This Week Health

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December 13, 2021: Sue Schade from StarBridge Advisors joins Bill for the news. Around the world, millions of people are rethinking how they work and live and how to better balance the two. The Great Resignation has U.S. workers quitting their jobs in record numbers. Harvard Business Review looks at 5 new rules for leading a hybrid team. As leaders, we need to take a hard look in the mirror and use the shift to hybrid an opportunity to maintain a culture of excellence. Harvard also looks at 5 principles to improve the patient experience. Rule number one, remember that patients are consumers. While tech advances have created exceptional consumer experiences, providers should keep in mind that a holistic experience involves more than just applying technology.

Key Points:

00:00:00 - Intro

00:08:38 - Almost half of the world's workers are considering quitting, according to a Microsoft corporation survey

00:13:00 - Managers who don't evolve through this pandemic are really going to struggle to retain staff

00:15:00 - People want to know that the work they're doing has purpose and meaning.

00:34:20 - The consumer experience is more than technology

Sue Schade blog: Developing next generation leaders (literally)

StarBridge Advisors

Stories:

Transcript

Newsday - How Leaders Can Accommodate Teams and Patients In a Digital Future

Episode 471: Transcript - December 13, 2021

This transcription is provided by artificial intelligence. We believe in technology but understand that even the smartest robots can sometimes get speech recognition wrong.

Bill Russell: [00:00:00] Today on This Week in Health IT.

Sue Schade: Burnout and mental health is certainly an issue for many workers. It's certainly an issue for healthcare workers. They don't want to live like their parents. My two daughters they're born in 78 and 81. And I think for a long time, they've made it clear to me, as much as they want to progress in their career, they don't want to work like I've worked. They don't want to have what I've had in terms of the push and the responsibility and at times what that means in terms of the [00:00:30] impact on your family and home life.

Bill Russell: It's Newsday. My name is Bill Russell. I'm a former CIO for a 16 hospital system and creator of This Week in health IT. A channel dedicated to keeping health IT staff current and engaged.

Special thanks to Sirius Healthcare, Health Lyrics and World Wide Technology who are our Newsday show sponsors for investing in our mission to develop the next generation of health IT leaders.

Before we begin. I want to share an exciting announcement for This Week in Health [00:01:00] IT. Starting in 2022, we're going to have four channels to bring our community more specialized content for your specific needs. The four channels are News, Community, Conference and The Academy. The News channel we'll have our Today and Newsday shows where we explore the news that is going to impact health IT. The Community channel is just that. A place where we come together and collaborate. One of the distinctions of this channel is that we will have guest [00:01:30] hosts from the industry and people that they invite to talk about the topics that we wrestle with every day. Things like clinical informatics, data security and the like.

We're excited about where the community will take this channel. The Academy is about training. It's about training the next generation of health leaders. Here's where we're going to be launching our new show. It's called Insights and the show will actually take highlights from our last five years and break them into 10 minute episodes for [00:02:00] your team and perhaps people who are new to health IT to come up to speed.

Finally, this channel, the one you're listening to right now will become our Conference channel. The same great content you travel across the country to receive. We're going to be bringing to you right on this channel. This show will become Keynote, where we do our long form 50 minute interviews with industry leaders.

And we will be augmenting that with Solution Showcases and briefing campaigns that introduce exciting solutions in more detail. [00:02:30] For more information on our other channels and where you can subscribe visit us at this weekhealth.com/shows - S H O W S. Now onto the show.

All right. It's Newsday. And today, Sue Schade is joining us from a new studio. Can I call that that room a studio? Or is it your new office?

Sue Schade: Well, I try to call it my space and my workspace and not an office, which is you can call it whatever you want. My husband and I are careful about what we call our spaces is we like. He's [00:03:00] been retired for a while. I move towards it you know. Call my studio. That's fine. For recording purposes.

Bill Russell: I noticed Ruth Bader Ginsburg made the move with you. She's over there. What are the pictures on the other side? Is that artwork?

Sue Schade: Yeah. Yeah. Those good. You caught it. You can't really see it unless I move the camera a little bit, but I will.

There's four of them and it's spring, summer, fall and winter. Arranged as I was told to buy a Chinese gentlemen who saw them getting ready to hang in my office at Michigan. [00:03:30] And he told me how I supposed to hang them in order. But we bought these prints when we were in China in 2011. Yeah. And behind me, can you see that one way in the back? It's piano keys. So there's a reminder as I go downstairs. Have I played the piano yet today, which is part of my balance.

Bill Russell: So you try to play every day?

