to grow at the fastest rate during the forecast period. Toxicology testing is in high demand as most of the smaller and/or startup laboratories find toxicology screening clinically and financially feasible. In addition, an increase in the launch of new consumables that provide improved solutions to make drug testing easy, accurate, and fast is expected to boost the market for clinical laboratory services.

There are other variables, and exactly where it all takes us remains to be seen, but it is indisputable that growth is happening. So now the question for the individual lab becomes, what can you do today to be able to capture the market expansion that is coming?

There are five key requests we’re seeing, and any of them, or combination of them, will prepare your IT operations to be ready to grow with the market.

Develop a Plan for Your Future. As this is likely going to lead to an investment — and possibly a sizable one — let’s look at developing a 5-10 year plan. No crystal ball needed; just professionals with balanced, deep experiences who know to ask questions and listen rather than presume anything about your organization. Then, chart out the vision and get everyone on the same page.
IT Assessment. The second step is to do an assessment of your IT configuration, staff, and IT leadership. Since this is the building block to everything that follows, we recommend an outside set of eyes. You want a team removed from the inner dynamics of your corporate culture, but one that can also become part of the team. A wider objective perspective is really critical at this point.
Infrastructure Assessment. What systems are you using? What are the inefficiencies, and how can they be improved? Aspects of IT infrastructure, personnel, training, physical upgrade, and communication both internally and externally need to be put under a microscope.
Integration/Interface Assessment. Technology and best practices provide many tools to have your integrations/interfaces performing at a fast, accurate level. The question is really to figure out what the best approach is for each lab. Testing and assessing how different IT aspects of your organization are communicating (or in some cases, not communicating!) is something that needs to be done periodically anyway, but especially when planning and preparing for growth. Part of this definitely includes the local server versus cloud conversation.
Virtual CIO Assessment. So often we see growth hampered by budget realities, and that certainly happens with the need of executive personal. We’re seeing many labs turn to a Virtual CIO as a solution. Virtual CIOs offer the experience and insight of a seasoned professional at a fraction of the cost of hiring that personnel in-house.

Many labs are already reacting quickly by increasing their IT investments and getting ready for expansion, and we encourage everyone to prepare now. It’s a remarkable, exciting time for our industry and I look forward to helping our partners ride this coming wave of growth. Now if you’ll excuse me, I have an inbox to attend to ….

Moving Your Lab to a DTC Model: User-Friendly Reports

March 3, 2021

By Bryan Firestone

Could your lab end up needing a forward-facing employee who deals directly with patients? I say it’s likely; here’s why. What we’ve seen with COVID testing is a sudden emphasis on patient-directed orders. Patients are going directly to a testing facility, bypassing their physician. Here at U.S. HealthTek, we’ve seen a significant uptick in labs asking for patient-friendly portals. We’ve gotten involved as middlemen in a way, being proxy testing brokers. This has opened up possibilities and begs the question: Will this trend carry through with other types of testing? And if our customer base is fundamentally changing, what does that mean for our way of doing business?

This may be the driving force for us as an industry to address an issue I’ve been thinking about for a decade: Making lab reports more accessible to all – including “end users.” Coincidently, I recently ran across an article in WIRED I had saved from years ago that asked the question that so many of us have asked: Why are lab reports so hard to read? Lab reports are sometimes difficult to understand even for those working in medical offices, so maybe now is the time for a serious redesign. From the article:

The typical blood test report is an exercise in obfuscation, a document that needs to be translated by a lab technician or physician, and that’s if you somehow manage to see a copy of your results. In many US states, it’s illegal for a laboratory to send test results directly to a patient—a regulatory puzzle that leads some labs to simply deny direct results to any customer, anywhere. The blood may be yours—but the information it contains is not.

