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This is Laura Dedo with the Becker's Healthcare Podcast.
I'm thrilled today to be joined by Eric Smith,
senior Vice President and Chief Digital Officer for Memorial Herman Health
System. Eric, it's a pleasure to have you on the podcast today.
Laura. Thanks. We're thrilled to be here.
Now, I know we have a lot to talk about.
There's so many exciting things happening in healthcare in that intersection
between healthcare and digital technology, too,
is just accelerated so fast over the past few years.
But before we dive into the broader questions,
can you tell me a little bit more about yourself and your background? Sure.
Uh, so as you mentioned,
I serve as the Chief Digital Officer for Memorial Hermann. Uh,
and in that role I've got responsibility for our digital experiences across our
system, data and analytics,
as well as our contact center experience and overall strategy. So, uh,
in April, just celebrated my third year in healthcare overall as well as, uh,
with Memorial Herman. So, uh,
before that I've spent probably the majority of my career, uh,
in financial services in, uh, technical and, uh,
kind of digitally oriented roles. Uh, early on in my career there were,
I was mostly technically focused and then as, um, I became more interested,
I guess,
in how technology could actually be leveraged to make things easier for the end
user and the consumer. So, and having been around long enough,
I was able to see the introduction of the web, mobile voice,
and other really interesting capabilities. And as these things evolved,
I shifted more of my focus on how to leverage and maximize these channels to
really empower and bring, bring unique capabilities to the end users. So, uh,
it's been fun to watch, uh, I guess the evolution of these capabilities, uh,
and being able to couple that with good design and,
and a focus on experience to really enable the consumer and love being able to
do that, uh, in healthcare today.
So it's been a busy three years at Memorial Hermann,
but it's been incredibly rewarding.
Absolutely. Wow. And what a time to join healthcare too, especially, um,
you know, right as the pandemic was beginning, uh,
and really getting to a space where you're making an impactful change.
How has the EHR platform you're using evolved in the last few years,
and where do you see that evolution heading?
So, interesting question, interesting time, especially from Memorial Hermann.
Uh, we've been on a journey over the past couple of years to really look at our
current state of our ehr, what the challenges are,
and determine what we want the future state to be knowing we really need to
improve the experience for our providers and clinicians.
So we've looked at how we can streamline and really standardize the experience
across our system as a whole and, and not just in our hospitals.
So like a lot of other systems, we've got a lot of complexity within the ehr.
While it's all well intentioned, it provides a lot of challenges, obviously for,
for the end user, in this case, the clinician and, and the provider.
So we also have the complexity of having multiple EHRs across our system. So,
and in addition to that,
we've got multiple systems for registration and billing.
So you can see that we just got a lot we need to go solve for.
And with that being kind of the core, uh,
we knew that it was important for us to go address this.
So especially as we really think about our system's vision to create healthier
communities now or for generations to come, uh,
this is a journey even though it's was gonna be, uh, a challenging one,
one that we needed to embark on.
So we're actually underway currently to consolidate a single epic based EHR
platform, uh,
and in parallel really taking the opportunity to look at our processes and
workflows, clinical and operational across our system,
knowing that this is an opportunity for us to really rethink and, and reboot,
if you will.
So EHR is clearly such a core component in the healthcare ecosystem,
and so gotta make it easier for our providers to interact with, uh,
really surface the most important patient data that they can take action on,
reduce their documentation burden and really allow them to do what they do best.
Uh,
and at the same time leveraging that data within it to really empower and enable
the patient, uh, and, and do so in a way that's digitally enabled,
that gives them actionable steps, uh, as part of their health journey.
So we're well into the journey now, uh, feeling good about our progress and,
and really looking forward to achieving the goal and delivering on our vision.
That's amazing to hear, and I love to hear talking about, um,
the patient experience and really how you can leverage the
technology, uh, to improve that and,
and give patients more control over their healthcare journeys and, and then to,
uh, make sure that they have access to care and,
and the care providers also, um, have a better experience.
So that's great to hear. From your perspective,
what capabilities are the most important for Memorial Hermann's digital platform
and what hasn't worked out well?
So, um, I love the word platform because I think from our perspective,
really that platform is key. Uh, a platform gives you, you know,
by definition will give you flexibility and extensibility.