Sue Schade: Oh yes. Oh, absolutely. Yeah, yeah. And work on new stuff all the time. Yeah.

Bill Russell: My little sign [00:04:00] above my door just says you're leaving the office. So just, just a reminder that when I walked through those doors that I am now home.

Sue Schade: Ok. Ok.

Bill Russell: It's a weird dynamic we live in these days, but Hey, we're going to talk a bunch about that. We're coming up on, let's see. Let's call it two years in the pandemic. Various aspects of the pandemic. We think we're almost through it. And then we have another spike and whatnot. Healthcare workers have been moving really fast. We've got a couple stories I want to touch on.[00:04:30] Hybrid teams working remote. I want to set this up a little bit because you're, the kind of person I can have this conversation with because you're very thoughtful on these kinds of things, especially with how we address working and balance with your piano in the back.

I'm going to start with a Bloomberg article. From the great resignation to lying flat workers are opting out. If people don't know what lying flat is it's essentially great resignations is what's going on in the US. Lying flat is what's going on in China. And you have similar things going on [00:05:00] in Europe.

You have similar things going on in Japan. And you know that the lead into this article is in China, the US, Japan, and Germany, the younger generation is rethinking the pursuit of wealth. And it's really interesting. Let me give you a couple of clips from this because I want to get your comments. The great resignation has us workers quitting their jobs in record numbers. More than 24 million did so from April to September of this year, and many are staying out of the labor force. [00:05:30] Germany, Japan, and other wealthy nations are seeing shades of the same trend. The pandemic has taken a toll with surveys showing feeling of burnout and deterioration in mental health in many nations. Although the great resignation is a phenomenon among those who are younger than 40, it's also reverberating across the economy and forcing a broader conversation about work. Millennials born between 1980 and 1990, which let's see is [00:06:00] that my kids. know it's not my. And Gen Z, the demographic cohort after them, that's my kids tend to marry, buy houses and have children later than their forebearers if at all.

As I just rattle off some of that to get the conversation started, it's interesting as a manager to read these things, I mean, we have two Harvard business review articles today. We have this Bloomberg article. But it would appear to me that how people view work and work-life balance is changing. And that's one of the things that's causing the great resignation. [00:06:30] People are looking at the potential of dying, the potential of not getting ahead and saying, I don't want to live, like my parents lived. I don't want to pursue money my entire career. And part of that is leading to shortages. Shortages across the board for, for healthcare, but also across the entire economy. What are your thoughts as you hear those first couple of paragraphs in this article?

Sue Schade: Yeah. Many things. What I captured here, taking some notes, the burnout and mental health is certainly an issue for many workers. [00:07:00] It's certainly an issue for healthcare workers. I think it's probably a big issue as well for women, which you didn't touch on specifically as you noted that article.

But I know you've talked recently about how many women have left the workforce during the pandemic, which is kind of whole nother issue that could be talked about. I think the, the concept of the point that they don't want to live like their parents and I get mixed up on the generations myself in terms of what those delineations are.

Whatever started in 80 is what [00:07:30] actually my two daughters span that one. They're born in 78 and 81. And I think for a long time, they've made it clear to me, as much as they want to progress in their career, they don't want to work like I've worked. They don't want to have what I've had in terms of the push and the responsibility and at times what that means in terms of the impact on your family and home life.

So they, they see me as a role model as a leader and as a woman. But not in how hard [00:08:00] I've worked, if that makes sense. Though, don't get me wrong. They work very hard. They're very competent.

Bill Russell: I understand completely what you're saying. Cause my kids would say the same thing to me. You traveled too much. You took on too much responsibility, that kind of stuff. And I look at them and I go, you all work very hard and they're like, yeah, but there's a different, like they won't trade some of the things I traded. They look at their life a lot more about life than about providing for the next generation, which is sort of my mindset.

Sue Schade: [00:08:30] Yeah. Yeah. Well, and, and the focus on family and kids and just a lot more, I think equality between couples in terms of raising kids than there might've been in my generation.

Bill Russell: Let me pivot this to health it a little bit. So almost half of the world's workers are considering quitting, according to a Microsoft corporation survey. About four in 10 millennial and gen Z respondents say, they'd leave their job if asked to come back to the office full time. The global survey by advisory company, Qualtrics International Inc [00:09:00] found more than any other generation. And so as we, as we sort of look at that, And the reason I talk about this is to provide managers a context. So if you're a manager listening to this saying, what's the relevance to health IT? These statistics generally are talking about your workforce and we've seen this. We've seen people leave jobs. We've seen people leave and essentially say, look, I'm not going to get vaccinated and I'm leaving. And we've seen people [00:09:30] just leave. And and you mentioned the women in the workforce and I think the number was 3 million women have left the workforce.

