Children’s hospitals are pulling through the pandemic with unique challenges and opportunities. The impact on individual pediatric organizations varies depending on ingoing financial position, organizational structure, level of relief funding, local disease prevalence, state/county pandemic response, and expediency and consistency of volume recovery.
This report provides a snapshot of how children’s health systems across the U.S. fared during this unprecedented time. In interviews with more than 20 children’s hospitals, C-suite leaders weighed in on how the pandemic uniquely impacted them and how they are pivoting for a new normal.
Key areas include patient volume, skyrocketing behavioral and mental health needs, financial performance improvement efforts, virtual care integration, and workforce issues. This report outlines benchmarks from our children’s hospital survey and imperatives for addressing these pressing issues to succeed in the new reality.
As children’s hospitals seek to reposition themselves in this new healthcare reality, they must take a multifaceted approach considering financial realities, clinical needs and requirements, competitive positioning, and workforce challenges. Each organization should tailor their specific strategies and initiatives to their unique market, finances, and community needs, but one fact is true for all—doing nothing is not an option.
