Healthcare technology should adapt to the work of clinicians, not the other way around. In medication management, that starts with understanding the clinical work — and removing the effort that doesn’t belong there.
Physicians, nurses, pharmacists, technicians and other clinicians come to work to care for patients. Along the way, they’re often expected to manage more systems, devices, logins, alerts and administrative tasks. Much of that burden goes unseen, and frequently very little of it has anything to do with their clinical training.
Over my career, I’ve watched technology get handed to people who never asked for it and weren’t involved in building it. It was done to them, not with them or for them. Those last two are where I think developers should put their effort.
That means starting with questions, not features. What problem is this person trying to solve? In what environment? How much effort does it take today? That’s what I mean by “technology with empathy.”
Remove the work that doesn’t need to be there
A pharmacist toggles between systems and logins to find basic inventory data. A nurse clicks through multiple screens for a routine dispense. A technician spends an hour on the phone tracking down information that should have been available digitally.
Any one of these moments seems minor. Across a 12-hour shift, they may add up — and each one can pull attention away from the work that actually affects patient care.
The goal isn’t to digitize every step clinicians perform today. It’s to remove the steps that don’t need to exist, so pharmacists, nurses, and technicians can spend their time on work that requires their training and judgment.
Match the safeguard to the risk
Nurses give medications while managing multiple patients and competing demands. They deserve technology that supports that workflow without getting in its way. If a task takes 12 taps, we should ask whether it can take fewer.
That doesn’t mean stripping out safeguards. There’s a human element to care that software won’t replace, and technology should support clinical expertise, not second-guess it. When the risk to the patient is higher, safeguards should step up. When a task is more routine and lower-risk, technology should get out of the way.
Let the system carry the load
Consider a patient who needs a medication at a scheduled time. In one version of that shift, the nurse opens the automated dispensing cabinet (ADC) and finds it empty. Then come the logins and the phone calls to get it restocked. The dose is late, and every minute spent chasing it is potentially a minute not spent with other patients. In another version, the pharmacy is alerted automatically when the medication runs low. A technician restocks the cabinet before it runs out, and the nurse gives the dose on time without making a single call.
Same nurse, same patient, same medication. The difference is where the work is carried — by the system or the caregivers. In my experience, that’s where most of the opportunity in medication management sits — not in asking people to work harder or pay closer attention, but in building systems that make the right thing the easy thing, whether at 2 P.M. or 2 A.M.
Good technology feels like relief
We’ve all used technology that technically works but still frustrates us because it fights the way we work. And we’ve all had the opposite experience: something that just works the way you hoped, no tutorial needed. In my experience, healthcare needs a lot more of the second kind.
Part of the challenge, I’ve found, is that clinicians don’t always know what’s possible. Not many people standing on a corner waving down a taxi were asking for a ride-share app — until one existed. Clinicians know the work and where it breaks down. The developer’s job is to turn that understanding into something that genuinely reduces effort.
Technology is a tool, not the goal. The aim isn’t to adopt the latest system; it’s to give caregivers the right tool for the job.
Adoption starts before implementation
Clinicians are often slow to adopt new technology, and for good reason. They’re being asked to learn something new while caring for people who depend on them to stay healthy and safe. Patients come first.
That hesitation tends to fade quickly when technology is intuitive and solves a real problem. I’ve seen that clinicians can tell when a tool was built by people who understood their workflow — and when it was, usually the newness matters much less. Adoption gets built into the design long before the first training session.
Measure innovation by what goes away
Medication management will likely only get more complex as therapies advance and care moves into more settings. Clinicians shouldn’t absorb that complexity through more logins, more screens and more disconnected systems. The technology should be sophisticated enough to carry it for them. In my view, one of the best measures of innovation is what we no longer have to do because the technology is there. That’s technology with empathy: built around the work of care, with input from the people who deliver it.
Becker’s 3rd Annual Fall Chief Pharmacy Officer Summit is the top tier event that the people leading the future of pharmacy convene. This 3-day event is built specifically for Chief Pharmacy Officers and senior pharmacy leaders. The sessions examine the workforce, financial and clinical priorities shaping pharmacy today. Becker’s is where candid discussions flourish and new ideas thrive. Becker's 3rd Annual Fall Chief Pharmacy Officer Summit
