'Meaningful use,' health reform make CFOs think about clinical issues

Historically many CFOs have paid little attention to clinical issues, but two forces--the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act (ARRA) and health reform--are driving what the team at Emeryville, Calif.-based healthcare performance management software vendor MedeAnalytics calls a "clinical/financial convergence," says Ken Perez, the company's senior vice president of marketing. "Clinical quality, broadly defined, is becoming a major, if not the major, determinant of a hospital's financial viability." The upshot: Hospitals need to fine-tune their attention "on the specific clinical issues emphasized by these economic carrots and sticks," says Perez. And doing that will require an organizational rather than departmental emphasis. With the financial viability of the entire hospital at stake, CFOs can't afford to stay in their silo and say, for example, "That's the domain of the chief medical officer or the patient safety officer or the compliance officer," he stresses. FierceHealthFinance

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