And I guess the way I typically,
the analogy I use is it gives you a set of building blocks that you can assemble
based off of the need that you need to go solve. So, you know,
when I look across the ecosystem of what's out there today,
there's a lot of well-intentioned point solutions that solve for very specific
need. But as we look at it internally, you know,
the challenges the consumer provider,
they don't have just a single need to need to go solve the healthcare is really,
it's a continuum and the needs evolve and there's specific needs even down to a
patient level. And so that platform concept really needs to, to, uh,
to be real in order for us to be able to solve for those things. So again,
giving,
giving us the flexibility to meet evolving needs and really a higher level of
integration and inter interoperability.
So we also look for platforms that really provide consistency and tone and
experience. I think we've all experienced, uh,
what appears to be very disjointed experiences within digital journeys,
even in different industries.
And so it's really important if you want to create that high level of engagement
to, to create a level of consistency in experience and again, in tone.
So we also know our platforms. We want to,
we want to use them to en enhance our, you know,
clinical decision support capabilities, managing our,
our population and our population health strategy using analytics and actions to
really engage patients. And clearly they need to be secure.
These platforms need to be secure and,
and aligned with our privacy polys and p privacy policies and, uh,
the regulations that exist out there. And we're also very keen to make sure,
especially on the patient side, we take very much a mobile first mentality. Um,
we see patients wanting to engage on mobile across other industries and,
and other, um, capabilities they engage with.
And so we have to take a mobile first approach as much as possible. So,
so to the question of what's worked well, um, you know,
we've got multiple examples of where we've been able to bring kind of these
characteristics that I mentioned together to, to, uh, enable this.
So as an example, we've developed a, a, uh,
open consolidated messaging platform that gives us the opportunity to address a
wide variety of use cases from appointment reminders, wellness visits,
informational text location data,
and really the ability to point patients to resources.
So the great thing about that is that platform's also given us the ability to
reach a broader community. So not just the folks with the latest device,
but actually someone that has something as simple as a feature phone.
So at our at-risk communities, um, we're able to, uh,
provide the same level of resource to them.
So really helping us break down that digital divide.
So we've also created a platform that engages patients digitally in their care
journey. So really giving them details in bite size,
really easy to understand chunks of, of, uh, content.
And we're able to enrich that with things like video and audio,
so that way it's engaging to them.
And on the backside it allows our care navigators to really track their progress
and prioritize who they might need to reach out to based off what they're seeing
and their, the interaction that they're having with the, with that platform. So,
uh, it's been great.
We've seen about a 70% engagement rate on that platform and plan to take that
and expand that, uh, into other journeys. So, uh,
to your question about what's not worked, um,
one of the things that I think we've found is, um,
our ability to actually pull detailed data and detailed metrics in the way
consumers are interacting with some of these platforms, uh, out, uh,
because we want to take that and understand that at a very granular level so
that way we can really understand the consumer's behavior at the end of the day.
And what we see is we see a lot of solutions out there that will give you a
dashboard to go take a look at that gives you high level data,
or they'll send you a pdf. But, uh, we've really been, uh,
pushing hard to make sure that we have the ability to bring that data together
in our platform,
combine that with other information and other touch points that we know the,
the patient, the consumer has with us.
And that way we're able to bring that all together and really have a full
understanding of the journey of, of the patient. So digital vendors are,
they're evolving in this space, but, uh, we're still seeing some gaps.
Got it. That makes a lot of sense. And you know,
it was really helpful to know and think through.
I can imagine over the next few years,
the technology will just continue to evolve and, um, you know,
really become more useful in the clinical space. From your perspective,
what trends in healthcare are informing the way that you're using data in
analytics, both clinically and operationally?
Yeah, I think one of the,
and we hear about this a lot if you go to different conferences, is it's,
it's this concept of personalization.
And it's personalization not just from the perspective of the way, uh,
the experience shows up, say, on my device,
but really even getting down to personalized medicine.
And so really understanding me as an individual and not necessarily me as a
cohort. So, you know, really leveraging data, leveraging,
leveraging analytics to inform me,
give me specific actions I need to take and when I need to take them,
and really guiding me at the end of the day. So don't tell me what to do,
but actually guide me through that process at the end of the day.
So we have to leverage the data we have about them, their history,
and that I think that gives us the ability to really kind of build out a plan to
help them optimize their health.
And so I think there's great opportunities to do this from the patient's
perspective,
but I think there's also great opportunities to help scale our providers,
which are overworked and overburdened right now,
and give them the tools to actually do that, to where they can set those,
those protocols and pathways, if you will,
and then leverage the digital channels to go actually, uh, execute those.
So, um,
I think operationally predictive insights and analytics is an area that we're
focusing a lot of work on.
So historically we've done a really great job of reporting data,
but that's always retrospective.
And so what we need is the ability to see forward and anticipate needs.
