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Imagine this. You're at the Hyatt Regency Chicago

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immersed in insightful discussions with the health care

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industry's top leaders.

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Welcome to Becker's 12th annual CEO

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and CFO roundtable from November 11th to 14th

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2024.

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Picture yourself networking with over a 1000 executive

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level attendees,

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collecting business cards, and forging valuable connections.

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Feel the excitement as you engage in 4

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days of sessions featuring 400

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elite health system speakers.

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Envision yourself diving deep into critical topics like

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rural health care, digital transformation,

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health equity, and c suite diversity.

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Now imagine being inspired by our celebrity keynotes,

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pro football hall of famers Troy Aikman and

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Emmett Smith, 43rd president George w Bush, and

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author and journalist Jenna Bush Hager. Their stories

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will leave you motivated

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and energized.

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Don't miss this unparalleled

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opportunity.

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Get registered today. Visit beckershospitalreview.com

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and click on the events page to find

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the conference website.

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That's the beckershospitalreview.com

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events page. See you in Chicago.

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This is Laura Dierdahl with the Becker's Healthcare

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podcast.

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I'm thrilled today to be joined by doctor

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Navneet Dang, chief medical officer at Geisinger Health.

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Doctor Dang, it's a pleasure to have you

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on the podcast today.

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Thank you, Laura. It's my pleasure to be

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here with you today, at Becker's,

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podcast, and, thank you for the opportunity.

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My pleasure. And, you know, I'm really looking

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forward to hearing from you because I know

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Geisinger

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is really a leader in innovation,

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and you're doing a great many things right

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now, that could really be instructive for a

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great deal of our audience. And so I'm

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excited to dive in. But before we do,

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could you tell us a little bit more

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about yourself and your background?

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Yeah. Sure.

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So my name is Navani Dang.

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I'm an internal medicine physician by trade,

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practicing medicine and has been in health care

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for about 20 plus years.

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I have been a health care executive and,

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joined Geisinger Health about 8 years back.

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And since then, I have been in various,

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leadership positions within Geisinger.

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For last 3 years, I am in the

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role of chief medical officer,

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and,

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oversee

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clinical operations, medical affairs,

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service line growth, business development in the Scranton

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market.

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I oversee a Tertiary Care Medical Center in

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Scranton,

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which is a level 2 trauma center

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and also the teaching hospital

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for Geisinger Commonwealth School of Medicine

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and,

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our various northeast residency and fellowship programs.

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We are the busiest medical center in Scranton

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area, and, we accept transfers transfers

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from all the other outlying hospitals in the

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area.

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And our vision as a health system is

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to make better health easier for our patients

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and communities.

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We serve in northeast Pennsylvania.

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I'm glad to be here with you today,

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Laura.

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Oh, absolutely.

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My pleasure. You know, I I love that

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tagline of making health care better for your

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communities.

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I I think, truly, that is such an

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important mission and vision. And, you know, given

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your journey and, how you evolved your career,

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what do you see as being some of

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the top priorities for the rest of this

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year? I know health care is in such

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a transformational time right now, and so I'd

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love to get your perspective on what's top

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of mind for you.

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Yeah. No. Thank you for the question. This

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is this is a great question. So I

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will say a couple things.

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Patient safety,

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journey to 0 harm,

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and,

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focus on

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providing overall high quality care for our patients

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has always been top of mind for for

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us.

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I would say that, for rest of the

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year, that is going to be,

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our main focus,

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in terms of how can we improve,

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patient safety for our patients? How can we

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reduce

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hospital acquired infections?

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How can we

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make journey to 0 harm a reality for

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our patients.

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And,

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the other

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focus for rest of the year,

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is going to be optimizing

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access.

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While we continue to provide

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care for,

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very sick patients in the in our emergency

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rooms

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and,

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they continue to get admitted in the hospital.

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But how can we move the care

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upstream

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and, make sure that our patients have appropriate

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access in the primary care office,

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and also

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access to specialty care and access to,

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screenings

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so that we can

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move

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the care upstream

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and reduce our emergency room utilization and also

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inpatient,

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utilization

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for our patients and

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communities we serve in Northeastern Pennsylvania.