And a lot of that was due to women bearing the brunt of, Hey, the kids are going to be home and they're not going to school anymore. One of us has to be there. Not only that we have to take on the aspect of educating them or a part of that. Making sure they go to class and all that stuff online.

And that's the context of the world that you live in. You're you're not at every dinner table, [00:10:00]but those are the conversations that are going on at the dinner table of your staff. So if you're coaching your managers, how do you have them think about this and how do you coach them to respond to these changes that are going on?

Sue Schade: I'd say a couple of things. One, I think it's absolutely critical that managers and organizations provide a level of flexibility to their employees at this point. Because it is a workers' market right, right now in terms of they can move wherever they want. So flexibility, [00:10:30] I think is key.

I think that really knowing your people and they're particular, you know without being invasive and overly personal. Knowing their situation, understanding their situation and supporting them through whatever they're working through. I think that organizations and it's one of the points in one of the articles we're going to get into around leading a hybrid team. Make work purpose driven.

You know, In health care, it's not that hard for us to connect our people to the mission. And a lot of people are in healthcare because of the [00:11:00] mission. And to constantly enforce that. Why what we do really matters. I would assume that you've got more at risk staff in I T in the technical infrastructure ranks that have opportunities to go to other tech companies and take those skills anywhere.

So making sure that they are very connected to the mission, I think is critical as well. Obviously your people supporting applications tend to tend to be a little bit more grounded in the mission and what the [00:11:30] organization is doing. So those would be a couple points that I would coach managers on.

Bill Russell: I coach CIOs, and I know that you have mentoring relationships with some as well. It was interesting to me, one of the CIOs I coach, early on in the pandemic, he essentially said, we've got to get these people back in the office. Right. And so that was sort of the mindset of how can we get them back in the office because we're missing out on too many things and whatnot.

And it's been interesting to see him evolve from that thinking. First of all, he couldn't bring everybody back in. [00:12:00] So it gave him time to sort of collect information. And he's the kind of person that listens a lot, asked a lot of questions and not. You know and you fast forward to a conversation we had just today.

And he said we have to be really sensitive to the journey our workers are on. And what they're trying to navigate at home. What they're trying to navigate. And so what they're going to do is they're gently going to offer them alright hey, we need you in the office one day.

And we want you to be a week.Mindful of that one day. You can pick the day, [00:12:30] but we want you to be mindful of that one day. What would give you the most value? What things could you do on that one day that you're in the office? If you have a department staff meeting that would be a good day for you.

Not that you have to choose that day, but that'd be a good day to interact with those people and have those, those conversations. And maybe bunch, some things on that day. And I think, I think that's how, I love the, it went from, Hey, you know what? We're getting everybody back in here because that's what we've always done and just feels right to me [00:13:00] to just thinking through it and really evolving.

And I think the managers that don't evolve through this, they're really going to struggle. They're going to keep losing people until they do evolve. Because people have a choice up to and including just leaving and not working.

Sue Schade: Yeah. Yeah. Well, just another piece of it. The managers, the leaders have to set the example in terms of their connection, back to the office and to the organization onsite. [00:13:30]Right. There's many conveniences and benefits to being fully remote, right. But as a leader, I don't think you want to go down the path of, I'm fully remote period.

Right. I think you've got to model, certain behavior. I'm going to be in the office these days because right. Here's the value of it. And I want my team to work with me in terms of, as you say in that example, the flexibility one day a week, which day is it going to be, provide some direction on [00:14:00] how the team works together.

How the teams interact with other teams? It's just, it's not binary. It's not, everybody's stay at home forever. And it's not, everybody's in the office every day. It's a whole mix to make work.

Bill Russell: CIO's, aren't remote workers per se, but if you took 260 work days a year, the number of days I was actually on site had to be at least 80 to a hundred days less than that.

I mean actually in the IT building, in my office. Had to be almost a hundred days less than that. I mean, I had to [00:14:30] go Texas for board meetings. Even within our health system, 16 hospitals, I had to go all over the place plus plus conferences and other things that you did. I, think, we were able to do it.

And so anyway, as we're having conversations with CIOs. I do want to hit on some of these other articles. I want to start with the five rules of leading a hybrid team. You selected this article. This is from the Harvard business review. Great article. Has a couple of things. I'll let you set it up. You already touched on the first point, which is to connect [00:15:00] work with the mission of the organization to make it purpose driven, because people want to know that the work they're doing has purpose has meaning.

