Ryan Donohue
Senior Advisor & Solutions Expert, NRC Health

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Ryan Donohue is a seasoned thinker and national expert on the impact of consumer behavior in healthcare. Ryan’s mission is to inspire and persuade healthcare leaders to embrace the consumer and engage the patient. For more than a decade Ryan has conducted extensive research on the effects of consumerism on the U.S. healthcare industry.

Ryan recently released his first book: Patient No Longer: Why Healthcare Must Deliver the Care Experience That Consumers Want and Expect, an imprint of ACHE’s Healthcare Administration Press. Ryan collaborated with Dr. Steve Klasko of Jefferson Health to search the origins of patient-centered care in order to understand and improve today’s efforts to engage patients. Ryan is currently shaping the book’s learnings into an interactive workshop to translate its insights to the organizational level.

Ryan serves as an advisor for The Governance Institute and a regular contributor to the Boardroom Press newsletter and other Governance Institute publications. Ryan has written two white papers for The Governance Institute: Considering the Customer: Understanding & Influencing Healthcare’s Newest Change Agent, and Brand Strategy in Healthcare: The Necessary Considerations for Brand Building in a Shifting Industry. He also created the Strategy Toolbook on Advanced Consumerism. He speaks regularly at Governance Institute Leadership Conferences, as well as other healthcare leadership events.

Ryan Donohue also serves as Senior Advisor and Solutions Expert for NRC Health—the largest provider of consumer intelligence and insights in the healthcare industry. Ryan leads NRC Health’s exploratory research instruments which he uses to detect consumer trends and map consumer sentiments across the U.S. Ryan has partnered extensively with hospitals and health systems to understand the impact of consumerism on care delivery and to advise clients on the necessary steps to adapt to a more consumer-centric healthcare landscape and build a more dynamic relationship with those they serve.

Utilizing NRC Health’s vast online consumer communities, Ryan gleans insights across major industries to draw parallels to healthcare and find clues on how consumer and patient behavior may shift. Ryan shares his findings with national and state-based associations and healthcare providers big and small, with the only common denominator being an intense curiosity about the future of health-care. Ryan’s mission is to identify the brightest version of healthcare’s future and nudge providers in that direction. Ryan received a B.A. in marketing and a B.S. in journalism and advertising with an emphasis in public relations from the University of Nebraska in Lincoln.

Speaking Engagements

• Patient No Longer: Leading the Consumer Revolution in Healthcare
• Human-Centeredness in Healthcare: Shaping Strategy, Design, and Execution Around Those We Serve
• The Dangers of De-Personalizing Care and How to Defeat Them
• Highway of Hope: Traveling the New Two-Way Streets of Consumer-Centered Care
• The Great Brand Blur: Standing Out in Healthcare’s Sea of Sameness