NEW
Core Versus Chore: Using Human-Centered Design to Solve Burnout and Inefficiency in Healthcare
Paperback
Publication Date: October 31, 2025
What if healthcare could run smoother — and your team could thrive — instead of barely surviving?
Modern healthcare is overwhelmed by inefficiency, burnout, and tech overload. Promises of revolutionary tools often leave practices drowning in complexity, while staff morale plummets and patient outcomes suffer. But what if the issue isn’t the technology itself — but how we think about the work?
Enter Core Versus Chore, a groundbreaking book from Grace Terrell, MD, MMM, FACP, FACPE, that flips the script on healthcare improvement. Using human-centered design principles, Terrell delivers a real-world framework to separate what truly matters — the core mission of patient care — from the endless administrative and technological chores that hold teams back.
This isn’t theory. It is a battle-tested, practical guide from someone who has lived the challenges of healthcare leadership firsthand. Packed with actionable strategies, Core Versus Chore equips healthcare leaders to untangle inefficiencies, prevent burnout, and harness the transformative power of AI and technology.
Learn to:
Spot real solutions: Identify technologies that streamline workflows instead of creating more chaos.
Prevent burnout at its source: Address the friction points that drain your team’s energy before they spiral into fatigue.
Lead innovation with confidence: Turn the rapid pace of change into a strategic advantage, especially in the age of AI.
Perfect for:
Physicians stepping into leadership roles
Healthcare administrators craving sustainable solutions
Clinical practice managers battling inefficiencies
Health system executives navigating technological disruption
Whether you are a seasoned leader or just starting your journey, Core Versus Chore delivers clarity, confidence, and tools to help you lead smarter, not harder. Stop patching problems — start solving them at the root.
Because your patients deserve better. Your team deserves better. And so do you.
"This book doesn't just diagnose healthcare's efficiency problems — it provides the surgical precision needed to fix them."
Grace E. Terrell, MD, MMM, FACP, FACPE, is a national thought leader in healthcare innovation and delivery system reform, and a serial entrepreneur in population health outcomes driven through patient care model design, clinical and information integration, and value-based payment models.
She is chief medical officer at IKS Health, an international healthcare company designing simple solutions for the complex problems in healthcare, using the “core vs. chore” framework. She has been a practicing general internist for more than thirty years. She has served as CEO of several companies, including Eventus WholeHealth, LLC., a company focused on providing holistic care to medically vulnerable adults and Cornerstone Health Care, one of the first medical groups to make the “move to value” by lowering the cost of care and improving its quality for the sickest, most vulnerable patients. She was the founding CEO of CHESS, a population health management company, and the former CEO of Envision Genomics, a company focused on the integration of precision medicine technology into population health frameworks for patients with rare and undiagnosed diseases.
Terrell has served as vice chair of the U.S. DHHS’ Physician-Focused Payment Model Technical Advisory Committee, the chair of the board of the AMGA, and is a founding member of the Oliver Wyman Health Innovation Center. She is the author of several books, including Value-Based Care and Payment Models, Reframing Contemporary Physician Leadership: We Started as Heroes, and Strategies for Recognizing and Eliminating Gender Bias for Healthcare Leaders.She is currently executive in residence at Duke University School of Medicine’s MMCi Program, a senior advisor for Oliver Wyman Health and Life Sciences consulting practice, and a member of the board of trustees of Guilford College.