[Note: It is no longer illegal anywhere. In 2014 the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services took action to provide patients direct access to the patient’s completed lab tests reports in order “to empower patients to be informed partners with their health care providers.” Labs can and have been fined for not doing so (see page 8 of the December 2020 issue of the G2 Intelligence report). Yet the vast majority of patients don’t think to ask. Now that they are used to patient-direct lab experiences, I think they will.]

Color and Diagrams

As just one example, I see patients who want information about their cholesterol (such as their Complete Blood Count, etc.) being more comfortable going directly to a lab. And those tests ordered from a doctor’s visit? The patient will be more willing and motivated to take them home and read them – and understand them – without a doctor’s interpretation. Imagine a scenario where after the doctor’s visit, the doctor sends the patient to the lab, and then the lab sends the results directly to the patient. This could eliminate the need for a follow-up visit.

The article in WIRED showed examples from a couple of the big labs, and they had some simple, excellent ideas. These included using color, and adopting a familiar green-yellow-red palette to make it easier to identify what needs immediate attention. And those numbers that fill these reports usually have no context. Having reports that contain qualitative interpretations of the data, showing how low or high something is, would be easy enough to do. WIRED goes on to advocate keeping it simple with a single page overview, keeping it relevant with clear call-to-actions, and by including charts.

Over the years I’ve used these ideas and some of my own mock-ups to show how lab reports could be designed. I brought in some physicians to look at them to say what they liked and didn’t like. This was years ago, and it was really still a taboo subject in the sense that many physicians were weary of the whole idea. Understandably, they had concerns about patients correctly reading a lab report and managing their own health without physician assistance. I completely respect that, but I do think overall the trend for patients to go directly to labs for matter is inevitable and the onus is on us to find a way to present the data in a consumer-friendly format.

Maybe the reports with a series of gauges – like odometers, fuel and temperature gauges like a car dashboard. Or even a simpler approach like our example here. The use of color is powerful, and at a glance, with no explanation, a patient can understand it. Graphics like that are so much more meaningful than a number.

There are increasing examples of this approach being used by labs, though it could be taken further and be a more accepted practice. More than ever before, rethinking how information is reported, and formatting it so that they are so clear that little-to-no explanation is needed, is going to be something that patients come to expect. Labs that get ahead of this curve will have a clear advantage.

Looking Ahead to 2021: Trends During and After the Pandemic

January 26, 2021

By Bryan Firestone

I wish I had a crystal ball.

That I don’t has never been more obvious than when I reviewed what I wrote last January in Looking Ahead at 2020 – 6 Ways to Prepare for Disruption. Funny, “worldwide pandemic” wasn’t mentioned (though I guess I get a point for “disruption”?).

For our industry, the health crisis proved to be the boom in business nobody wanted, but we rose to its challenges nonetheless. As testing for COVID quickly ramped up, that typical ebb and flow of business that a lab navigates through during a normal year went to “11” and stayed there. Our focus here at U.S. HealthTek has always been to keep up with the demand, and our clients kept us busy. We saw a large number of start-up labs appear to meet the demands of COVID testing. We also noticed that the extra revenue labs brought in made it possible for them to address long-simmering IT needs and upgrades they had put off. In other instances, some who had started 2020 with a list of IT “to-do’s” shelved them earlier in the year. Now we’re seeing that those projects are definitely thawing, and I venture to guess there will be a significant uptick as labs re-engage in any and all work they had planned on for 2020. All of this adds up to a demand for experienced, quality IT professionals, and so we are preparing for a busy year.

Start-Ups

To those start-ups doing just COVID testing and to those labs who pivoted to making it their primary work: you may want to consider doing some math. If we do vaccinate 100 million in the first 100 days of the Biden administration, that’ll be almost 30 percent of the population. After another three or four months from that, those numbers increase further. Hopefully by summer we’ll be seeing a reduction of cases – and related, testing will inevitably decline. Labs in general, especially those start-ups, will definitely need to diversify to keep up in a market that is crowded already. Preparing for that now is advised.