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So the goal is always to,

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keep our communities and patients

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healthier

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and,

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see if we can avoid the hospitalization.

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But if they need hospitalization,

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and ER visits, we are there for them

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as well. So I would say those are

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some of the key priorities for rest of

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the year.

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That makes a lot of sense. You know,

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really aligns with a lot of what I'm

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hearing from leaders across across the country in

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thinking about access and trying to figure out

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the best way to and most streamlined way

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to, direct patients. Like you said, some will

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need the inpatient care of the hospital, while

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others,

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you know, could use more access to specialty

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care, primary care, and some

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of the other clinical services within the community.

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So, you know, when you look at that,

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I know that, nationally,

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we certainly have the booming shortage of specialists

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in health care,

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and physicians and clinicians in general.

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How do you think about access? How do

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you make sure that the patients

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know where to go depending on,

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what their challenges or what their issue is

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and really direct them in the right way

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so that, you know, you can be as

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streamlined as possible in delivering that care and

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making sure they've got,

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clinicians as well are optimized

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in their time and their schedules too.

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Yeah.

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Again,

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great question.

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I don't think there is a there is

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an easy solution to this,

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But,

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our focus has really been on providing,

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that team based care approach.

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And,

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we are really making sure that we are

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providing right care,

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at the right place at the right time

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for our patients and communities

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that we serve.

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We are really

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leveraging

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our APPs

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a lot

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in this team based care approach,

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And, we are also leveraging telehealth services,

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to make sure that our patients have,

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access to care,

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at the right place and at the right

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time. And we are always

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not seeing them in the emergency room or,

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you know, in the hospital.

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One of the things that,

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we have done

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in terms of patients who get admitted to

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the hospital,

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we are leveraging our remote patient monitoring,

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tools,

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post discharge.

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And there is a whole care team who

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is able to monitor these patients after discharge

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from the hospital

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to prevent,

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readmissions

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and prevent ED utilization

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from happening.

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So I would say those are some of

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the tactics that we have deployed

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to make sure that our patients have, the

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right access.

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Well, that's great to hear. And, you know,

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certainly,

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some really powerful solutions, it sounds like, to,

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kind of get,

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the system

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systems in place and the right support for

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patients as they're going through their health care

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journeys, whether it's with the APPs, telehealth, or

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some of the remote patient monitoring,

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to tackle some of those issues. So that's

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great to hear. Thank you so much, doctor

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Dang. And along those lines, you know,

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are there any other programs or initiatives that

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have been really needle moving for you in

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the last year or so?

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Yeah. Thank you. So,

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couple things come to mind

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in terms of, some of the,

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work in 2023.

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We have been really laser focused in terms

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of providing high quality care, as I said,

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in my introduction,

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for our patients and communities in Northeast Pennsylvania.

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CMS,

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5 star is one of our strategic

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focus areas

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and is also one of our strategic priority.

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Because I truly believe that if you don't

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measure, you can't improve.

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And under CMS 5 star,

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there are more than 50 measures

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into 5 big buckets of quality,

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which are mortality,

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readmission, patient experience,

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patient safety, and harm measures are also part

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of,

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CMS 5 Star.

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And,

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there are KPIs under timeliness of care as

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well.

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What we did to make sure that,

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we are improving our clinical outcomes,

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we created a multidisciplinary

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structure.

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And as a part of

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this multidisciplinary

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structure, we have multiple teams

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comprising of, physicians,

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nursing staff, care management.

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Again, a team based approach

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who continue to look at our performance.

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We use Vizient as our,

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internal

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data vendor and also look at benchmarking across

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the industry

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so that we are able to focus on

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patient outcomes.

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And we also focused heavily on

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journey to 0 harm initiatives

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so that we could improve our

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performance and minimize patient harm. As a result

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of all these efforts,

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we achieved leapfrog a ratings

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this year,

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from,

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in our spring 2024

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ratings.

