Thomas H. Lee – författare

Two leading physicians'' prescription for solving our health care problems: organizing the fragmented system that delivers care.

One of the most daunting challenges facing the new U.S. administration is health care reform. The size of the system, the number of stakeholders, and ever-rising costs make the problem seem almost intractable. But in Chaos and Organization in Health Care, two leading physicians offer an optimistic prognosis. In their frontline work as providers, Thomas Lee and James Mongan see the inefficiency, the missed opportunities, and the occasional harm that can result from the current system. The root cause of these problems, they argue, is chaos in the delivery of care. If the problem is chaos, the solution is organization, and in this timely and outspoken book, they offer a plan.

In many ways, this chaos is caused by something good: the dramatic progress in medical science—the explosion of medical knowledge and the exponential increase in treatment options. Imposed on a fragmented system of small practices and individual patients with multiple providers, progress results in chaos. Lee and Mongan argue that attacking this chaos is even more important than whether health care is managed by government or controlled by market forces. Some providers are already tightly organized, adapting management principles from business and offering care that is by many measures safer, better, and less costly.

Lee and Mongan propose multiple strategies that can be adopted nationwide, including electronic medical records and information systems for sharing knowledge; team-based care, with doctors and other providers working together; and disease management programs to coordinate care for the sickest patients.

U.S. policymakers must come to terms with the implications of the "globalization of technology"—specifically, the dramatic increase in crossborder technical activities of private corporations and the rapid growth and redistribution of global technical capabilities since the mid-1970s.

This book presents a policy framework for reconciling our national interests with the realities of the emerging global technical enterprise. Specific recommendations address how public policies can help ensure that U.S. citizens derive a fair share of the benefits of the global technology base. The volume discusses corporate nationality and its relevance to the policy debate, the need for greater international policy cooperation and negotiation in antitrust law, and the obligations of multinational corporations and their home and host governments. It also includes a series of detailed, up-to-date "technology profiles" of eight global industries, from aircraft engines to semiconductors.

The best strategies in healthcare begin with empathy

Revolutionary advances in medical knowledge have caused doctors to become so focused on their narrow fields of expertise that they often overlook the simplest fact of all: their patients are suffering. This suffering goes beyond physical pain. It includes the fear, uncertainty, anxiety, confusion, mistrust, and waiting that so often characterize modern healthcare.

One of healthcare’s most acclaimed thought leaders, Dr. Thomas H. Lee shows that world-class medical treatment and compassionate care are not mutually exclusive. In An Epidemic of Empathy in Healthcare, he argues that we must have it both ways—that combining advanced science with empathic care is the only way to build the health systems our society needs and deserves. Organizing providers so that care is compassionate and coordinated is not only the right thing to do for patients, it also forms the core of strategy in healthcare’s competitive new marketplace. It provides business advantages to organizations that strive to reduce human suffering effectively, reliably, and efficiently.

Lee explains how to develop a culture that treats the patient, not the malady, and he provides step-by-step guidance for unleashing an “epidemic of empathy” by:

Healthcare is entering a new era driven by competition on value—meeting patients’ needs as efficiently as possible. Leaders must make the choice either to move forward and build a new culture designed for twenty-first-century medicine or to maintain old models and practices and be left behind.

Lee argues that empathic care resonates with the noblest values of all clinicians. If healthcare organizations can help caregivers live up to these values and focus on alleviating their patients’ suffering, they hold the key to improving value-based care and driving business success.

Join the compassionate care movement and unleash an epidemic of empathy!

Thomas H. Lee, MD, is Chief Medical Officer of Press Ganey, with more than three decades of experience in healthcare performance improvement as a practicing physician, leader in provider organizations, researcher, and health policy expert. He is a Professor (Part-time) of Medicine at Harvard Medical School and Professor of Health Policy and Management at the Harvard School of Public Health.

From the top experts on healthcare workforce engagement comes a vital road map to reduce the alarmingly high—and fast-growing—rate of staff burnout and to transform care.

More than half of U.S. physicians and 40 percent of nurses experience one or more symptoms of burnout. This crisis poses a serious threat to our health systems, impacting not only the well-being of the caregiving workforce but also that of their patients.

Written by a team of thought leaders with deep expertise in healthcare workforce engagement and cultural development, The Engaged Caregiver shows leaders, managers, and front-line providers how to:

•Recognize the early signs of burnout and turn it around

•Address staff more effectively to keep them engaged

•Build strong, reliable teams with a real sense of purpose

•Map their organization’s core values and get everyone on board

•Create a positive culture that’s cohesive, inclusive, and resilient

•Develop highly effective leadership and organizational systems

•Hire, engage, and manage talent strategically—and successfully

•Promote diversity, equity, and inclusion in the workplace

•Leverage data to drive improvements throughout the organization

In this wide-ranging guide, healthcare professionals will learn how to identify, diagnose, address, and overcome caregiver burnout on a personal level, as well as measure, develop, and implement strategies that improve the entire workplace culture. The Engaged Caregiver provides an actionable plan for creating a resilient work culture that empowers caregivers and gives them the support they need to fulfill the patient promise with every care experience, every day.

From the author of The Epidemic of Empathy in Healthcare and The Good Doctor comes a book that explores how the pandemic and other crises revealed what excellence in healthcare truly means and presents an action plan to achieve it.

The goal of healthcare has always been to reduce suffering, but three perfect storms of recent years—the health storm produced by the Covid-19 pandemic; the economic storm that resulted from its disruptions; and the social storm that followed the murder of George Floyd, which sparked fresh outrage at longstanding inequities—have sharpened and added important nuances to our understanding of what that means. In Healthcare’s Path Forward, Thomas Lee explores how the work of healthcare is being transformed by a deeper knowledge of what suffering means for patients, their families, and healthcare providers themselves. To respond, healthcare organizations must:

Lee uses data to demonstrate trends and insights into how health systems can thrive, offers examples of organizations making major advancements, and provides specific, practical recommendations for healthcare leaders, clinicians, and other caregivers. This book is a thoughtful, impassioned call to work toward excellence and forge healthcare’s path forward—together.

Harness the power of social capital to improve the efficacy and efficiency of healthcare organizations

Written by Thomas Lee, Chief Medical Officer at Press Ganey, Social Capital in Healthcare describes a new and powerful framework for improving healthcare, arguing that managers should approach the work of building trust, teamwork, and high reliability with the same intensity and discipline as CFOs use when managing the finances of their organizations.

Lee''s powerful framework integrates management priorities such as safety, quality, patient experience, and workforce resilience/burnout/loyalty, demonstrating through data that these “silos” are in fact intertwined, and the work of improving them is best taken on with a single focus: improving social capital.

In this book, readers will learn about:

Drawing upon deeply respected work from sociology, psychology, and business strategy, Social Capital in Healthcare earns a well-deserved spot on the bookshelves of all forward-thinking healthcare executives, managers, and consultants.

Lawson is well along in satisfying these objectives when he is asked to fly to Saigon to assist the United States Embassys Defense Attach Office in fixing problems with their intelligence systems. In a matter of days, he finds himself drawn into the dark world of CIA operations by a cultured and attractive French-speaking Vietnamese woman, Lan Le Ninh. Finding both her and the nature of the work compelling, Lawson voluntarily abandons his life of leisure in Thailand.

From this point on, its a race to correct the aberrant systems before the North Vietnamese communists launch their long-feared final offensive. In the process, Lawson learns a great deal about Americas long-running secret war in Southeast Asiaand how many Americans died anonymously in carrying it out.