The Cloud

The pandemic didn’t really slow the industry’s acceptance of cloud-based technology. In all the work with labs we’ve done this year, all but one moved their data to the cloud. The technology and security the cloud offers is significant. With it, the lab is able to avoid the expensive maintenance an onsite system requires. We’ve been especially successful moving labs to this because of our expertise, which allows us to make sure that it’s done right. Another development in this area is that, in addition to the big three services (AWS, Microsoft, and Google), there have been additional, smaller private cloud data centers popping up, though for us it’s not a direction we’ve taken clients yet. But watch for that option to grow.

Owning the Data

Another trend that has benefited our clients is the prospect of a lab owning their own data. Our clients see the clear advantage of this partnership as opposed to relying on a third-party vendor who “manages” their data and thus also ends up owning it. More professionals in the industry have become aware of how valuable this data is. Yes, we’re vertical service providers, and our offerings are broad. We do anything and everything from infrastructure, project management, staff management, revenue recognition, strategic initiatives and more – a complete spectrum of functions and services. But we stop at owning data. We know labs need to be agile and move quickly, be able to maintain quality, and take a long-term approach to their business. Key to that is owning your own data, and current and new clients really get that now more than ever, appreciating our partnership-based approach in ensuring it happens.

CRM

One more point to review from last year: fulCRM, our CRM solution. We have been incorporating it into our clients’ labs, and there is a lot of interest in it throughout the industry. (If you haven’t seen our video on it, it’s here.) The system, designed by our team to be lab-specific and less expensive than other solutions, facilitates customer loyalty and satisfaction in a simple, direct, effective way. Like all our products and services, we’re looking at further improvements. Internally we’re thinking of adding a supply ordering feature, and currently getting feedback on that idea. As 2021 rolls in and COVID rolls out with it, labs are going to need to be more competitive, and our fulCRM certainly offers an edge.

There is one more aspect to the coming year I’ve got my eye on – but it’s such a big topic, I’m saving it for next month’s article: patient-directed lab orders. Has COVID “trained” patients to bypass doctors and go straight to the lab? Stayed tuned for that. Meanwhile, here’s to a healthy, thriving 2021.

Software Development Services Doesn’t Have to Be Scary Part II

November 18, 2020

By Robert Negosian

Last month Bryan Firestone talked about the “scary” parts of software development for labs. I’m going to go a little deeper and offer a case study, but I do want to re-iterate one of his key points: Often we see labs immediately assume that they need to build software from scratch. My first job with a new client is to explore off-the-shelf solutions first, which is always the more inexpensive route to go, even when they need to be customized a bit. After exploring that and determining that something does need to be built, it’s my job to make sure it’s not only built well but functions in all the ways needed – including being able to handle future, unanticipated situations.

My first question to every client: What is the mission critical function of your operation? What are your needs? What systems are already available? We’re often involved with projects where the client has a specific problem to solve, and it’s usually an operational issue involving IT. There are operational workloads to consider, as well as what systems have to be implemented. The choice to build it or buy it impacts a client’s long-term needs.

Often a client will have it in their head that they want a brand-new system. If they’re right, and the need is pointing toward building something specific just for them, then we have to explore the “Is it worth it?” question. Exploring other ways to achieve the same goals might not only lead to significant savings, but result in better, more efficient processes. Of course, sometimes we have to blast through the “But we’ve always done it this way!” roadblock.

Tech is not a hobby to me. So while I’m a technical guy who knows code, I’m coming at it all from a business perspective. For example, I’m going to question building a $1 million new custom system to make $1.5 million. That’s not enough ROI for me. It needs to make $10 million to make sense. As my associate Mike Pratt likes to say, a lot of clients think they know what they want, but sometimes we need to bring them back to earth and really dig into what the needs of the lab are, and determine the best solutions for those needs.

