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Establishing a Viable Career in Healthcare Through Tech
Technology and healthcare are inextricably linked for a number of reasons, not least of which being continual tech refinement leading toward automation and miniaturization. The new threshold in human development seems to be a field called “biotech”, and it involves a diversity of applications worth considering.
While most careers in healthcare that are chiefly built around technology probably won’t involve the application of technology toward new discoveries, many will manage that tech in terms of data networks, records-keeping, and compliance. If you’re tech savvy, there are a plethora of healthcare careers presently open to you.
Following, we’ll briefly explore five tips to help lead your technology career in healthcare markets. The field is somewhat competitive right now, so securing the position you need will require giving yourself every advantage possible.
Be Skilled in Compliant Remote Infrastructure
Owing to issues like the pandemic of 2020, remote medical infrastructure is at a new premium. Prior the 2020 pandemic, telemedicine was already an area of healthcare quickly gaining momentum. As social distancing manifested, remote operational infrastructure became exceptionally common.
Approximately 1 in 4 workers today complete their duties in a remote capacity. That’s notable. Many hospitals have no choice but to lean into this technological shift. Now remote medicine, that requires some technological acumen. But many IT people realize facilitating such solutions in telemedicine is very attainable.
If you can provide expertise in the facilitation of remote solutions like telemedicine, that will be very valuable in the present market. Such tech skills tend to be quite straightforward, so be sure to list remote infrastructure on your resume.
Provide Value Through Extensive Compliance Knowledge
HIPAA commonly charges tens of thousands of dollars for infractions, and they’re almost militant in how they do this. Healthcare institutions of any stripe must remain compliant to HIPAA regulations. If you’re able to facilitate compliance for a healthcare institution, big or small, that’s quite valuable, especially if you can do so in conjunction with other tech services.
Learn compliance requirements, and if you can demonstrate during an interview where a given healthcare clinic is out of compliance, then tell them the average fine for that, you may have just demonstrated the value of your acquisition.
A $100k infraction is going to be about your cost as an employee of a given healthcare institution annually. Save them that right off the bat, and they’ll see your acquisition as exceptionally valuable. They win, you win, and the government can’t extract some outrageous fee for a minor infraction.
Be Familiar With Revenue Cycle Management (RCM) Software
Revenue Cycle Management (RCM) software is very important for healthcare businesses. The truth is, in medicine a lot of bills go unpaid. The “cycle” of revenue tends to have unique characteristics for healthcare institutions.
Sometimes they can last longer than others. Familiarity with programs like RevenueXL can make a potential tech employee very valuable to a medical institution. RCM done properly will be lucrative for a healthcare facility, and given the idiosyncrasies of medical businesses in this area, sometimes tech people are the only ones who can do such software justice.
Put Skills on Display by Identifying Areas of Improvement
When you come into a healthcare clinic for an interview regarding a tech position, if you can take a quick look at what they’re doing, and suggest cost-effective improvements, that will demonstrate your value. Don’t let the cat out of the bag on the best possible upgrades immediately. However, there’s almost always somewhere things that can be improved.
Know the costs of the improvements you suggest, and demonstrate how upgrading to, say, cloud infrastructure or IoT (or both) might save a given healthcare business X amount of dollars after implementation costs.
Find Newer Healthcare Businesses Who Need IT People
Newer healthcare institutions will likely discover they need tech people after initially opening up to the public. The newer a healthcare operation, the more likely they’ll need to hire additional IT people.
Bigger institutions who are scaling out may have similar needs, but newer operations tend to have tech holes they don’t realize require filling until they’ve been operational for a little while. Accordingly, they may represent a point of focus as you seek employment.
Enabling Your Technology Career in Healthcare
Focusing on new healthcare clinics, putting your skills on display, being familiar with RCM software, having extensive compliance knowledge, and being skilled in remote infrastructure represent some notable aspects of healthcare IT acumen that have a high likelihood of getting you hired.
Know what healthcare employers need, what you can do, and how to demonstrate your skill. An approach built on these precepts should yield gainful employment.