Sue Schade: Yeah. So, so let's give some context. This is by Laslo Bock who was at Google and is now the CEO and Co-founder of Humu, H U M U. Have you heard of them?

Bill Russell: No, they just keep making up words.

Sue Schade: It's an HR software company using people science to help people do their best work.

And when I looked them up online, it [00:15:30] looked like they do a lot of consulting services as well as product in the whole HR space. And there's five key points here. The first one I did already touch on about make work meaningful and make work purpose driven.

He's saying purpose matters more than ever. Research shows that people don't feel their work contributes to the company's mission are 630% more likely to quit their jobs than their peers who do. As I was reading it, I thought of something that I saw on LinkedIn from a former [00:16:00] colleague of mine when I was at the Brigham.

And she's now at Humana and she posted on LinkedIn, I really liked this. She said sharing part of my morning mantra, move the mission, mind the hearts and souls of those moving the mission. When stuck, take a break, then frame focus and finish the work. Repeat. It seemed like a very grounded kinda perspective to her work.

I really liked that. Just to go on the second [00:16:30] point that he makes is trust your people more than feels comfortable. And he talked about you need to offer direction, but not directions.

I mean it gets at broad direction where we need you to go. Not the how. Not the micromanage in terms of the how. And I think a couple more. He talks about learning the small moments.

Bill Russell: Let's go back to that. I love the trust your people more than feels comfortable.

It's the thing I used to say to my managers is I want you to be descriptive, not [00:17:00] prescriptive. I don't want you to prescribe people do these things. I want you to describe what you want to have happen. Like we want this project to be successful. We're going to define successful as on-time off, but whatever.

I mean, just describe what you want and then let them, let them do what they're going to do and encourage them to come to you for questions and that kind opf stuff. But that is so important. And I think in this remote world, we have to trust our people. Right? That is, that's the number one thing I find when managers are like, Hey, we need them to come back in the [00:17:30] office.

I'm like, why do you need them to come back in the office? And more I push on it and the more I'm thinking about it, it feels to me like, it's a trust thing. It's like, I need them in the office because I'm not sure they're going to get the work done. Well the information that we have now would indicate that they do get the work.

And do, do I care if they're taking a nap from two to two 30? I don't really care if they're taking a nap from two to two 30, because if they weren't taking a nap at their house, they'd be in the office doing whatever they did from two to two 30, which is wasting [00:18:00] time anyway. So, there, there is this trust factor.

There's that old thing flying around the internet and it gets attributed to Steve Jobs of, you hire great people. You've got to trust them to do it and just get out of their way. And it just, just let them do it. I think that's part of what we need to do is you know if we hired good people, trust them to do their job.

Sue Schade: That feels really old school that bring them back because you don't trust them. Especially when you're dealing with professionals. To me, my push when I was at Boston children's, as we thought about, what should we do, my concern was not trust about productivity and what they're [00:18:30] doing, but connectivity. What are we losing by not having people connected in a more in-person way. Both to each other, as well as to the people they're supporting with the hospital organization.

Bill Russell: All right. So you set it up. Learn in the small moments, send people on your staff nudges.

Sue Schade: So nudges. T hat's an interesting one. And I think if you look at this company's website, maybe they're trying to it's a thing, it's a thing. But nudges would be something maybe coming from HR that says, have you sent any thank you notes [00:19:00] this week to your staff?

It's little reminders to do certain kinds of things. And I mean, quite honestly, if you're the kind of person who is kind of high touch and very connected with your staff. You might find this annoying, right. But if you're not and it doesn't come naturally, maybe those are really helpful. The nudges.

Bill Russell: I just received a thank you note from somebody who's probably a gen X, gen Z kind of person, a handwritten thank you note. And I'll tell you, my view of that person just went like from here to, I can't [00:19:30] put as high as I can put it up. Cause he had to go out and buy the note. He had to write the note. He had to put it in an envelope. He had, I mean, it's such a hassle. I we're like, well, why, why would he have done that? He could have easily sent you an email?

Well I receive 250 emails a day. That note was like it stood out significantly. And as a manager, I'm always telling my managers, Hey, think of creative ways to communicate with people. And not just the daily email, the weekly email. Talk to them about things more than [00:20:00] work. If you could figure out a way to talk to them about things more than work, you're going to connect on a different level.

Hey, I like these last two, by the way. Number four, provide clarity. Be more decisive than feels comfortable.

Sue Schade: The point that I highlighted in that one Bill, is that when it comes to company direction, policies and values, being clear is the kindest thing you can do. Even if your decision is unpopular, which I found that really interesting because there's so much time spent like, oh, how's this going to be received?