Off the Shelf v. Custom

Off-the-shelf solutions usually require some configurations. Salesforce, for example, was originally known as a highly customizable CRM platform. It has a foundational layer that allows one to customize and build workflows and store huge amounts of data. They have become the giant they are because they realized the platform could be used in a broad array of business applications. So they pushed out their underlying technology as the product with the idea that any industry can adapt it to their needs.

But that’s just one idea we might bring to the table. The most important value U.S. HealthTek provides from my viewpoint is that we’re not tied to any one technology. We come with an open mind and a deep understanding of all the tools available. It’s a benefit because some consultants are married to specific software, and I’ve seen situations that rapidly devolve into what can only be described as trying to fit a square peg in a round hole.

As Bryan wrote last month, the number one reason to build a custom software system is when it offers proprietary advantages over your competition. So once U.S. HealthTek and the client decide to go the custom software route, we take all the precautions to ensure its success. For example, I’m always on the lookout for “scope creep.” This is when a builder starts on a two-story house and half-way through, the owner decides she wants a walk-out basement. Well, the foundation has already been poured, and now things have to be torn up. Any “Oh, by the way we need it to do this” after the fact runs up the cost and complicates the goal and the deadline. We ask all the right questions up-front to avoid having to tear up your foundation.

Case Study

If I’m told by a client that I need to capture basic data from patients like names, dates of birth, etc. – well, there are many options available for that situation. But if it also involves validating a driver’s license and social security number, then the government is involved, making it a more complex situation.

We had one client who had a Third Party Administrator (TPA) that handled all transactions manually. Associates would make calls to businesses, who would then send manual requisitions to another vendor. Sound like a big logistical nightmare? It was. The emails that followed … the faxes! So our client had the idea to create a portal that would basically automate all of this. Building it internally wasn’t feasible, and there was nothing off the shelf for their needs. But there were good reasons to go custom on this solution, and we were glad they came to us.

It took a year for us to complete the portal, but when it was done, it was completely automized for their specific needs. And it got great results, making them a leader in the country when it comes to TPA. The initial costs were not insignificant, but that is where they decided to invest their money. ROI? It saved them a ton of manual labor (and costs associated with it) and differentiated them from their competitors. Today they are handling 10 times the amount of business as they were before.

Business Before Building

I tell people I’m not necessarily an applications developer – I’m a logistical guy who can develop and implement custom software. I figure out the core of the problem, and determine whether it needs a hammer or a nail gun. Code is not a means to an end. It’s just a tool to solve a problem. So before going down this road – one that has many forks – we recommend that when you talk to your team, you see if there are off-the-shelf solutions, and if a custom software development is the best road to take, make sure you have the right people, the right tools, and a clear goal. Then it doesn’t have to be scary at all.

Oh, the Horror! (J/K: Software Development Doesn’t Have to Be Scary!)

October 30, 2020

By Bryan Firestone

What scares you the most about adapting new technology for your business? Scope creep, high costs, or uncertainty about future scaling might be a few fears that send a shiver down a manager’s spine. But your business is an organic entity that is evolving, growing, and potentially adapting from one business segment to another. That impacts the IT component of your business, and you don’t want it to eventually become part of the problem and not the solution. There might be a service you don’t have, or a platform that needs to be run more efficiently – any number of things. Sometimes an in-house IT professional will pitch building it internally from scratch. But when it comes to making the decision, the truth is that many CFOs and CEOs (understandably) don’t always know a lot about IT; in fact, sometimes they are downright scared of it!

What we see over and over again is a system built in-house that works pretty well – for a while. But as the lab grows, the system becomes clunky and outdated. Bugs need to be fixed, maintenance releases are required, and documentation all needs to be kept up with. Then many times, users adapt/accommodate the system through manual workaround processes that further slows things down. Future needs might not have been considered or maybe it was all done on a shoe-string budget. So now it’s taking a lot of time and money to maintain, and it appears that the only option is to replace it by building a custom software solution … or is that the only option?

