US hospital chief signs up for Cayman conference

CNS): The boss of a major US hospital and a Canadian health care consultant will be two of the speakers appearing at Cayman’s annual health conference next month. Steven Thompson, CEO at Johns Hopkins Medicine International and Senior Vice president of Johns Hopkins Medicine will be analysing the issue of improving the health status of individuals and communities via a number of different strategies, while Cynthia Hastings-James, Co-founder of Cookson James Loyalty Inc & BestLifeRewarded.com, will be examining how incentives can drive health behaviour change. The 20/20 Healthcare Conference will be looking at ways to ensure that patient care is a priority for healthcare providers.

According to a release from the conference organisers Thompson has over 25 years’ experience in various positions within academic medicine and academic health centres. He says that over the past decade there has been growing attention paid to the development of strategies to improve the health status of individuals and communities.

“This arises from a growing number of reports that highlight metrics which indicate health status and healthcare delivery are not achieving the outcomes desired in a cost-effective manner,” he said “A number of approaches have been developed with the emphasis of placing the patient at the core, to improve quality and outcomes. These include the development of patient and family centred care, patient centred medical homes, guided care and the Aliki Initiative, which has been established to educate healthcare professionals in patient centred care delivery.”

An early review of these initiatives highlights the need for improved patient care infrastructure, care provider training, patient education and informatics support. “While there is little dispute that this is the direction that must be taken, it is increasingly clear that thoughtful analysis and preparation are required to achieve the desired results,” he added

Meanwhile, Hastings-James who was described as an expert in her field has over 15 years of health promotion, medical education and marketing experience. She co-founded Cookson James Loyalty Inc and launched the BestLifeRewarded health incentive platform, which has been credited with changing the face of Canadian healthcare by producing a personalised focus on the end health consumer, conference organisers Tower Marketing stated..

Hastings-James will be sharing her knowledge on the use of incentives with patient-centred approaches to improve intrinsic motivation and overall wellness at the conference audience and will also be speaking as a panellist during the workplace wellness breakout session.

The theme of this year’s conference, which is set to take place from 18 – 20 October at The Ritz-Carlton, is ‘Patient-Centred Care: Achieving Quality Outcomes’  The conference is free and open to the public and everybody who is interested in healthcare in the Cayman Islands is encouraged to attend. For more information or to register visit www.healthcareconference.ky