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the description. We are excited to welcome you in October.
This is Laura Dedo with the Becker's Healthcare Podcast.
I'm thrilled today to be joined by Brian Carlson,
vice President of Patient Experience at Vanderbilt Health. Brian,
it's a pleasure to have you on the podcast today.
Thank you, Laura. It's good to be with you.
Now. I know we have a lot to talk about right now.
It's such an important and incredible time in healthcare.
But before we dive into my questions,
can you tell us a little bit more about yourself and your background?
Absolutely. Um, I, uh,
currently serve as vice president of patient experience at Vanderbilt University
Medical Center or Vanderbilt Health in Nashville, Tennessee.
I've been in this role for about 10 years. In prior to that, I was in, uh,
group practice operations, uh, running physician group practices.
Got it. Wow.
So definitely very closely aligned with the physicians and now the patient
experience. Um, given your current role,
what do you see as being some of the biggest issues that you're following in
healthcare right now? I can imagine, you know,
there's so much happening with the evolution of patient experience and
consumerism in this space, so I,
I'd just love to hear what's top of mind for you.
Yeah, I, I think first that's top of mind and, and I think this is probably on,
on most colleagues' minds as well, is just the,
the financial pressures that most organizations are facing.
It's a difficult time right now in the healthcare space, uh, with, uh,
the financial headwinds we have,
but we're working our way through that and obviously trying to stay true to our
mission, uh, and visions in each organization,
and also holding to safe quality care and, and outstanding experiences.
So sometimes the financial pressures don't, uh,
always butt up well against an ideal experience,
but I think that we're weathering the storm pretty well here at Vanderbilt and,
and doing a nice job. I think the second issue that I would put out there, and,
and I heard this at the annual conference last month at, uh, Becker's, is,
is is the,
the concept of culture and the importance of it and the focus on it and the
intentional need to be, uh, focusing on culture within our organizations.
Absolutely. I think that makes a lot of sense. You know, and,
and certainly especially during times when there are, you know,
budgets are tightening and trying to really, uh,
continue to provide great patient care.
A big part of that is the staff and the team, uh,
within the organization that makes the, the experience that much better.
And so when you think about the culture, um,
and the intentional culture that you've built at Vanderbilt, you know,
what does that look like? How have you, uh,
continued to grow and develop within the internal team so that you can make sure
patients are receiving great care and a great experience, uh, on the flip side?
Yeah, that's a, that's a, that's a great question. I think that there's,
there's kind of four, four steps that, that I think about. And the first is,
is the importance of the foundational items, the mission, vision, values,
those behavioral standards, uh,
that really are the guideposts by which the workforce gauges on,
on what do you expect me to do.
And then from there is the expectation or the need that we're transparent in
talking about, you know, those behavioral standards.
And we need to do it continually.
We can't just talk about it in new employee orientation and then stick it on a
wall and expect people to live by it.
They need to see it in action day in and day out,
and you need to continually reteach the culture.
So you need to be transparent about it. You need to be discussing it.
I think the,
the third item is really around goal alignment and ensuring the goals you
have, uh, for the organization are aligned. And, uh,
everyone's working in the same, in the same direction, uh,
because that causes frustration.
Which effects can affect culture if people aren't rowing in, in the same, uh,
in the same direction. And then, um,
and then the last part is really, uh, around the, um,
uh, the cul the, the transparency again, and that's just with data,
patient experience, quality data. It's just being open and honest.
Financial situation is being very transparent with the workforce about here's
where we are, here's where we want to go,
and here's what we need to do to need to do to get there.
Absolutely. I love that. I think that, you know,
is so important and definitely is a great roadmap to building the type of
culture that you need in, in, um, comfortability amongst team members to,
to then, um, be able to deliver patient care. So that's amazing to hear.
What are you most excited about right now? What makes you nervous?
Well, you know, I'm gonna actually go a little different direction, uh,
because I,
there's been a lot of discussion and explosion lately with the concepts and the
discussion around artificial intelligence and how to use it. And I really, I'm,
you know, I work, uh, in our digital health space as well here at Vanderbilt.
And, um, the prospects of that are so exciting, you know,
to make our jobs more efficient, easier to be predictive,
using big data and algorithms to, to do that, that's exciting to think about,
but it's also nervous because things can go wrong. We have, we have, um,
privacy, we've gotta think about, we've got security, we've gotta think about,
uh, we've got, you know, misuse that we have to think about and, and,
and the prospects for that. So it's,
it's the same concept and I'm both excited and nervous about it.
Absolutely. That makes a lot of sense. And I know, you know, right now, overall,
artificial intelligence is experiencing a huge renaissance, you know,
evolving every single day in terms of its capabilities and how people are using
it to grow in different industries. And healthcare is no different.
Now from the healthcare perspective, I know, as you mentioned,
those discussions can be very varied, um, that has a lot of potential,
can do some really great things from operational and clinical side,
but also the areas privacy, security, um,
in making sure that it's used in ethical way are hugely important. Healthcare.
So what are those discussions like with your, your broader team?
How do you really set some of the guardrails?
And I can imagine still in the very early stages of the technology's evolving
every day. Um, what are those discussions like and how do you, uh,
develop that on the digital health side?