So what kind of staffing do we need? What level of skills do we need, uh,
bed and resource utilization and when and where we're likely to need specialty
support and things along that line. So we're also looking and,
and leveraging data analytics to really affect and enhance the patient
experience. So understanding when and, and how we need to engage our patients.
So we're leveraging that data and combining that with our digital experiences
and seeing some, some really positive results. So for example,
we're pulling and understanding the patient population that we have that's due
for an annual wellness visit and plugging that into our digital outreach
platform to where we're able to see, uh, without hardly any human effort,
a 15% engagement rate and a scheduling rate for something as simple as an annual
wellness visit.
And we're also seeing reductions in notion rates of up to 20% for appointments,
uh, leveraging pace reminders, all driven by engagement data,
so we know when we need to reach out to a patient to,
to make sure that they'll actually show up for that appointment that they've
scheduled. So I think one other trend that we're seeing,
and we're a very active participant in is this, this idea of being able to,
to assemble, uh,
all the data that we have and combine that with other health systems, uh,
to form really large scale, uh,
data sets that can be leveraged for research and, and other needs. So, uh,
it's a really, it can be a really valuable platform,
especially when you have the ability to layer tools on top of that to do some
deep analysis and really find that ultimate needle in the haystack from a
healthcare perspective. So, um, we're proud to be a founding, uh,
health system partner in Reta, uh,
which is very laser focused on really how to leverage large sets of data like
that to save lives, uh, really, uh, and,
and what's great about it is it's all under the guidance and, uh, management of,
of member health systems.
That's great to hear, and definitely just fascinating to see how Veta has, uh,
evolved over time.
I know very forward thinking and forward looking organization,
and certainly I'm exciting to see, hear, experience, good results there.
Before we wrap up our conversation, I'm wondering, Eric,
if you could talk a little bit about what you're most excited about for the
future. I think we've gone through a lot today, um, that, you know, is really,
uh, helpful and interesting to hear about and a lot to be excited about,
but where are you really seeing it as being great opportunities going forward?
Well, I I definitely,
completing our EHR transition is something I'm very excited about for the future
without a doubt. That's something that, and I,
I say that laughingly a little bit,
but also that's really important because that, that for us will, will one,
remove a lot of complexity that is that we have to account for behind the scenes
and allow us to really focus on on, uh, clinical outcomes, uh,
patient experience and those sorts of things. So I, as far as the future,
I'm definitely,
I continue to be very excited about this focus on the consumer at the end of the
day, and that's, it feels like that's the buzz today,
but I really think the opportunity is there for us to really deliver on that.
We've clearly seen it, uh, in other industries and,
and I know in healthcare we definitely want to improve the lives of people
through good health.
And I really think this focus on the consumer will make them a very active
participant and, and create a level of engagement to be part of that. And again,
I think we've seen multiple examples of that, uh, in,
in other industries and how, and what the results have been and how, uh,
consumers have taken more of an active role, uh,
in really managing things like their finances and, and other things. So,
uh, I think it's hard to have any kind of conversation about the future without
talking about AI a little bit. Uh, and I don't mean that from a,
a buzz standpoint, but I, I think also just broadly what AI can bring, uh,
even beyond what we're seeing today. So, you know, I think I've,
I've had this vision,
I've talked to our team about the idea of a virtual health companion that can be
your coach, if you will,
and it's with you all the time and really guide you in your health journey.
So there's a lot we still need to, to work through in that space. Um, you know,
from making sure that the data's secure, making sure that, um, we don't, uh,
bring biases into the experience.
But I think the core is there to really do that.
I'm excited about that opportunity to,
to have somebody that understands to have a virtual thing, if you will, that,
uh, understands me and really coaches me and guides me, uh,
regardless of what my, uh, my health journey might be. So,
and I think along with that,
the ability to leverage that data that's in the E M R and the,
the instrumentation and the informed element that comes from the provider to
make sure that your providers very active in that, uh, in that engagement,
I think one creates scale for them, uh, but also, um,
enables the patient to do what they need to do and when they need to do it.
So again, I don't think we're that far away from it, but I think it'll be, uh,
make an incredible difference, uh, in improving healthcare at scale.
That's amazing to hear.
I love that turn and focus on the consumer and the patient experience.
And then too, as you mentioned, artificial intelligence just has, um,
such amazing opportunities as it evolves in the healthcare space. Eric,
thank you so much for joining us on the podcast today.
This has such fun and interesting discussion and look forward to again soon.
Sounds good. Thanks Laura. Appreciate it.
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