May 8, 2020: Today’s conversation is with Josh Sol, Director of Innovation in Ambulatory Clinical Systems at Houston Methodist. We kick things off hearing about Josh’s role at the institution and the many facilities it is comprised of before our guest gives a little background on how they have progressed through the pandemic. Josh informs us of the great job they have done training physicians to scale virtual medicine before he sketches out some of the solutions they came up with for challenges in areas of IT, physician support, and operations. Josh gets into the many innovations the institution has implemented in this time, listing their use of different Epic tools, a virtual lounge, Alexas and iPads in patient rooms, and even a virtual ICU center in the pipeline. Central to these implementations is their Technology Hub, and Josh discusses the role it plays in their sophisticated innovation framework. From there, we chat about what virtual implementations will become a part of their standard procedures as hospitals start opening up again, and Josh stresses their ongoing focus on patient experience and accurate clinical documentation. Wrapping up, Josh talks about how useful the common architecture they began developing as early as 2016 has been for integrating recent IT implementations from a preparedness standpoint. Tune in for a this brilliant report from an institution that had a great framework in place to help them scale to meet the crisis.
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