To celebrate and thank medical lab professionals for their vital role in contributing to patient health and well-being, Medline hosted a lab industry webinar during national Lab Week entitled “Healthcare Disruption, Laboratory Impact and Individual Response.”

Lab expert Jane Hermansen, MBA, MLS (ASCP), presented on some of the challenges currently disrupting the healthcare industry, lab’s role in addressing those challenges and career paths in lab available in and out of hospital systems.

With 35+ years in clinical lab leadership, Hermansen provided a snapshot of the size and importance of the U.S. clinical lab industry:

-$85B industry, with projected annual growth of 3.2% through 2030
-652K lab professionals
-233K CLIA-waved labs, from 283K labs total

Hermansen said that while statistics show that 70% of patient diagnoses are informed by lab data and 70% of a patient file is made up of lab data, laboratory testing accounts for only 3.3% of total national health expenditures.

“That’s a pretty good deal [for health systems],” said Hermansen, “Three cents on the dollar to influence 70 percent of patient care decisions.”

According to Hermansen, disruptions in healthcare that impact lab include the shift of patient care outside of hospital settings, more proactive patients, payment challenges, cost pressures and consolidation of health systems.

Key topics from webinar:

[From 00:00] Medline Introduction

[From 15:00] Lab by the numbers; Healthcare disruptions

[From 37:45] Lab Impact

[From 49:56]  Lab Career Path