Latest / Becker’s Healthcare Digital Health + Health IT / Jasmine Bishop, Managing Director at MedStar Telehealth Innovation Center

Transcript

Jasmine Bishop, Managing Director at MedStar Telehealth Innovation Center · Becker’s Healthcare Digital Health + Health IT

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  Philips is a health tech leader focused on
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  innovation that improves the health and well-being of
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  people. Our health care technology and informatics solutions
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  help care teams diagnose, treat, and manage more
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  patients with greater precision, speed, and confidence across
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  the care journey. With Philips, clinicians are empowered
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  with streamlined insights in the moments that matter
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  for every patient. Better care for more people.
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  Philips.
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  This is Gracelyn Keller with the Becker's Healthcare
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  Podcast, and we are live at the 9th
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  annual health IT digital health and RCM conference.
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  I'm excited now to be joined by Jasmine
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  Bishop, who is the managing director at MedStar
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  Telehealth Innovation Center.
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  Jasmine, thanks for being here, and would love
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  to start off by having you introduce yourself
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  a little bit further.
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  Thanks for having me.
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  As you said, I'm the managing director for
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  our telehealth innovation center at MedStar Health. We're
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  a 10 hospital health system in the DC,
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  Maryland, and Virginia area, and we are also
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  benefited by a large innovation institute of which
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  I am part of. And we are
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  supporting,
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  up to 450,000
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  patient visits each year with some of our
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  telehealth, so I'm excited to talk to you
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  a little bit more about that today. But
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  as a quick background, I've been in telehealth
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  for 15 years. I started in California where
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  I'm originally from, and we started back then
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  with addressing the biggest barriers that we have
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  in telehealth, which is broadband. So we actually
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  were
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  installing,
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  broadband lines across the state of California.
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  And
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  since then, I've moved into the health system
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  space, and I'm excited to be able to
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  expand what it means
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  to provide telehealth care and move into some
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  more care innovation. So I'm excited to talk
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  more about that today. Great. Well, thank you
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  so much for being here. And I understand
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  your organization has had 3 years of historic
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  growth in this space. So can you expand
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  a little bit on how telehealth has matured
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  for you?
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  Definitely. So MedStar Health was well positioned when
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  the pandemic hit, and everyone had to shut
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  down most of their ambulatory operations in March
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  of 2020.
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  And well positioned because of us having a
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  MedStar Institute for Innovation and a telehealth innovation
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  center, which I now lead alongside my diet
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  partner, Doug Breith and Booker.
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  And we had already partnered with different platforms
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  to be able to provide telehealth services. We
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  just had to amp them up significantly.
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  So we have the same story that every
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  other health system had about historic growth in
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  that moment. What I'm really excited to talk
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  about is where we're going next and how
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  we've already started to see some of that
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  growth stabilize.
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  So we are now in a moment where
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  we have 15% of our ambulatory visits are
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  still being done over telehealth, at least in
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  primary care. Overall, about 8%,
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  and we get upwards of 30 to 40%
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  in our behavioral health space.
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  Year over year, we continue to see in
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  this past 2 fiscal years
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  450,000
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  visits per year, which suggests some stabilization.
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  So I'm excited for us to be able
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  to continue to build on that growth and
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  then, as I said, be able to move
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  beyond what is considered traditional telehealth.
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  And how has this evolution of telehealth enabled
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  care continually?
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  So the care continuity piece is important because
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  it describes how we can bring in technology
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  beyond just the point of care when a
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  patient, say, bumps their head in the middle
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  of the night and needs to call our
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  247 virtual urgent care platform, which we call
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  MedStar evisit.
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  We also are being able to bring this
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  technology into our urgent care centers. MedStar operates
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  over 30 urgent care centers across, Maryland, DC,
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  and Virginia,
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  And these urgent care centers are key to
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  part of our care continuity plan. We wanna
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  make sure that patients are going into the
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  right center of care for their acuity level.
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  Sometimes the patient doesn't always know, and that
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  is where we're able to bring in specialty
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  consultations into urgent care. So imagine if you
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  go into one of our urgent care centers
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  and you are not so sure if you
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  might need to go to an emergency
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  department,
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  we actually have bunkered ED Physicians that are
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  supporting the urgent cares through video based consultation
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  to help the urgent care providers make those
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  decisions at the site of care.
