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This is Laura Dierda with the Becker's Healthcare
podcast. I'm thrilled today to be joined by
doctor Zafar Choudhry, senior vice president as well
as chief digital, chief AI, and chief information
officer at CLL Children's. Doctor Choudhry, it's a
pleasure to have you on the podcast today.
Thank you for having me, Laura.
Now I'm excited for our conversation because I
know you've had a lot of experience in
the technology as well as, of course, health
care space and, a really unique perspective that
you bring to us. You've been on the
podcast several times before, and and so it's
always great to have you back.
And I'm curious to dig into some of
the cool things you're doing at Seattle Children's
as well as how you're thinking about the
future, especially given some of the
uncertainties,
within the health care as well as just
broader,
you know, US ecosystem here. But before we
dive in, I'm wondering, could you tell us
a little bit more about Seattle Children's and
what makes it unique?
Yeah. So Seattle Children's, it's a pediatric health
system. We're in the Pacific Northwest.
We serve
Washington, Alaska, Montana, and Idaho,
and we have 47
sites.
Amongst, those four states, we're about 13,000
people.
500 of those work in IT,
generating about 4,000,000,000 in revenue.
And in the IT arena, we do everything
from infrastructure
all the way through to digital health.
Oh, that's great to hear. And, you know,
when you think back to the last year
or so, what accomplishment are you most proud
of?
So we've done some interesting and cool things.
We've
certainly
implemented a new ERP.
So we are through phase one of our
ERP implementation.
We migrated from,
InfoLawson
to Workday and launched
the human capital management modules as well as
payroll. And
good news is we've been able to pay
people correctly on time for many months now
using that new system.
The other thing that we have done is
we moved
all of our analytics and data platforms
from
IBM Netezza, which we had used for five
years,
to a full
partnership with Google Cloud. So everything now runs
within that space. And we managed to do
that in a very short period of time,
migrating many, many
billions lines of code as well as
hundreds and hundreds of databases.
That's amazing to hear. And, you know, I
I know that's a huge undertaking,
technical
as well as just the manpower it takes
to do,
something like that and and make the transition.
I'm curious,
you know, when you're,
bringing together all that data in in the
code and and trying to,
set the foundation for what you need to
be successful in the future, how do you
do that successfully with your team? What kind
of,
expertise and talent do you need? And then,
you know, looking at the the change management
to bring you into,
the transformation,
on the people and culture side.
How do you bring that all together? What
advice would you have for leaders who are
going through the same thing currently?
Yes. Of all of these programs,
you know, we are a technology group serving
a health care system. So we really are
in the patient business,
not the technology business. And most of the
programs
we run
are really transformation
programs
that require a lot of change management. So
anytime we do a major project like a
new system implementation
or a migration from one tool to another,
we are heavily involving our people and culture
teams, and they usually provide,
resources to help in that change management process.
We also wanna make sure that anything we
build
is operationally led and technology enabled. So
you don't do these things well without a
multidisciplinary
team of people
who help you get there. So we are
facilitators
to a greater extent
and
trainers, but at the same time,
doing the people and process component
requires
partnership.
And if you bring the right partners to
the table,
you're going to have success.
And implementing systems is actually the easy part.
The sustaining of those systems
is where you have to put a lot
more effort. So getting to a go live
on something,
it's great. You celebrate it. It may be
a long journey. You may have spent many
years on it, but then making sure that
that system is actually
used the way it should be
so that you're driving
all the benefits of the investment you've made
is where you still need to continue to
focus your change
energies within the health system.
Got it. That's helpful to know and understand.
And, you know, really, I appreciate you digging
a little bit deeper there. Now looking ahead,
what are some of the big organizational goals
that you're setting for 2025?
So we've got to continue to do
the second phase
of our Workday implementation.
