With just two weeks until the General Assembly crossover deadline, MHA’s advocacy team and your government affairs leads have partnered together to make considerable progress on the field’s top priority—growing the health care workforce.

On Friday morning, Maryland Secretary of Health Laura Herrera Scott, M.D., visited the MHA offices to speak with and hear directly from hospital leaders. Secretary Herrera Scott shared that during her first 30 days she has begun a deep dive into the available data and an assessment of staffing, partnerships, and processes. She praised hospitals for their role as “an incredible partner in the state’s care delivery system.”

Today MHA is launching a new MHA Managing Patient Bias and Requests for Provider Concordance and Reassignment Toolkit. Developed with Erika McMullen, founder and CEO of Moxie Consulting Group and Dr. Nicole Rochester, founder and CEO of Your GPS Doc, the toolkit will help your teams navigate patient requests for provider concordance and reassignment and support colleagues that are facing bias—based on race, sex, religion, age, and more—from their patients.

Maryland’s unique financing system, the Total Cost of Care Model, acted as a shock absorber to the early effects of the COVID-19 pandemic. Yet, hospitals are not protected from events that have led to a “perfect storm” of financial challenges—record inflation for supplies, drugs, and equipment, as well as overwhelming labor costs. As a result, Maryland hospitals’ median operating margin was negative for 12 of the last 14 months. The latest monthly median margin was negative 1.4%. This compares to pre-pandemic margins of 2% to 3% on average.

Erin, a nurse at R Adams Cowley Shock Trauma Center at the University of Maryland Erin and Pasha are lending their voices to MHA’s JoinMdHealth campaign—our field’s first statewide workforce recruitment campaign. The digital advertising launches February 6 and features your best spokespeople—your own awesome team members. This marketing push shines a light on the special opportunities for career development and personal fulfillment available in our hospitals and health systems.

In his inaugural address, our new, history-making governor, Wes Moore, outlined his vision to make Maryland the safest and healthiest state in the nation. This is a goal we all share and one that our fieldwide advocacy agenda will help us reach. The beginning of the Moore administration has been marked by enthusiasm and a fresh energy that many of you experienced at the celebrations surrounding Gov. Moore’s swearing-in.

During the General Assembly’s 445th legislative session, which kicked off January 11, lawmakers will consider serious issues that affect your health systems, your patients, and your communities. MHA and your hospital leaders also have been key to incoming Gov. Wes Moore’s transition planning on health care policy, and we look forward to building on that strong foundation after he is sworn in on January 18.

Omicron put nearly 3,500 Marylanders in your hospital beds on one day—January 11, 2022. Around that time, 15 Maryland hospitals made the extraordinary decision to adopt crisis standards of care.

With the holiday season upon us, we should take the time to reflect on the year now ending. It’s striking how many challenges Maryland hospitals and health systems faced and what you’ve accomplished. Your dedicated, mission-driven teams have been nimble and creative to maintain high standards of care amid workforce shortages, financial stresses, waves of COVID-19, and now an unprecedented flu and RSV season.

We recently reached a milestone: 1,000 days since a Maryland hospital admitted our state’s first patient for COVID-19. Looking back on these past nearly three years, the immense toll of this pandemic—on our workforce, our hospitals, and the people we serve—has yet to be fully revealed. It may be some time before we understand the effects on everything from health equity and behavioral health to education and population health.

While a few results are still being tallied, it’s clear Maryland had a historic election. The statewide elected office winners are the most diverse ever. They include: Maryland’s first Black Governor-elect Wes Moore; Lieutenant Governor-elect Aruna Miller, the first woman of color and first immigrant elected to statewide office in Maryland; Brooke Lierman as our state’s first female Comptroller; and Anthony Brown as our first Black Attorney General.

As we head into flu and respiratory illness season, already there are record numbers of patients overflowing emergency departments and pediatric ICUs. We’re likely to continue to feel the strain throughout the fall and winter, particularly if we see another cold-weather COVID spike. We aim to help you preserve limited resources and peoplepower for the sickest patients—those who truly need hospital care.

Everyone deserves the opportunity to achieve optimal health—regardless of social, economic, or racial/ethnic differences. Yet, longstanding health disparities persist in Maryland and nationwide. MHA and Maryland hospitals and health systems committed to address these inequities. We are encouraged by promising efforts here—such as measures to help caregivers recognize and overcome implicit bias—and across the country.

Your MHA team has been busy connecting with new and prospective elected officials, communicating the importance of hospitals, health systems, and their employees—who comprise the state’s largest private sector industry.

MHA’s Executive Committee came together recently for a two-day meeting to address the tough challenges Maryland hospitals are facing collectively.

This is a commitment we all share. September is Suicide Prevention Awareness Month, and September 17 is National Physician Suicide Awareness Day. This day of recognition is sadly necessary, because 400 physicians die by suicide each year, and shocking data show that physicians and nurses die by suicide at twice the rate of the general population.

In Maryland, we’re welcoming fewer cases and fewer COVID inpatients than our neighboring states, the District, and the nation. But as fall approaches, we must be prepared. We typically see cases rise as people move indoors and, as happened over the past two years, new virus variants emerge.

Tuesday night we hosted dozens of hospital leaders at MHA headquarters for a rousing discussion about a potential new twist on Global Budget Revenue (seriously!). There were different perspectives along with many new faces in the room as CEOs, CFOs, COOs, and other top executives from all parts of the state came together to talk about the need for change, support, and fewer barriers. And, importantly, how we can do better for our communities under Maryland’s heavily regulated system.

Historic. Staggering. Unsustainable. These are just a few of the words Maryland hospital leaders use to describe workforce shortages that have worsened over the past two and a half years. A 2022 Global Data report, commissioned by MHA, predicts the shortage will grow worse. That data lines up with projections showing that, without intervention, openings could double or even triple by 2035.

Last week the national 988 Suicide & Crisis Lifeline debuted. The line gives those with behavioral health and substance abuse issues an alternative to 911. In Maryland there are eight coordinating centers with counselors to connect callers to the right setting—whether it be a safe station, a crisis or mental health center, or urgent care. Though the hotline comes with $400 million nationwide in federal support to enhance mental health services and crisis centers, we know more needs to be done.