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  We also are able to
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  provide some confidence and comfort to what we
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  would call our worried well, those that are
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  fine to go home, but do have some
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  ailment that would be benefit
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  from connecting with a specialist. And so in
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  that moment, we can actually roll in a
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  video cart and have them do a teleconsult
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  either with the patient in the room or
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  just between the urgent care provider and their
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  specialist
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  to discuss the treatment plan when the patient
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  gets home and even to schedule at the
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  appointment.
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  That also helps with our patient's ability to
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  know who to reach out to, and we
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  can even schedule that appointment right when they're
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  there.
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  And as we discussed telehealth and with the
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  incredible growth that we've seen in that area
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  from
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  couple years ago all the way through now,
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  I would love to know how you see
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  that health care organizations can better support
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  both IT and clinical teams as we're carrying
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  out these innovations and delivering health in a
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  digital way? Yeah. It's such a great question.
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  We have a shiny toy problem.
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  It's, it's really fun to do the new
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  thing. It's just like any one of us
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  that have started a diet program as an
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  example. We do it for a couple weeks.
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  It feels good and because it's exciting and
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  new, and then it drops off. I think
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  the same thing can happen in not exactly
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  the same way, but with the same impact
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  when it comes to building out new innovation
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  in our health systems.
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  We will find ourselves with an impassioned clinical
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  champion that wants to do something important,
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  maybe even be lucky enough to have some
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  funding for it. And then, ultimately, once we
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  have that thing live, we move on to
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  the next without
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  continuing to build and nurture that original innovation.
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  So one of the ways that we can
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  support our IT organization is ensuring that when
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  we are considering a new innovation, we build
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  it in a way that has sustainability.
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  And sustainability isn't just ensuring that it has
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  a clinical champion that is going to stick
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  around. It's also about understanding the back end
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  support.
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  Cybersecurity is a big issue for everyone right
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  now, and we wanna make sure that we
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  have
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  product managers that are supporting these platforms that
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  we put in place, application support so the
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  users have someone to reach out to when
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  the product isn't working. And,
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  ultimately, when we are
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  going after financing for these new innovations,
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  keeping our IT colleagues in mind and ensuring
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  that we're building the support that they will
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  need to be providing us into that finance
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  request.
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  And finally, as we wrap our conversation, I'd
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  love to know what your top piece of
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  advice is for health care leaders
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  as we prepare for further advancements in technology
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  and greater
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  demands for care.
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  Sure.
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  So I would say partner boldly,
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  and I mean that internally and externally. So
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  we are familiar with the traditional lines of
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  value,
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  cost savings, revenue generation.
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  We know that we can go to our
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  finance teams and show them where those are
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  hitting in ROI through a nicely
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  built business case. But there's a lot more
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  value that can be gained through patient and
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  provider experience
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  that doesn't have to always be seen as
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  soft value. There are ways to define that
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  that actually make a difference for our system
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  to ensure that the very slim margins that
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  nonprofit health systems work within, we're able to
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  make those margins work for us and for
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  our patients and ensure that we're still
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  funding innovation for the next generation.
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  The other element that I would share is
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  on the external side. So we like to
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  partner with all size of vendor,
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  and sometimes they're startups, and that requires us
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  to put together a bit of a vendor
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  stack to support whatever the initiative is. Maybe
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  that vendor is really good in one space,
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  but we need to round them out with
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  1 or 2 other vendors. Sometimes those other
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  vendors might be competitors to the original one,
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  and we want to encourage them to partner
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  boldly too. See beyond those traditional
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  competition lines so that they can partner in
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  a way that
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  allows for true codevelopment
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  and building out real innovation.
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  Wonderful. Well, thank you so much for taking
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  the time to join me today, Jasmine, on
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  the Becker's Healthcare podcast. Again, we are live
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  at the 9th annual health IT digital health
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  and RCM conference. Thanks so much, Grace.