To Build or Not to Build?

At U.S. HealthTek, a lot of what we do is building customized software solutions, so my next question might surprise you: Is there a product out there that already exists that can fit your need? Is there something “off-the-shelf” to save you time and money? If so, how does that measure up to the potential advantages of a custom-built solution? There are more options out there than you might realize, and it’s important to think outside the box of the lab world. Salesforce, for example, originally created as a CRM solution for industries, is a powerful automation and analytics platform that can be adapted for many uses, including applications and services in our lab industry.

We recommend that you look at building custom software only if it is determined that you have some kind of special need that’s not being met, or if that build will give you a specific competitive advantage; for example, a proprietary service or tool that will give you an edge over your competitors. That’s where you should spend your money in software development.

But by no means should you start there. Be sure you work with an experienced consultant who can explore all options, both internally and externally, to be sure you’re focusing your money and effort in the right direction. Part of our process is listening and fully understanding the problem that needs to be solved. If there’s an easier solution, we’ll suggest it. If not, we’ll discuss building a software solution in-house and what that means for your organization.

Friends, not Foes

In looking at a custom software solution, some think that they are going to build a product to take care of all their needs. Others think it won’t cost much money just to try.

Both are wrong.

It is human nature to be protective – even defensive – of one’s work. So it’s understandable when an internal IT team isn’t keen on outside consultants because they believe they can, and should, handle anything. At the same time, those in the C-Suite see that as a roadblock holding back business and feel an outside consulting team will make it better.

Both are right.

One reason to consider outside consultants is that often internal IT staffers are focused on a specific scope of view. They typically spend a lot of their time putting out fires, looking at what isn’t running well at that moment and fixing it to get through the week. And at no fault of theirs, they don’t always know what they don’t know. We will come into a situation like that with a clear understanding of “internal” (them) and “external” (us). The internal team knows the specifics better than anyone else. But we bring an outsider’s perspective, with experiences at many different companies, each with their own specific problems, challenges, and potential solutions. One key to success is attitude: We don’t walk in with all the answers. We just walk in with questions. Our goal is to quickly develop a working relationship with those who have been in the trenches and find solutions together. We leave having made friends.

What Is the ROI?

Buying or implementing solutions that already exist has clear advantages. It will always cost more to support your own software; but by buying off-the-shelf you’re putting support in someone else’s hands. However, if your plans are to develop something that adds clear value for your clients, that’s a smart place to put your money. Maybe it’s a new way of delivering custom reporting, a new customer portal that makes access to data easier and quicker, or a solution that’s improving efficiencies and resulting in faster turnaround times. So really the question becomes this: Is what you’re building providing additional value to your clients?

For software development, we recommend spending money that assures a strong ROI. To achieve that goal, we’ll do the analysis and create the specifications. We’ll project the scale of the business needs three to five years into the future. And know that we’ve seen it all – labs doing $5 million a year, others doing $1 billion a year – and everything in-between. We know how to focus on the immediate need and how to plan for the long run.

The IT lab is a crazy-complex world. There are a thousand moving parts, and not one piece of software can do everything. So, get as much information from as many sources as possible, and above all, be sure to work with a team that isn’t too quick to spend your money! And if there’s one person who comes at all of this first from the business perspective and secondly (and I mean a distant second) as an Information Technology expert, it’s our own Robert Negosian. Robert is as smart as he is blunt – but there’s nothing scary about him. He’s going to continue this conversation in the next blog, diving deeper and talking case studies. So stay tuned.

Meet the Team: Lauren Sutton

August 25, 2020

“What’s really cool about being a U.S. HealthTek project consultant is you’re not doing the same job all the time,” Lauren Sutton says. “There’s a lot of opportunity to learn and grow, and there’s no chance of getting bored!”

Like the other professionals at U.S. HealthTek, Lauren has spent almost her entire career working in the lab industry. (Except for that year she was a Napa Valley wine consultant. Does it come in handy in this business? Ask the next time you run into her!)