So that's still got about five or six
months left on
it. That will be the financial module as
well as
our supply chain. So that will involve, once
again,
operational changes to to lead to the transfer
transformation that we're looking for. We have heavily
invested
in our AI program, and this wouldn't be
a conversation if I didn't mention AI. But
we've heavily invested in that in our partnership
with Google. So we are a Gemini
AI site,
and we're currently working on some generative AI
use cases
in their final stages before they will be
released to
our clinical population. And a lot of the
focus has been on
clinical use cases that more than anything else.
The other thing that we actually have just
completed
as we speak
is we have we have done
and
put into play a strategic partnership
with Rackspace.
So moving forwards
in a ten year agreement, Rackspace will be
our core provider for all of our infrastructure
in the Rackspace cloud
as well as all of our networking.
And that will mean that the 1,600 applications
we have
will run-in
the Rackspace cloud, and that's been a big
program of works that we just
completed a few weeks ago. So those are
some of the key things. The other thing
that we are planning to do is build
a new campus
in Renton, Washington,
and that site will be a fully fledged
hospital and all ancillary
systems to support that. That's gonna be a
seven year program, and we actually kicked that
off in the last few weeks. So the
first phase is to do the actual
design of the building and the design of
the technology that goes into that
building.
So we've had a heavy focus
on that project as well.
That's great to hear. And I I know,
on all of those fronts, a lot of,
teamwork and effort and resources go into it.
But, certainly, it sounds like,
bringing everything together to make the organization and
the system more efficient, effective, and able to
treat patients better, which is, of course, the
ultimate goal. So,
that's really cool to hear. I know a
lot of opportunities to continue to grow, develop,
and use technology,
to your advantage, but I can imagine that
there are challenges as well. What are some
of those headwinds that you're anticipating for the
next year or two?
So I think the first headwind, I think,
is going to continue to be workforce
shortages,
especially in the clinical space.
Increasing labor costs, there's burnout
That's
impacting health care organizations
and retention as well.
The other thing is financial pressures. So there's
a rising cost of care delivery,
including
inflation in medical supplies, labor expenses,
and now
tariffs, which is straining
health care organization
budgets.
We're also seeing reimbursement challenges from payers,
including potential cuts and increased denials
that will add to financial difficulty.
And,
you know, we are sort of midsized, but
we sort of have to stay
as good financial stewards moving forwards.
The other thing we're seeing is regulatory changes
and uncertainty,
evolving regulatory requirements,
some of the executive orders,
including changes to privacy mandates,
creating some challenges.
So so it's a moving
target
going forwards because there's also
changes in health care policy due to political
shifts that could create uncertainty.
As I said, we're seeing a rising cost
of delivering that care, and that's gonna be
a combination of what we buy, what we
pay in labor, and what the tariffs bring
around medications
and,
medical supplies as well as hardware and software.
We're seeing a focus and headwinds around
more integration
in tech the technology space. How do we
integrate new technologies into existing health care systems?
And that can be complex and expensive.
Let's not forget cybersecurity
threats.
That is on an all time high, and
that is going to create some challenges for
us. The other thing is how do we
maintain
equitable access to health care for all populations
and address any disparities,
with some continued priority.
So I think when you sort of take
all those different things,
these headwinds create a complex and challenging environment.
So we've gotta have
an adaptability
focus on innovation and efficiency
so that we can navigate these challenges.
Absolutely. I I think that makes a lot
of sense. And it seems like, you know,
as you mentioned, having that flexibility and being
nimble,
no matter what you wake up to, whether
executive orders or,
some other,
things that are happening that you can't control,
the ability to manage that, in the day
to day basis while also looking ahead with
that strategic growth plan.
You know, it seems like that would just
be a challenge on a continuous basis, but
it sounds like you've got a a strong
way of managing that and trying to keep
that balance.
Yeah. We are trying. It's it's always difficult
to interpret new things and then figure out
what those actually mean, and then you're moving
at a very high pace, which is unusual
for health care.
So we're trying to keep up, you know,
trying to take a deep breath and keep
moving forwards. Because in reality,
change is inevitable.
Right? And so you have to just be
prepared
and try your best to lead people through
those changes.