What should we do? What's going to be the best [00:20:30] approach on this across the board. And there are going to be people that don't like it, but to say, this is what, we're making a decision. This is the direction. I thought that was an interesting one. What'd you think about one?

Bill Russell: I love that one. I love that sentence too, but the thing I say to people is, especially people I'm coaching. If I were to interview your entire staff right now and ask them what is the, career progression for you in your current role? How many of your people do you think would be able to answer that?

And that's the kind of, we need to provide that level of clarity, especially in this [00:21:00] time when people are trying to figure out, do I stay here? Do I not stay here? Somebody comes in and provides them that clarity. They may leave just to have that clarity. That's what's next for me. That's where I'm going.

And that that's a simple fix. It's not a simple fix, but that's a fix where you can just have every manager document, sit down with every employee on a one-on-one basis, whatever that timeframe is. Some organizations did it every six months. Our organization did it every six months. And I [00:21:30]remember the managers every six months, they'd roll around like, oh, we gotta do this again.

I'm like, no, no, this is, this is, this is the job. This is like the thing here, you're going to, you're going to provide them clarity. It's like, how are they doing? What's next? How can they prepare for what's next? What can they do? That's a challenge. I mean, that question of do they know what's next in their career and if they can't answer that question, My gosh.

That's one of the basics, but I, I can almost guarantee you almost every organization I walk into, if I was [00:22:00] able to pull every IT person on their staff better than half would have no idea what's next to their career progression.

Sue Schade: You wonder how often is that the one of the responses in the exit interview. I didn't know what was next. It didn't seem like there was next. Right.

Bill Russell: There was no next for me.

Sue Schade: Yeah, no, next year. So I'm, I'm leaving. The last one here gets at culture. It's include everyone. Take a hard look in the mirror and the point here use the shift to hybrid as an [00:22:30]opportunity to identify cultural gaps and to set new norms, to create a better, stronger culture.

So, we've obviously seen a lot of focus on organizational culture during this rather stressful two years for organizations.

Bill Russell: Yeah. I did an interview with Doug King CIO at Northwestern medicine. And one of the things I like about what he was doing, he he'd created this funnel of new labor coming in from colleges and that kind of stuff.

And one of the things he talked about was. He goes, I try [00:23:00] to get them to give me all sorts of new ideas before they get indoctrinated. Like before they're told, like we don't do that in healthcare. We don't do. He goes, cause they're just, I mean, their brains are not limited when they come in the door and they're just like, why don't we change the intake process?

And people are like, oh, you don't understand that so many conversations for like, you know, when you're new to healthcare, you just look at it through a different lens and you go, you know we should be able to make this better.

Sue Schade: Yeah. I love that podcast. [00:23:30] I've been meaning to comment on it and share it myself on social media. I don't know Doug, but I really liked what he did there in terms of starting early with college age in terms of a career path. At Michigan when we were doing the big clinical Epic inpatient implementation. We have like about 250 interns who are at the elbow support for three months.

Bill Russell: Michigan students.

Sue Schade: They were college students from various [00:24:00] schools within Michigan, not just the university of Michigan. And we had a whole program. We had had about a dozen in a previous phase implementation and that worked and we said, let's just do this. Let's go big or go home. Right. And we had a whole program where instead of bringing in the, at the elbow support, more costly contract people who they apparently didn't feel knew the product well enough.

And it didn't work that well that we would try something different. And we brought them in [00:24:30]and they got a month of indepth exposure and training to the product. And then we use them for the Go Live support shifts on the units. And it was tremendously successful. We hired a number of them after that.

So yeah, I'm all in favor of this. The other thing I'm in favor of, and I think this was at University of Vermont. We did this with a small internship program. And asked them to do a project, in addition to their internship, to pair up and identify an [00:25:00] opportunity for improvement to do something different in the department.

And this is where back to your point about Doug. It's fresh eyes. They're not indoctrinated yet, so they can ask those questions. Like, why isn't this simpler? Why isn't this automated? So, yeah. Gotta to get those new ideas in and, and get people early in their careers into organizations. I'm a fan.

Bill Russell: Fantastic. So our friend John Glasser is also writing articles. November 11th he wrote this article and John Glasser has been on the show for those who don't [00:25:30] know, John has many stints. Mass General. Is that where you ran into him? Mass General?

Sue Schade: Could say ran into him. He was my boss for 10 years.

Bill Russell: There you go.

