by Tony Chen

I'm very excited to announce our newest blogger at Hospital Impact: Mr. Joe Wasserman.

Wasserman is the President and CEO of Lakeland Healthcare, a three-hospital system that includes two long-term facilities, an assisted living center, 3,500 associates, and 325 physicians located in Southwest Michigan. He has been in this role since 1985.

Joe received his Masters of Health Services Administration from the University of Michigan - Ann Arbor. He is also a Fellow of the ACHE.

Joe: Welcome to the community and the team, and we look forward to working with you.

by Tony Chen

Follow Hospital Impact on Twitter. There, I'll be providing daily links, "recently heard" quotes, & commentary on the news of the day.

What is twitter, you ask? Well, think about it like a blend between a blog and an instant message. Entries are limited to 140 characters and show up on your "followers'" homepage. See wikipedia's explanation of Twitter.

At the end of the day, twitter is basically a new communication tool. You can blast information out, you can interact with like-minded followers and readers. And you can learn more about your market - real-time. Every day, I'm getting at least a couple of hospitals who sign up for twitter and start following us. More on how hospitals can use twitter in a later post.

In the meantime, head over to twitter.com/hospitalimpact and tell me what you think. Waste of time or useful communication tool?

by Tony Chen

As you have probably figured out by the new look here at hospital impact, we have made some big changes. As I eluded to in an earlier post, I am excited to announce that the Hospital Impact blog is now a part of the FierceMarkets family. For those visiting for the first time, welcome! Read about us.

How We Decided to Team Up
After 3+ years of blogging, I've realized that Hospital Impact has become a great, fresh "hospital leader" perspective, one that is still very much needed in our industry. I have been getting the FierceHealthcare daily email newsletter for almost 3 years now, and have found them to be filled with great tidbits and even new business ideas. Those newsletters have even occasionally linked to posts here on the blog. With their fresh approach in delivering healthcare news and Hospital Impact's emphasis on the "insider" perspective and analysis, we think it's a great match going forward. For me, it's also a realization that Hospital Impact can be so much better with me out of the way and just involved with the work I enjoy most about it - the writing itself.

What This All Means for You
The main thing is that Hospital Impact will continue as a blog for hospital leaders by hospital leaders, and if anything, we'll be seeing a lot more traffic, and subsequently, more comments and discussions.

Read more!

by Tony Chen

Just a quick note to say that we are looking for a few good hospital executives to join the blogging team here at Hospital Impact. Here's a refresher of what we're looking for. email me at tony [at] hospitalimpact [dot] org if you are interested.

We also have a big announcement to make in the next few weeks. I'll share the details as soon as I can, but the upshot will be that Hospital Impact will be getting a lot more exposure in the coming months.

by Tony Chen

I'll be at PDMA's "Front End of Innovation" Conference in Boston next week. If anyone is around and up for drinks, let me know.

Last time I checked, I couldn't find any other hospital members of the PDMA (Product Development and Management Association). Think of them as the ACHE for innovation & product development people. As I interact with this group, I'm definitely stretched by their progressive thinking about how to bring innovation into any culture/organization (apparently, the Russians did a lot of innovation theory work back in the day that are still being utilized widely today).

What can hospitals learn from the likes of Dow, Staples, Google, Starbucks, IBM, Kraft? I'll let you know.