So where's the innovation?

Last week I had the chance to attend the VHA's annual leadership conference in Denver. Aside from being wowed by the civic energy and natural beauty of Denver--which seems like a city on the move!--I was a bit underwhelmed, at least by the range of products I saw at on the show floor.

Admittedly, this wasn't exactly HIMSS, which is doubtless where vendors spent their real money. Still, I had expected to see more variety and innovation at a show drawing about 3,000 of the top decision-makers in the hospital industry.

Now, I'm not saying that hospital IT vendors aren't innovative. But I am wondering why that innovation wasn't readily apparently on the VHA show's exhibit floor. I may be making too much of a leap here, but I'm wondering if this reflects accurate assumptions about the hospital IT investment process.

Are vendors assuming that they need to focus their marketing dollars directly on IT managers attending HIMSS, rather than the influencers and decision-makers outside of the department, such as COOs, VPs of patient care, chief nursing officers and senior pharmacy managers? Worse, are they right? Are hospital IT investment processes still being made inside of the IT department silo? 

As FierceHealthIT readers well know, hospital IT investments need to serve care processes as much as handle back-office functions. That's more the case than ever as apps like e-prescribing and EMRs become necessities.

If the vendors are reading the situation right, many non-technical health system execs don't feel that exploring IT innovation is their job. If that's the case, the situation needs to change soon, because you can't do your job without informed input. Maybe it's time to ping some of your colleagues outside of IT and see what they know. You might get an unpleasant surprise. - Anne

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