Sue Schade: There you go. Boss, colleague, friend, mentor. What an opportunity to work with him. Yeah, he was the CIO for the whole system when I was the CIO at Brigham.

Bill Russell: Fantastic. And so he did a little stint at Cerner, a little stint, a fairly long stint at Cerner. And now he is executive in residence at Harvard Medical School and lecture [00:26:00] at the university of Pennsylvania Wharton school.

So he is, he is passing on. His expertise to the next generation. So he wrote an article five principles to improve the patient experience. I think someone with this much experience is is definitely worth listening to I'll tee some of this up. So, number one, patients as consumers. In healthcare the term patient and consumer were often seen as only loosely related. The patient is the [00:26:30] term applied to a person who is receiving healthcare. A consumer is a person who makes a decision about obtaining a good or a service and then proceeds or not to obtain it.

Healthcare providers have traditionally been concerned with patients, but not with consumers. Many providers aboard the word consumer or customer. I remember the first meeting where I used the word consumer and I was maybe a month into my healthcare tenure. And I thought my healthcare tenure might last for one month and [00:27:00] one day because it was, it was not well-received. This was 2011 and it was not well received. They are not consumers. They are patients. If we treat them like consumers, we're not going to be able to tell them what they need to hear. We're not going to be able to care for them the way, if we treat them as consumers. For me, that was the first education on, oh, there's different ways to view this.

I didn't recognize that there's different ways. But you know, in the context of the other things we're talking about, people do have more of a choice today than they [00:27:30] ever have of what they're going to do, where they're going to receive care, or quite frankly not receive care. They might have a bad experience and just say, you know what, I'm going to live with this.

I'm just going to stay home. And so that's an interesting first point. Do you get much pushback? I mean, that was 2011. I find that that pushback has really subsided pretty significantly in healthcare. But do you feel any of that pushback when you talk about patients as consumers?

Sue Schade: I'm not sure that we did talk in my most recent organizations about patients that as consumers. So wouldn't [00:28:00] have had the opportunity for that pushback. I don't think they were there now at Boston children's they probably in the innovation area that was doing a lot in terms of digital front door might've been talking that way, but it's not been, it's not really been an issue. I think that his concept here is on target in terms of thinking about people, making a choice. Where they get their service, what kind of service? And that is the consumer aspect of it. And that's where you see all the push right now for it to make it easier to access healthcare [00:28:30] services. The digital front door, as it is still commonly called.

Bill Russell: Yeah. And then he gives a caution to us in health IT. Number two is the consumer experience is more than technology. We need that reminder from time to time, but essentially, we get caught up in the well we're going to give them the ability to do appointments online and but the experience is is broader.

And I remember the conversation that I had with Glen Tullman around this. And he said, we still do a lot of abnormal things in healthcare because, [00:29:00] it's like we drop a vase and we break. And what we do in healthcare is we sweep the glass to the side and we say, that's the path you go down.

We never actually pick up all the glass. We just, we find a way to navigate through it and navigate around it, instead of saying, Hey, you know what? These systems don't talk to each other. This doesn't work. This doesn't work. Let's let's fix. Because the experience is not good for the clinicians and it's not good for the patients.

And I mean, that was his perspective. [00:29:30] I think we do a lot of that every day. We're trying to figure out how to optimize workflows and those kinds of things. I think what he was saying, and the bigger picture is we're working around a lot of things that are broken. But in that, in the context of that story, the experience is far greater than that.

It's the people they interact with. Once they get on site, it's the experience of moving from one care venue to another from one care provider to another. It is the it is the technology for sure. We've heard that through the [00:30:00] pandemic that the experience for telehealth can vary pretty pretty widely for different groups of people.

Sue Schade: Yeah. So, if I can use a very current example this morning, and it happened to me in this context. It's more than the technology, the process. So like, there's this, new, more advanced shingles shot that people of a certain age should be getting, even if they got one years ago. So I made the appointment.

I got it at Walgreens this morning and I arrived for a 10:30 [00:30:30] appointment. They gave me a form to fill out. And, when I was done both sides, bring it back up. Lots of people waiting around for boosters and vaccines and different things. So I sit down, I start filling out this form and I'm looking at it and going, wait a minute.

I did all this online when I made the appointment. I answered all these questions. So I go back up to tell him, you should have this. Well, she wasn't there. And there was now someone ahead of me. And so I thought, okay, I'll fill out the form just in case I really have to. And there were some questions, like, are you sick [00:31:00] today?

Well, I made the appointment last week. So when I was online, I couldn't answer that question. Right. So I fill it out. I give it to her and I said, I did all this online. She goes yeah, we should tell people to bring a printout of the online form that's been completed because we don't have access here to that.