Lauren grew up on Lake Ontario, just north of Buffalo, New York, and still lives just outside that area. While earning her BA in Business Administration and Management from Buffalo State College and later an MBA from Medaille University, she took what seemed at first like “just a job” in college.

Lauren Sutton, Consultant at U.S. HealthTek

“I worked at a lab during school for a company that would become Quest,” she says. “I started out in specimen processing, went into billing, and then sales support. It was all really interesting to me.” Indeed, she spent 18 years there. Seeking new challenges, she made the move to Specialty Labs, quickly rising from hospital sales rep to become territory manager. But what is most special to Lauren about Specialty Laboratories was this is where she first met Cristy Reiter and Robert Negosian, the current President and COO of U.S. HealthTek, respectively. Stints at Amedisys and Immco Diagnostics happened next before she re-connected with Cristy and answered to call to join them at U.S. HealthTek in 2012 as a Senior Consultant, where she works with clients all over the country.

“I have worked with so many companies that not only have I gotten to learn different aspects of the business along the way, I’ve also made a lot of great friends.” Like most people you ask at U.S. HealthTek, she thrives in the company culture. “I like the fact that I am always busy, and that I have good mentors to learn from, like Robert who is amazing and so brilliant. The whole company is family-friendly and a true team – we can always reach out to each other if we have a question about anything. I think it’s one of the reasons we work so well together.”

She fits plenty of extra-curricular fun in, too. Bowling since she was 12, in college she bowled on a team and landed in the Buffalo Bowling Hall of Fame. Her passion for the sport and wanting to give back led her to volunteer for the past 12 years as a Youth Director for the Tonawandas USBC Bowling Association. “We promote youth bowling, sportsmanship and offer scholarship opportunities for kids of all ages,” she says. “It is so exciting to see these kids excel and their bowling scores grow; nothing better than that smile on their face when they bowl their highest scores.” She and her husband Ron have done well with their own three kids, too: Mathew works for a custom brokers company on the Canadian border and the other two are in the Navy, with Timothy serving as an ENT corpsman and Christina a general corpsman.

Meet the Team: Mike Pratt

July 24, 2020

Throughout his journey to becoming VP of Sales and Marketing, Mike Pratt has always kept his goals and passions in sight. They have directed him along his career path and ultimately led him to join U.S. HealthTek.

U.S. HealthTek’s VP Sales/Marketing Mike Pratt.

Mike’s roots are in Simsbury, Connecticut, a quaint New England farming town filled with picturesque rolling hills. While he graduated from St. Lawrence University with a degree in history, right out of college he found himself working in the medical field. “Within a week of graduating, I became a sales rep for what was then Fairfax Medical Lab,” he says. “I quickly saw my calling and became passionate about creating a higher level of quality in healthcare.”

In 2004, Fairfax was bought by Clinical Pathology Laboratories and then he worked (for the first time, but not the last) for Cristy Reiter, current president of U.S. HealthTek. “Cristy is the first to tell you how incestuous this industry is!” he says with a laugh. “It’s mind-blowing how many times you end up working with the same people. Let’s just say this is an industry where burning bridges is just not sustainable!” A long-term relationship led to him to Long Island, where he joined Sunrise Medical Laboratories and decided to try big-city life. “There I was, driving into Manhattan every day. I learned fast that the big city was not for me.” When the relationship went south, he went north to West Hartford, where he worked as an inventory control and fleet operations manager for Environmental Systems Corporation.

But his passion for healthcare beckoned, and in 2010 he returned to the industry with Saint Francis Healthcare Partners. As he rose through the ranks for the next eight years, he saw first-hand a critical paradigm shift happening in the industry. The ACO was mandating a switch from paper to digital records and physicians were being dragged “kicking and screaming” from a fee-for-service revenue model to a value-based model. He noticed another shift that particularly interested him and dictated his next big career move. “A lab used to be a facility down in the basement of the hospital, segregated from everything else, expected to churn out accurate and timely results,” he says. “But within a value-based system, labs need to present the data they generate in a more meaningful way. The Clinical Lab 2.0 movement embraces the lofty expectations labs now need to meet. I find it exciting.”