Not everybody will be happy. It's not that
I agree with everything that's happening, but I
sort of use the eighty twenty rule. If
we can do 80%
of the things well, we can keep moving
forwards, and we can keep taking care of
kids in the Pacific Northwest.
Absolutely. That that, you know, makes a lot
of sense and is a great way of
looking at it. I'm also curious. You know,
you talked a little bit about some of
the financial challenges, especially as, you know,
with
medical supplies and devices continuing to increase as
well as workforce shortages
in in some of those,
challenges as well. And when you look at
what you're doing on the technology side, how
much of,
you know,
what you're able to, I guess, bring into
the system,
you think of as a solution to some
of these problems or assisting in some of
these problems versus, you know, exacerbating them?
Yeah. So
automation
and AI
are additional tools that you put on your
tool belt to help address some of the
tasks that you're doing in the back office
as an as an example
so that you can focus people on
the important work versus
the day to day lights on doors open
work. So I do think that
using AI technologies
and
automating some processes
will help us build some capacity,
and it'll also take the pressure off work
that people honestly don't like doing
but have to do. And maybe if we
can automate that, we'll see some significant operational
improvements
as a as part of that process.
So I think we can't ignore,
and we have to adapt to the new
technology changes
and rapidly try to integrate some of those
tools
so that we take pressure off people,
reduce burnout.
And then if you reduce burnout, you also
improve in retention,
take away some of the day to day
standard tasks that, let's be truthful, everybody hates
but has to do.
And then we can get our people focused
on
what they really came to work at Seattle
Children's for was focused on patients,
patient outcomes,
and addressing,
any disparities.
That's helpful context, and and thank you so
much for digging in deeply there. Now before
we wrap up our conversation, I'm wondering how
are you evolving as a leader, especially given
the market dynamics we've talked about and as
well as the rapid pace of change for
technology and AI in the health care space?
So truth truth be told, I'm
one of the OAIPs.
So I'm an old aged
IT professional,
and I struggle at times to keep up
with the pace of technological
change.
But it is my job, and I have
to do that. So we've been looking at
how we transform with these technologies,
how we engage
multidisciplinary
teams to help us
evaluate these new technologies
and also
get them and encourage them to volunteer to
try new things.
I think
all of this will have changed, so we
focus, and I'm trying to adapt to
leading on change, being a better and clear
communicator,
and trying to do as much stakeholder engagement
as I can. The other thing I've been
trying to do is understand the workforce of
the future. So So one of the things
I find really confusing
is the gen z population.
It's a very interesting group.
They don't focus for many
for for for long on anything, and they
always want the next challenge.
And so I've tried to surround myself with
this group of individuals so that I can
educate myself on how I need to adapt
my style and the kind of work that
we give the group so that they remain
engaged.
The other thing we're looking at is my
role has evolved into
spending more time
focusing on patient care and making sure that
the tools that we're bringing to the party
are tools that actually impact
the front line. So you see a lot
more of this
virtual nursing
and
use of AI to predict things like
patients falling from a bed, etcetera.
So sort of that to improve the quality
and efficiency of the care delivery that we
have.
And then, of course, we also have to
build
pipelines of new staff coming into the organization.
So
I've had I've put some focus on mentoring
programs
as well as
how do we get high school students
through
associate degrees.
It has a pipeline into our organization, and
we sponsored
programs with the local college to
create those programs and provide scholarships
to make that happen. So I've tried to
stay
thinking one step ahead
whilst never losing the focus on
patient well-being
and understanding
that
change is inevitable.
And if organizations
don't transform,
they will fail.
That's fascinating. And certainly, you wanna be, not
in that group, but but in organizations that
are thriving and growing. And,
doctor Chowdhury, thank you so much for joining
us on the podcast today. I I really
appreciate your perspective on a great many things,
and we look forward to talking with you
again soon as well as seeing you at
our health IT event. I know you'll be,
speaking on one of our panels, and truly
will be excited to see you there in
person.
Thank you, Laura, and I look forward to
the conference that's coming ahead for backers.