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And, this is the 2nd year in a

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row

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that,

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we maintained our CMS ratings as a 4

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star,

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medical center,

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which we are extremely proud of. And that

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means we are providing high quality care for

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our patients and communities that we serve in

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Northeastern

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Pennsylvania.

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That's amazing to hear. You know? And what

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great results in thinking about, you know, the

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CMS 5 star hospital league, frog a ratings.

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Certainly a great reflection of the type of

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carrier delivering in the operation that you run

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at Geisinger.

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And, you know, one thing stood out to

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me about what you were saying and talking

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about in terms of becoming more of a

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data driven organization,

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using tools like business platform and and a

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partnership there.

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I I know this is a a big

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challenge for a lot of organizations as they're

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trying to incorporate more data and information into

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the care delivery processes and systems. Some,

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clinicians, you know, jump on it right away

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while others need a little bit more time

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or need some convincing.

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How easy it has been to really become

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more of a data driven culture at Geisinger?

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What have you done to,

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really bring everybody on board and move in

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the right direction when you think about the

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type of information and type of data that,

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you're producing for your overall team?

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Yeah. Thanks, Laura. This this is again,

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a great questions.

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So one of the things,

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that we have done, we wanted to make

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sure that how do we

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leverage

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data and how do we change the data

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into information

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and create that knowledge sharing,

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that is needed for our teams to act

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on. One of the things we did, we

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created what we call as accountable care unit

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model,

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where there is a diet partnership

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between a physician and a nursing leader,

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who continue to look at all the patient

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outcomes on their specific unit, whether

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it's hospital acquired infections, like central line associated

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bloodstream infections,

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or catheter associated urinary tract infections,

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falls or pressure injuries, all the patient heart

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measures

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or whether

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it's, length of stay or,

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any other throughput measures.

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And they work together as a diet leadership

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team

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to drive performance and improve patient outcomes.

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I would say that that has been extremely

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successful.

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Again,

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a team based approach

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where physicians and nursing teams,

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even at the middle management level and at

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the unit level,

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are driving performance. I would say that has

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been really impactful for us.

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Well, doctor Dang, it's been such a pleasure

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speaking with you. I know we've talked a

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lot about Geisinger's, some of the different goals

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around patient safety, zero harm, high quality care

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for your entire community, and the accomplishments you've

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achieved with the CMS 5 star rating as

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well as becoming more data driven in leapfrog

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a, which is amazing to hear and see

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those results. Now I wanted to look a

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little bit into the future before we wrapped

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up our conversation.

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How are you thinking about growth and member

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experience going forward?

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Yeah. Thanks, Laura. Another great question.

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I would say that for me,

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we realize

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growth has how do we improve access to

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care

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and

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move the care upstream.

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Whether it's primary care access or whether it's

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access to specialty care

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or whether it's access to screening.

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Whether it's mammograms,

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whether it's,

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colonoscopies.

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So I think that would be our main

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strategic focus

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and we are focusing heavily on providing value

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based care.

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We know that how can we move the

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care outside the four walls of the hospital

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closer to home has been a strategic priority

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for us.

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We know that when we take care of

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our congestive heart failure patients or COPD patients

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and patients

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who have other chronic diseases

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as a part of our primary care offices

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or in the specialty care offices,

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we are able to keep these patients healthy

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and keep them out of the hospital.

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So I would say that,

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providing

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access

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is one of our growth strategy.

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And, certainly, that also helps to improve our

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patient experience and our member experience.

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So that will be our strategic focus going

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forward.

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It's fascinating to hear. I know that transition

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to more care and monitoring in the home,

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is huge for the entire health care industry

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and great to know when,

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that you're thinking through that and, taking innovative

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approach of how to achieve quality,

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care and outcomes and and use that,

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appropriately.

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Doctor Dang, thank you so much for joining

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us on the podcast today. This has been

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a really fun conversation, and I look forward

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to connecting with you again soon.

423
00:15:58,054 --> 00:16:00,855
Yeah. No. Thanks, Laura, for your time, and

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appreciate the opportunity.