Integration of Knowledge Is the Winning Recipe. Especially During Crises
It is the classic situation in which, when things that change suddenly, planning is almost impossible. But, if you don't plan, maybe devising plan A and plan B, you risk being overwhelmed. "Bocconi was very helpful in this respect," says Luciano Ravera, a graduate in Business Economics in 1989, now managing director of the Humanitas Clinical Institute, the leading hospital of a group present in Italy. Humanitas has nine hospitals, including the famous Humanitas Research Hospital in Rozzano, 18 diagnostic centers, a research center and an international university dedicated to the medical sciences, for a total of about 6,000 employees. "I attended several strategic planning courses at Bocconi. With this pandemic we entered a world we didn't know, but we were able to react by keeping our nerves steady and working in a team. Which is also the recipe for effective planning, which must be fast and orderly. "
The work group, the concept on which Ravera insists, is the key to success, because in a large hospital there are not only healthcare personnel, but also other professional figures whose contribution is essential. "In our task force, which met twice a day in the most difficult moments, there are doctors but also engineers and managers, because this allows you to have different and equally important points of view". When a hospital is hit by such a cyclone, everything changes. "The structure changes, because you find yourself admitting patients who cannot stay in contact with others and therefore you must reinvent the arrangement of the wards. With the important twofold objective of better treating the sick and protecting health personnel. "
The Rozzano hospital has managed 250 Covid patients, a very large number, but care is not the only front on which Humanitas is engaged: "Research is equally important", continues Ravera, "within a week we are were able to set up a laboratory certified by the Lombardy Region, in which clinicians and researchers work side by side. At the moment we have 20 Humanitas clinical studies in place on Covid patients, which concern new drugs to be tested, new diagnostic indicators and more. Since there is currently no planned therapy ", the manager continues," it is important in the short term to identify which drugs are the most effective, as the vaccine is a medium-long term solution ".
Clinical research is also a great way to benchmark and in fact there are many hospitals with which Humanitas now interacts and compares itself: "We have been contacted by many hospitals around the world interested in knowing what we were doing, and now we are part of an international network in which we compare notes above all on the models of care", explains Ravera. "A webinar organized by one of our doctors on Covid ICU patients on March 28 was attended by 130,000 clinicians from different countries. The fact of being a partner of the University of Wuhan allowed us to draw on their experience. "
Being at the center of an emergency this serious, which even managers accustomed to delicate situations would never have imagined, has at least one positive aspect: discovering that you are part of an organization that works even under a very high degree of stress. "One of the most beautiful aspects of my role is to realize the profound integration of knowledge that distinguishes us, because in addition to the doctors, great effort is given by nurses, technicians, the whole team. A hospital can respond better or worse depending on how integrated its knowledge is. And in this, to my great satisfaction, I think I have set a good example. "