President’s Message
July, 2008
ANI: The Healthcare Finance Conference
Diana Gernhart and I attended ANI in Las Vegas in June as representatives of the Oregon Chapter. This was one of the better ANI’s I have attended; so I thought I would give you a brief summary of my experience.
We had some very good keynote speakers this year. Richard J. Umbdenstock, the President and CEO of the American Hospital Association gave an excellent overview of the critical issues facing healthcare. He is an awfully good speaker, clear and concise and “pulled no punches” in laying out that our healthcare system is broken. Next up was James Carville and Mary Matalin, political consultants and TV commentators. While Mary is “right” and James is “left”, somehow they have managed to have a successful marriage, and there was quite a bit of humor in their presentations about their political differences. No predictions on the Presidential Contest however. Tom Peters was the keynote on Wednesday. Tom is the author of many books including In Search of Excellence. He talked about the importance of relationships (building and maintaining human relationships!) and that there was so much that could be done to improve healthcare in the U.S. without spending a lot of money. He was entertaining and even though he ran over by 20 minutes, only a handful of the thousands in the audience left the room before he had finished.
There were so many sessions that I had interest in, and it was very difficult to chose. I finally selected a few that turned out to be very good indeed: Using Activity-Based Budgeting Methods, Major Project Financial Planning & Risk Analysis, Financial Benchmarking, and Washington Update. Each session provided good take-aways and the speakers were excellent.
On Tuesday evening, Diana and I attended the President’s Banquet. This is an event that recognizes Chapter accomplishments, and representatives from all the HFMA chapters attend. For FY 2007-08 the Oregon Chapter won four awards: Bronze awards of excellence in Education and Certification, and Yerger awards for the Region XI Symposium and the Symposium website. One chapter, Northern California, made a MAJOR turnaround from being on the HFMA watch list for underperformance to accumulating eight awards. They did it through an emphasis on membership involvement, strategic goals for improvement, and committing to committee chairs actively mentoring their co-chairs.
Next Year’s ANI will be hosted by our neighbor’s to the north in Seattle on June 14-17, 2009. How about putting a “tentative” on your calendars – it really is a wonderful opportunity for quality education and the opportunity to network with fellow HFMA members.
Barbara White
Oregon Chapter President, 2008-09