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Today in health, it I'm on vacation. So I'm going to be highlighting some of the great content we have on town hall. And so this is going to be an episode from a town hall host. And their guest more on that in a minute. My name is bill Russell. I'm a former CIO for a 16 hospital system and creator of this week health. A set of channels dedicated to keeping health it staff current and engaged. We would think our show sponsors who are investing in developing the next generation of health leaders, accordion dynamics, Quill health tau site nuance.

Canon medical and current health. Check them out at this week. health.com/today. All right, I'm on vacation this week. So I'm taking this time to highlight the great interviews that our hosts have done on the town hall show.

So today brenda oliver cmio baptist south kentucky and michael Atcock vp of population health at magnolia health have a really interesting conversation on closing the gap between providers and payers to create a patient centric healthcare model here you go

So we're talking to payers and providers and just from a digital health perspective,

there still seems to be a chasm and I'll use the example of that.

we've had conversations with payers or parents will come to us and say, Hey, we've developed this great tool to help you, Dr.

Oliver,

it will help you at the point of care, et cetera, et cetera. Yet we have tools like that already built into our EHR and,

and then we, if we were to implement these payer tools, we could potentially have 5, 6, 7 of them with differing recommendations,

based on what guidelines they're following, et cetera.

Just as a specific example, how can we get closer together? How can we bring this chasm together?

and instead of independently developing a tool, come and say, here's, here are our goals as a payer. What tools do you have? How can we get this particular quality metric or these metrics improved?

I think you spoke first about aligning incentives and I think that's, that's key, how we're being paid is, is probably the most important thing, but are there other things that we can do either from a healthcare system perspective?

to, to bring that chasm closer.

I think one of the things that I've noticed, and I still sit in on, I'm still a part of the Mississippi hospital association and still sit on lots of meetings through the tele-health association where this, because we're not the same entity, we can't have a conversation standpoint.

I think that a lot of where we're successful is going in and building relationships with provider groups and working together and having those conversations. In the beginning before we start developing the payment methodologies, or before we start developing our own new tools, but sitting down with,

Michael Edcock and Baptist health, to be able to say, okay, this is what we can bring to the table.

This is what you already have. Here's the gap. How do we close it together? Is that something that you can do with a tool that you have, or is that something that we need to invest in as the payer to bring to the market? Because it just doesn't exist or if it does exist, who hasn't, how do we bring it to bear?

How do we maximize that? But I think it it's just like everything else, Even though we're talking about health IT, it's all about relationships and having conversations and communications with each other. I think that's part of the reasons that we've built friendships through high tech and different groups is being able to have conversations regardless of which part you play in someone's health care. That part is important. Somebody's got to pay for this. Someone has got to actually deliver the care. Someone has to make sure that that information is available. Someone has to start that of idea. It's no different to me as we have, used to do rounding in the hospitals, you wanted as many different members of the team as possible there at that discussion.

I think the same thing could be said for payers and provider groups. How do we come together and have those discussions? And I think there are some groups that just don't want to have that discussion at all. And I think that's a shame. I know that where we are we certainly believe in sitting down and having those discussions and seeing what we can do to help you improve the lives of those that you're empowered to care for.

I wonder

if it's, if it's a lack of understanding that we would, we would welcome those conversations. If they think that we wouldn't want to have those conversations.

yeah. And I think some of it's,

the fact that we have to get together and negotiate at some point. And negotiate rates and negotiate how someone gets paid for whatever it creates this.

Okay. Well, that's the relationship? Well, no, that's a piece of the relationship. And at some point we've got to get past that and talk about how we're going to work together to care for this person. I think if we could all focus on the fact that what's at the center of all this is someone's life and someone's care. And if we focus our conversations around that, I think we can actually get to where we need to be.

I think it's when we try to. The payer at the center of the relationship or the healthcare system at the center of the relationship or the provider at the center, the relationship or the technology at the center of the relationship.

It doesn't work. It's got to be the patient, the member, whatever you want to call them. The person has got to be person centered. If we keep that in mind, it's not hard to come together and really rally around. What's best for those people. As a payer, I can tell you that I don't always know or representing a payer.

I don't always know what's best for.

a member as the provider, there are pieces, there are things that you need from other people on the team to know what's best for that patient. I can tell you as a patient. I always want input and what's best for me,

I know what I'm going to be able to do, and I know what I'm not going to be.

If you ask me to stop eating things that I really like to eat, that's not likely to happen. Let's come up with another solution. How do I exercise that extra, those extra calories or layer? How do I,

take a, take a pill to get rid of that cholesterol. Let's talk about often that solutions, because what may be best may not be best for me

Fantastic. So keep checking back for more of these great interviews. I wouldn't be returning from my vacation on August 8th. We did prerecord some news day episodes. So every Monday you're going to have a nude news day episode, and then we'll be dropping these interviews until I returned on August 8th.

So that's all for today. If you know someone that might benefit from our channel, please forward them a note. They can subscribe on our website this week health. Dot com or wherever you listen to podcasts, apple, Google, overcast, Spotify, Stitcher, you get the picture. We are everywhere. We want to thank our channel sponsors who are invested in our mission to develop the next generation of health leaders.

Gordian dynamics, Quill health tau site nuance, Canon medical, and 📍 current health. Check them out at this week. health.com/today. Thanks for listening. That's all for now.