Kaiser Permanente to lay off dozens of IT employees

Kaiser Permanente is laying off members of its information and technology department for the second time in about five months. 

The Oakland, California-based health system confirmed Tuesday it is cutting 72 IT employees. Kaiser, which employs about 220,000 people total, made the move as part of an organizational cost-cutting initiative, a spokesperson said.

Read more: Why health systems are dropping their IT teams

The layoffs affecting the organization's Kaiser Foundation Hospitals arm are effective April 26 and will be spread across seven locations in California, according to Worker Adjustment and Retraining Notification documents filed this month. Kaiser will offer severance packages or help employees fill other positions within the organization, the spokesperson said.

Kaiser laid off 115 workers from IT positions in November and 79 administrative employees in January.

All three rounds of the layoffs targeted non-union roles, Kaiser said.

Many health systems are transitioning analytics and technology employees to managed service companies as they look to scale virtual care, artificial intelligence and analytics initiatives. By moving the work and employees out-of-house, a process called rebadging, health systems struggling with razor-thin margins say they can deploy IT projects more efficiently while saving on costs.

The Kaiser spokesperson did not comment on whether the health system plans to outsource IT roles.