Becker’s Healthcare Podcast Lab Stewardship as a Strategic Lever for Health Systems
Dec 23, 2025
Dr. Sanjai Nagendra, a hematopathologist and lab stewardship pioneer, teams up with Cameron Thomason, who has two decades of experience in healthcare operations, to explore lab stewardship as a strategic approach. They discuss how effective lab stewardship balances care optimization and cost control. The duo covers essential tools like analytics and AI, the importance of leadership support, and community engagement in lab practices. Their insights highlight innovative methods for enhancing healthcare quality and operational efficiency.
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Lab Stewardship As A Systemwide Strategy
- Lab stewardship is a coordinated, system-wide approach that optimizes test use, quality, and patient care while controlling costs as a secondary effect.
- The field has evolved from basic utilization review to real-time, multidisciplinary programs powered by informatics and AI.
Make Stewardship An Enterprise Priority
- Position stewardship as a cross-functional, clinically led enterprise priority with visible executive sponsorship to secure alignment and sustainability.
- Use accessible, trusted data and clinical decision support to embed best practices without adding provider workflow friction.
Quality Wins Build Buy-In
- Stewardship creates value beyond cost savings by improving quality, safety, and clinical outcomes, which drives physician and leadership buy-in.
- The lab acts as steward of data while cross-functional teams operationalize changes across care pathways.