He quickly jumped at an opportunity to be U.S. HealthTek’s VP of Sales and Marketing in February 2019 to pursue this ideal. He was drawn to the open source approach founder Bryan Firestone has always taken with the business. “So often in IT, individuals keep their ‘secrets’ just that. Bryan is an original because he is inclusive, and shares everything with everybody. The company’s approach is always for a greater good, which is creating a better health care system. It’s an exciting company to work for that really has its priorities straight and has the intellectual muscle to make things happen.”

Sales and Customer Service During COVID-19: Are You ready?

July 1, 2020

By Bryan Firestone

There is much talk about what aspects of our lives will be permanently reshaped because of the pandemic. As my associate Mike Pratt discussed in an article even before coronavirus showed up, businesses have been making the shift to virtual operations. But here we are in a pandemic, and now those who were skeptical of the idea were temporarily “forced” in it. Now we’re seeing companies across all industries notice the profitability and efficacies of having staff work from home, and a company’s sales and customer service operations are a critical part of this shift.

Apparently, there is nothing like a pandemic to make sales and customer service both more important and more difficult. The personal touch has always mattered, and clients will still be seeking that, though how satisfaction is delivered may be different. It is a contradiction, to be sure, but here is our challenge: can we maintain and grow those relationships when there are more exchanges happening virtually? The starting point is a lab-specific, easy-to-use Customer Relationship Management (CRM) system that is globally accessible and built for the specifics of what your company does (read: your team will actually use it).

Communication— Inside and Out

Any good salesperson knows that a happy and returning customer is all about great communication. While many folks in our industry are still using giant spreadsheets to track interactions, today’s environment requires that we move beyond that, into something much more efficient. The right CRM product will allow your team to get past the technology and to simply use it to reach customers. Many CRM products like fulCRM are designed to allow staff to quickly pull up customer info, immediately get status on any issue, push potential red flags to the top before they become emergencies, and let the user focus on the information, not the tool. (There’s a nifty two-minute video about it here.)

And keep in mind that a CRM tool is not only for your external customers, but your internal ones as well. As we’ve written about before, the symbiotic relationship between IT and Sales deserves just as much attention as external customers. A solid CRM tool can facilitate internal communication and improve processes; your staff’s internal “customers” deserve quality customer service, too, and a CRM is a lifeline for achieving that.

Free Up Time for That Personal Touch

With this new normal we’re in, don’t sacrifice personal touch – in fact, it’s better to over-communicate and to reach out more frequently to be sure your customer feels taken care of. And don’t forget your customers are in a new normal, too. A great CRM tool can help you track your customer’s changing preferences and needs and to make sure you’re aware of those changes and can adapt to them quickly.

Across the board, the less bogged down in confusing paperwork and strung-together programs your coworkers are, the more attention can be paid to doing the tasks that can increase profits. Once you have the right CRM tool in place, your staff will have improved efficiency and can focus on great communication and that personal touch. And honestly, they’ll be happier for it.

The Right CRM App for Your Company

Choose a cloud-based CRM tool that can be accessed anywhere, by any member of your team. Being able to log in via your phone or tablet is now a necessity, not a luxury. And be sure your CRM software doesn’t do too much or too little for your organization – like Goldilocks, you want a CRM tool that’s just right, or it will end up a waste of time and money. Some CRM systems will allow you to get a tailored experience so there is no unnecessary clutter or features to learn and then forget because they’re not useful.