Okay. To that portal. And I'm like, okay. No we can't get it. Like, so I said, well, yeah. And it didn't tell me to print it when I finished it so I mean, [00:31:30] that's just, that's like a little thing from an experience flow perspective. Right. There you go.

Bill Russell: Yeah, that's fascinating. Although, as a CIO, don't you get those stories? I know that when I was walking the halls, people would say, let me tell you something that happens. And then they would tell me, and I'd go, ah, I can't believe we do that. And I'd go back to the team. I'd say, well, why does this happen? And then they would lay it out. Why it's happening? And I'd be like oh that's not simple to solve is it?[00:32:00]

Sue Schade: Yeah. This, I don't know. This sounded simple to solve with my CIO hat on. I have all this information. I've scheduled the appointment online for that pharmacy. They should have access to the information.

Bill Russell: It was a Walgreens? Not to call them out, but. And Walgreens are not independently owned. They're nationally owned.

Sue Schade: Yeah. Here's what I want to say. Cause I did do a LinkedIn post last week that got a lot of views and some comments as well as someone who works at Walgreens saying I [00:32:30] saw your post and you should take that to customer service.

Right. But I was not trying to call out Walgreens. I was trying to generalize on my scheduling experience and how we can do better. And this was the long wait on the phone, finally gave up on the phone, went to see if I could A, do they give this shot at the local Walgreens? B, can I do it scheduling online, which I could and then I finally hung up. I'd been on for half an hour. Halfway in, I did the online, including the form that I had to do again today on paper. Anyways, I [00:33:00] don't want to call them out specifically. I think every organization and probably all of these retail organizations that are disrupting things are having similar challenges in terms of getting their whole workflow and systems to where they really need to be.

And I hope they get there because I think they're very, a very important part of the delivery system. I mean, that can not be easier, right? I don't want to drive really far, get an appointment with my PCP to get a shingles shot. Go to my Walgreens where I get my one prescription. [00:33:30] Great. So I hope they can get there and they can continue to refine, refine these processes and systems.

Bill Russell: Yeah and actually I'm going to point our listeners to this article. Five principles to improve patient experience John Glaser lays out a couple more of these points. Tech advances create opportunities to deliver exceptional experience. And it does and be careful about the meaning of terms in strategy discussions and thi s is interesting because he says care providers use the term digital front door can also [00:34:00] misdirect the strategy because it implies that care needs a building and is reactive. Beginning when the consumer rings the doorbell. The phrase journey to health may be better term. This phrase is clear about the goal for the person who is the consumer and a patient. And the phrase does not blend at the mechanics with the goal. Mechanics that can quickly become an anachronism.

It's interesting because that digital front door is, and I've [00:34:30] talked about, this is replacing the term portal. And we are so happy to see the word portal go away. But what we may be failing to realize is digital front door is is maybe communicating the wrong thing. Yeah, it's just interesting to think about, so anyway.

Sue Schade: I have one more story. Do we have time?

Bill Russell: Oh, absolutely.

Sue Schade: So he talks about journey to health is a good phrase. My other story, and this would be the payor and health provider [00:35:00] connection. Okay. So I'll make it really simple. I fractured, I had a fracture needed to get a bone density test for the ortho physicians.

She goes, we really should, at this point get another bone density test. I'm like, great. I thought she was going to order it. Next day, I get a call from my health insurance and they said, we're looking at claims and we see that you had a fall, you need to get a bone density. And I'm like, did my doctor tell you to do that and they go, no, no, no, no. It's based on the claims and we're going to have someone in the area on September 15th and we can come to your home and do a bone density and [00:35:30] I'm like, great. Then I don't have to go somewhere. Great. But I'm wondering, is it really as good as the kind that you lay down on and get scanned?

Right. And they go, oh yeah, yeah, yeah. So the guy comes to my house. Does the scan on a little piece of my forearm. Says, it's as good as the regular kind and I'm waiting. And he goes, the results will be into your PCP in a couple of weeks. So when I go for my ortho follow-up they haven't seen the results yet. The nurse practitioner, who's going to talk to me about bone health is trying to track down the [00:36:00] results.

She couldn't track them down. We finally figured out between the two of us that that home bone density tests had been denied by Medicare because it didn't meet certain criteria, so they didn't charge, they zeroed it out, but then they also didn't tell me any results or that it didn't work. And that I have to get a regular kind.

