Recently, Michael Bond, Vice President of Sales and Marketing at Juno Health, sat down with Authority Magazine to discuss the topic of health tech for their interview series titled, Technology Making an Important Positive Social Impact. The discussion covered everything from Bond’s upbringing and family history to his interest in revolutionizing the way clinicians think of the EHR experience and helping to move health IT forward.
Bond was asked to speak about the particular problems he is trying to solve, and he responded by saying he aims, “to provide affordable, user-friendly electronic health record technology built on modern web and cloud infrastructure to help hospitals overcome significant clinician and CEO burnout. Out-of-date systems simply do not provide the necessary support to clinicians and can also result in worse patient outcomes.”
The following are our key takeaways from the conversation.
Bond talked about the problem of burnout and how an EHR that is built on 21st century technology (as opposed to 40-year-old technology) can leverage personalization, user-friendly design and the advanced tools we see in other industries. The result, he asserted, is less documentation burden, alleviation of burnout, and happier clinicians.
One ripple effect of this is improved care. When healthcare workers are stressed and unhappy they're less likely to provide the level of care patients deserve—even if they have the best of intentions. However, when clinicians feel empowered and are freed up to spend more time with patients, they can treat the person as well as the complaint.
Another benefit of user-friendly solutions like Juno EHR is the reduction in turnover, another massive problem facing the healthcare industry. Satisfied employees tend to stay where they are, as opposed to leaving for another job or leaving the industry altogether. Turnover is extremely expensive, resulting in the costs associated with recruiting, hiring, training, and paying contract wages.
All of this is a strain on the bottom line of hospitals, many of which are already struggling financially. Bond went on to mention that Juno EHR can help in this regard as well, because it’s easier to configure and costs significantly less than legacy solutions that add to the financial strain, particularly of smaller hospitals.
Bond’s ambitions are far reaching. In addition to the improvements mentioned above, he believes if everyone was using healthcare software that, like Juno EHR, drove better care delivery, was more affordable, and was built on modern technology, many of the other problems facing the healthcare industry could be addressed as well.
This includes better outcomes for patients and lower costs. The latter is important because, as Bond pointed out, our nation’s healthcare expenditures continue to grow, while our quality of care lags behind many other countries.
Bond also pointed out that the healthcare system can be chaotic, dysfunctional, and difficult for patients and their loved ones to navigate. “Even with the experience I have,” he said, “I sometimes have trouble navigating today's health systems.” Juno Health’s potential to change that is something to be excited about.
Bond acknowledged that AI is becoming widespread in our industry but cautioned that thoughtful implementation and ongoing consideration will be needed as we move forward. The potential to help clinicians and physicians complete tasks like documentation more efficiently is undeniable—and, if done right, will benefit patients as well.
But Bond argued, the practice of medicine should be led by the people who have dedicated their lives to it, and have the education, knowledge, and experience to pair with that dedication. The human element needs to be at the forefront.
Bond mentioned the five things he thinks people must consider to be successful in this regard: personalization, affordability, a need in the market, differentiation, and a vision for the future.
He says the evolution of Juno EHR was a result of the application of these elements as well as assembling a team who had a deep knowledge of the current state of EHR technology at the time. The team asked fundamental questions about what they were building and as result determined that it was imperative it could accomplish the following:
The most important step to creating an EHR capable of making a true, positive impact, Bond said, is starting with the latest technology and taking a forward-thinking approach to the future. If that sounds like the EHR you’re looking for, we’d love to show you the Juno EHR difference.