U.S. HealthTek saw the need for CRM tools for the medical lab industry years ago, and this is why we launched fulCRM — the only CRM system designed by lab people for lab people. We think it’s a perfect balance of function and affordability – if you’re a Fortune 500 company it’s not going to meet your needs, but if you’re a small- or medium-sized lab, it may just be the Goldilocks solution you’ve been looking for.

IT Versus Covid-19: Why Data Will Save Us

May 12, 2020

By Robert Negosian

My phone rang at 5 in the morning this weekend. I was happy to take the call because it was from the people whose work will lead to the defeat of this pandemic. The call was not from a politician, and certainly not from someone reacting to something they read on Facebook. It was from the IT department of a medical lab focused on delivering critically-needed COVID-19 testing kits. The issue was that three separate entities needed help coming together to exchange data accurately and quickly. The experience represents an important point: since the start of all this, medical lab-related IT teams have been answering the urgent call to action just like first responders. IT teams ensure that the infrastructure, processes, and systems that enable the collection of data continue to keep important work flowing, and in this conflict, information is key to winning the war.

U.S. HealthTek’s Robert Negosian.

With the Utmost Urgency

Back to the phone call. The task was to focus on ensuring that COVID-19 testing kits were shipped to the proper locations, that orders and results were transmitting seamlessly to minimize data-entry errors, and that turnaround time was decreased in routing data to analytics and lab systems. Then ultimately, this critical information needed to be delivered quickly to government and health officials to help them make real-time decisions in the battle against COVID-19.

COVID-19 is a cunning, elusive and overwhelming virus. But it cannot beat the technologies that US labs deploy to capture, format, analyze, and report data.

Stepping back, here’s the bigger picture that U.S. HealthTek and others saw as early as February: anytime there is a medical crisis, it’s immediately susceptible to misinformation, assumptions, and the great unknown. In situations like this, the data and the information derived from it becomes critical. That data begins to take shape thanks to the men and women working in medical labs across the globe and IT departments are the integral factor to corral that data, turning it into valuable information that can be shared universally. IT has always been the best tool for gaining information; no one can argue that, wherever they are on the political spectrum or how they feel about the state of the world. In the beginning of this pandemic, the data wasn’t there — or at least it wasn’t conclusive enough to even start to chart a path forward. There wasn’t enough known to make good decisions, and so the healthcare industry had to quickly leverage their greatest asset: data.

Data is best thought of as what is on the spreadsheet. A good analogy is found in baseball: you have a team of individual players and many ways to quantify them: hits, strikes, RBIs, etc. Those data points are dropped into columns on a spreadsheet. The coach then turns that data into information, which impacts decisions that lead to winning: batting order, whom to bench, who should be pitching, what pitches to throw, everything. The question of determining something like the COVID-19 death-rate percentage first depends on an accurate-as-possible count of those who have been infected by the virus, then counting recoveries versus deaths. Information is then pulled by breaking data down into categories – for example, noting that COVID-19 is fatal for 9% of people in their 70s, 13% percent for those over 80 years old, etc. Where does all this information come from? Lab IT.

How We Will Beat This

I’m working on logistics for a few labs in a state where they are already re-opening the economy even when cases and fatalities are still on the rise. There is therefore an urgency in those labs in knowing how many tests kits they can get out, how they get back to the lab, and how quickly the lab can make that patient data available to stakeholders. Decision making comes from policy makers at local, state, and federal levels such as the Departments of Health, the CDC, and even Homeland Security. All these consumers of information perform much-needed statistical analyses to define policy that impacts every person in every town of America, and throughout the world. For these decisions to be made intelligently and to the greatest benefit, the data and information provided must be standardized and delivered via IT-based tools and infrastructure.

People can complain that this pandemic is over-hyped, but Lab driven data is empirical and impartial. This is not just a biological challenge, it’s an informational challenge. We will beat COVID-19 because of our collective ability to gather information and make meaningful decisions for ourselves, our neighbors, and our families. And IT is critical to that whether people realize it or not. They are heroes too.