Right. So then I lost a couple months in this test that my ortho and bone health nurse [00:36:30]practitioner specialist want me to have. So the story here is the technology is advancing. I thought this was like a great alternative and home thing that turns out at least from Medicare, not okay. And the other interesting thing is that the orthopedic surgeon and the nurse practitioner who focuses on bone health, none of them had heard about the option of a home based portable bone density. So, technology's out there. We gotta [00:37:00] make sure that it all comes together in terms of how it's used.

Bill Russell: Yeah, that story is an interesting one because it was such a, those are the kinds of stories we hear at digital conferences, right. At innovation conferences. Oh, look, this is what's happening. And I love the fact, cause I think you talked about that the last time and we talked about it in a positive light and now we're sort of coming back and saying, Hey this is the other side. This didn't, this didn't connect in complete the way we thought it was going to connect and [00:37:30] complete.

Sue Schade: Yeah, I wrote about it too, as just a really positive in terms of access and something in the home, but yeah the full circle story wasn't so positive.

Yeah. And it's interesting. Cause that's one of the things that's happening with CIO's anyway is all these advances are coming pretty rapidly and we're being asked to connect them all in right? Connect it into our communications platform.

Our follow-up. Our appointment scheduling. Our get it into the medical record. Get [00:38:00] it to the, and that doesn't lend itself to health IT organizations moving at any slower pace anytime soon, does it?

Plenty to do.

Bill Russell: Plenty to do. W e ll Sue always, always a pleasure to catch up with you. And I'm happy to see that you're now in your new location and all it looks like it's mostly set up. Are you set up for the holidays?

Sue Schade: We're going to put the tree up tomorrow. I got a few decorations up the other day, so yeah. And we've already had our first [00:38:30] entertaining over Thanksgiving, so yeah.

Bill Russell: You didn't have much going on and you had the interim CIO thing and then you moved and then you have these stories to tell about the different appointments.

Sue Schade: Now I've turned into like a professional full-time healthcare consumer. I feel like, yeah. We have the cataract surgery too. That story and access there. So yeah.

Bill Russell: That is, that is life. I did consulting for 20 years and that's the life of a consultant. You go, go, go, go, go. And then you get like two weeks off and [00:39:00] you just schedule all this stuff that you needed to schedule. The, fixing the things around the house, the fixing the things around your life. Seeing the you know the accountant. Making sure that your taxes are going to get done and all that stuff.

Sue Schade: Before we close, I'm going to give you the kudos again, publicly on what 22 looks like with all your new four channels. Love it. And I've already subscribed to all of them.

Bill Russell: Yeah. You, like the way I called you out on the today show?

Sue Schade: I literally was walking the [00:39:30] dogs when I heard that. And I just had to like, okay, I will subscribe as soon as I get home.

Bill Russell: It's so funny. Cause everybody has their pattern or things they do. And you walk the dogs. Some people exercise. I hope to be one of those people someday. But right now what I do is I listen to a lot of Scott Becker's stuff cause he interviews so many interesting people and I'll pop those on as I go for a walk and that kind of stuff. But yeah, I'm glad that the industry is growing. More people are doing [00:40:00] podcasts and next year we're going to have guests. What would are we calling them? Hosts. I'm not going to be on the show. It's going to be them interviewing their teams and things to that effect. We have Craig Richardville's. He's going to be one of the people who's going to interview his people in his network and he'll do 12 episodes next year.

Angelique Russell data scientist. I'm looking forward to that. She's so smart and the people she interacts with her, and I know she's so smart or I think she's so smart because when she talks, I'm sitting there like looking words up and writing [00:40:30] things down. But yeah, it's it's amazing the work she's doing in clinical data science. And I look forward to some of the people that she brings on the show. Should be, should be good. And Sue as always thank you for being a supporter of the show. Thanks for for coming on all this year. It's been fun to, have these conversations and to share your wisdom with the community.

Sue Schade: Thank you. I've enjoyed it.

Bill Russell: What a great discussion. If you know someone that might benefit from our channel, from these kinds of discussions, please forward them a note, perhaps your team, your staff. I [00:41:00]know if I were a CIO today, I would have every one of my team members listening to this show. It's conference level value every week. They can subscribe on our website thisweekhealth.com or they can go wherever you listen to podcasts, Apple, Google, Overcast, which is what I use, Spotify, Stitcher. You name it. We're out there. They can find us. Go ahead. Subscribe today. Send a note to someone and have them subscribe as well. We want to thank our channel sponsors who are investing in our mission to develop the next generation of health IT leaders. Those are [00:41:30] VMware, Hill-Rom, StarBridge Advisers, Aruba and McAfee. Thanks for listening. That's all for now.

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