Kelly Emrick MBA, PhD.

  Dr. Emrick's Books, Blogs, and Podcasts Let's just acknowledge it upfront: Leading in healthcare right now is incredibly challenging. If you're feeling like you're constantly juggling, trying to keep multiple plates spinning while the ground shifts beneath your feet, you're definitely not imagining things. It feels intense because it is intense. Leaders are grappling with some significant headwinds all at once, the kind that make you wonder how to keep steering the ship effectively. Specifically, the financial realities are hitting hard. Budgets are tight, demanding incredibly difficult decisions that impact resources, services, and our people. While hospital financial results improved slightly in 2024, there is a looming liquidity issue. Notably, tariffs will erode about 15% of those margins. At the very same time, we're navigating the dizzying arrival of Artificial Intelligence. Is it the answer to our efficiency prayers, a new layer of complexity, or someth...

  Dr. Emrick's Books, Blogs, and Podcasts The Case for Radiology Research, Even When Budgets Are Tight Radiology's magic happens when scientists and clinicians together perform the art of peering into the body with minimal disruption. This magic doesn't just happen; it's built on years of not only scholarly research and discovery but also, and very importantly, funding. Right now, in 2025, we're at a crossroads. Funding for radiology research is becoming more problematic because of changes in NIH grants and competing interests that are trying to work their way into the federal budget. Radiology is a defined field by discovery. Think about the radiology researcher, who spent years learning how to make MRI scans clearer and faster, so that when 10-year-old Timmy was put into an MRI, he was able to get a diagnosis in minutes, not days. Rigorous clinical research has fueled the leaps from CT scans to the refinements being made with MRI. And the innovation doesn't ha...

  Dr. Emrick's Books, Blogs, and Podcasts Part II – 2025 Medicare Physician Fee Schedule The landscape of healthcare delivery is shifting dramatically, and forward-thinking practices are focusing their energy on four critical areas that will define success in the coming years. After 10 years of discussions, population health and value-based care management have finally emerged. And I predict that as the economy continues to struggle, it will accelerate the population’s health framework. Transitioning from a volume-based economic model to an outcome-based model depends on how effectively the practice or health system integrates its value-based care model. The alignment between fee schedule values and quality metrics is closer than ever. Innovative practices are adopting a systematic approach to this integration. They are tracking quality metrics and restructuring their care delivery models around them. Optimizing risk adjustment has become essential, with leading...

  Dr. Emrick's Books, Blogs, and Podcasts The Great Leadership Exodus Imagine walking into a hospital where nearly half of the top leaders are planning to leave within the next year. Picture the boardrooms, the strategy sessions, the late-night calls, suddenly missing the voices that have guided the organization through crises and triumphs. This isn’t a hypothetical scenario; it’s the reality facing many healthcare organizations today, as revealed by a recent survey from B.E. Smith, a division of AMN Healthcare. The 2025 Healthcare Leadership Trends survey paints a vivid picture: 46% of healthcare executives plan to leave their organizations within the next 12 months, with 26% ready to exit immediately or within six months. For healthcare leaders reading this, these numbers aren’t just statistics; they’re a call to action. Behind these percentages are real people, leaders like you who have poured years into building careers and serving communities. The decision to leave isn’t made ...

  Dr. Emrick's Books, Blogs, and Podcasts Sugary Drinks: Poison, One Sip at A Time Have you ever stopped to think about what that daily soda or energy drink might be doing, not just to you, but to people all over the world? A fascinating study in Nature Medicine looked at how sugar-sweetened beverages (SSBs), you know, things like sodas, sweetened teas, and those flashy energy drinks, are playing a significant role in a global health crisis. I am talking about type 2 diabetes and heart disease, and the numbers they found are pretty staggering. Imagine this: In just one year, 2020, these sugary drinks were linked to 2.2 million new cases of diabetes and 1.2 million new cases of heart disease worldwide. That’s like the entire population of a small country suddenly facing these health struggles, all tied to something as simple as what you sip on every day. This isn’t just a random statistic either; it’s personal. Those 2.2 million diabetes cases make up almost 10% of all new diagnoses...

  Dr. Emrick's Books, Blogs, and Podcasts Could This Be the Key to Saving Memories? While researching new techniques for radiology brain imaging, I stumbled across a new research study that has me buzzing with hope, and if you know someone in your family affected by this runaway disease, this is the story for you.  Dementia is one of the biggest global health challenges, with an estimated 152 million people predicted to be living with dementia worldwide by 2050. The article is from a journal called Molecular Neurodegeneration, written by a team led by Wang et al. (2025). The research surrounds Alzheimer’s, a disease that’s like a thief, sneaking away memories and leaving millions of people and their families heartbroken. Scientists have been trying to crack this case for ages by targeting the usual suspects: sticky brain clumps called amyloid plaques and messy tangles called tau. But even when they clear that stuff out, the memory loss keeps coming. This new research says, “Ho...

  Dr. Emrick's Books, Blogs, and Podcasts Coffee Lovers, Rejoice Hey, lovers of coffee, prepare to hoist your mugs! A new study just dropped some seriously uplifting news: your daily brew may be doing more than just waking you up; it could be fighting cancer, too. Yep, you read that right. That comforting cup of joe you can't live without might also be a secret weapon against certain types of cancer. So, let's spill the beans on what this research is all about and why it's got us all a-twitter. Scientists have been pouring over long-term data (probably with coffee in hand) and found something pretty exciting: certain compounds in coffee might help prevent cancers like colon and liver cancer. We're not talking just about the caffeine here—coffee's packed with other goodies like antioxidants that could be the real MVPs in this story. This news hits different for the millions who treat coffee like a non-negotiable part of the day, whether a quick espresso shot or a...