Yeah, yeah. And it, like you said, it's, it's, it's developing, it's ongoing.
But I think that starting with both the, what are the opportunities,
what are the things that we want to do, what do we wanna get involved on?
But then the guardrails really come into play around what's the governance we
need to set up to oversee this? And of course, you know,
you don't wanna be too stringent,
but you gotta be stringent enough where you make sure you're dotting all your I
and crossing all your T's. So that's,
that's still an ongoing conversation and we haven't, we have not figured it out,
uh, as most organizations ha have, have, not either. But, uh, the,
the prospects of, of that governance aspects and how we, uh,
think about safety, you know, privacy, ethics, ethical uses,
all of that stuff, our ongoing conversations we're having,
and it's that core group of governance individuals that we need to establish and
keep, keep talking about it and learn from each other.
We need to be sharing across organizations as well so we don't duplicate and we
can learn from each other in, in those setups.
Absolutely.
I think that's so important and definitely something that we aim to do, uh,
at our meetings. As you mentioned, our annual meeting earlier, uh,
in the conversation,
being able to just be on the forefront of what's happening on a day-to-day basis
is, um, so crucial.
And so thank you so much for bringing that in and mentioning it. Now,
before we wrap up our conversation, I wanted to look into the future.
We've talked a lot about some of the ways that healthcare is changing,
whether it's focusing on the patient, the consumer, and then two,
having artificial intelligence, uh, really mm-hmm.
takes center stage in many ways.
So what will effective healthcare leaders need to be successful over the next
two to three years?
Yeah, that's a, that's another really good question. I,
I think the first thing that comes to mind for me is, is the idea that,
that healthcare is the ultimate team sport.
We can't operate individually and we need to surround ourselves with le with
with individuals that we trust and that are working towards the common goal.
Cuz if we have, if we trust each other, if we can put that to the side,
we're gonna be much more effective in our ability to handle the,
the very challenging problems, uh,
but also exciting ones that we have ahead of us. So the,
the team aspect of it in the leadership space and across the organization and
who you're working with and, and are you tied to the,
the goal of the organization is very important.
I think the second thing that I would say is keeping an eye on the workforce and
that, that cultural aspect, you know,
the last couple years have been with Covid and then coming out of Covid and, um,
you know, the, now the financial headwinds,
people want to believe in something that's bigger than themselves.
And healthcare has the,
is the ultimate place for that to happen because we do miracles every single
day,
but we need to continue to translate that to the many thousands of individuals
that come, come in our organization and wanna be part of that,
that bigger picture. So how can we support them?
How can we make their jobs a little more effective? How can we make it easier,
uh, for them so they can feel that pride in the work they're doing? I think the,
the third thing is just, is the continued explosion of,
of technology and our ability to assess, uh, accurately assess,
you know, what are the problems we're trying to solve,
and then how can that technology help us? We,
we can't add technology just because it's the shiny dollar and it looks great
and, and we, we think it's gonna solve something and it may solve something,
but actually may cause other problems down the line.
So you have to be very intentional these days about what's the technology we're
gonna introduce, and is it truly solving a,
a workforce or a patient problem to make things a little easier and a little
more effective? Um, and I,
the last thing I would say is back to that team aspect is,
and also back to the financial headwinds,
is in the experience space now is not the time to,
to use the financial headwinds to reduce the experience,
you need to lean into it further because the experience is human experience,
it's both patient and employee.
And having intentional conversations and professionals working in that space
will make the organization not much more effective. And,
and now's not the time in the financial pressures to cut those types of
programs.
Absolutely. I think that's a really great point,
and certainly that human human relationship makes, you know,
all the difference in the world when you think about the experience in patient
care. And it brings up a really great point, um,
as we've been talking through healthcare resources are precious right now more
than ever. And, and so from the patient experience lens,
if you know you're a hospital or health system that is facing some of these
challenges in a tightening budget, um,
but still want to be supportive of these initiatives and,
and move forward with the great patient experience and great patient care, uh,
what you,
you prioritize when you're thinking about your investments and thinking about
what needs to, um, come in, whether it's from the personnel side or technology,
what do you really need to prioritize to, to have a, um,
great patient experience team in, in, uh, culture within your organization, uh,
but also being mindful of the budget?
Yeah, I, I, I mean, I go back, it's the, it's the effective workforce. I mean,
um, happy employees, equal happy patients,
and we need to continually lean into, you know, working,
uh, across disciplines. So hr, marketing, operations,
patient experience with the lens and the focus on what are we doing
for the workforce to make their jobs a little easier, a little more effective.
And then the ways to do that is also being how can we introduce technology into
and, and, and technology solutions to make process processes easier. Um,
but I always, always go back to the behavioral standards,
the values of the organization. Are you continually reminding the workforce,
the guiderails or the guard posts for how you expect the care to be delivered
and how you expect individuals in the organization to interact and,
and work with each other. And if you do that,
if you have those and you do that consistently,
you're gonna win on the experience side.
I love it. Brian, thank you so much for joining us on the podcast today.
This has been a really fascinating discussion and I look forward to connecting
with you again soon.
My pleasure. Thank you for having me.
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