Latest / Becker’s Healthcare Podcast / Steve Smith on Transforming Patient Access Through Automation at Inova

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Steve Smith on Transforming Patient Access Through Automation at Inova · Becker’s Healthcare Podcast

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  This is where health care leadership comes together.
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  Becker's sixteenth annual meeting brings more than 3,500
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  hospital and health system executives and nearly 800
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  speakers to Chicago
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  April.
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  This year's event includes keynote conversations with Dallas
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  Cowboys legend Troy Aikman and former president George
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  w Bush. For the agenda and event details,
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  visit beckershospitalreview.com
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  and click on the events tab in the
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  upper right. We're looking forward to hosting you
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  in Chicago.
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  This is Laura Dirda with the Becker's Healthcare
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  podcast. I'm thrilled today to be joined by
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  Steve Smith, assistant vice president of enterprise contact
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  center and access at Inova Health System. Steve,
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  it's a pleasure to have you on the
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  podcast today. Thanks for having me.
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  Now I'm excited for our conversation. I know
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  we'll be spotlighting some of the cool things
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  you're doing at Inova as well as getting
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  your perspective on the future. But before we
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  dive in, can you tell me a little
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  bit more about yourself and Inova Health System?
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  Well, sure. Absolutely. As you mentioned, I'm Steve
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  Smith, assistant vice president of enterprise contact center
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  and access added on Inova Health here in
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  Fairfax, Virginia, right outside of Washington, DC.
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  We are a five hospital
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  magnet accredited
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  system,
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  with over 3,000,000 patients served every year.
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  Last year, we were
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  acknowledged as the 2025,
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  Prest Gainey Hospital of the Year in large
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  part to our relationship with our patients and
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  under the leadership of doctor Steven Jones.
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  That's fascinating to hear and, you know, truly
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  a a great honor. Now when you think
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  about the last year or so, what was
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  the most important initiative that you led? What
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  did you do, and what were the results?
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  Sure. In the last year, we have changed
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  to a cloud based phone system that's powered
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  by a digital assistant.
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  We really needed to take our technology,
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  up again
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  and really provide our patients,
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  seamless access to our system
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  and provide self-service when applicable.
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  You know, with the digital assistant,
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  the digital assistant integrates
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  and interacts with the patient to route them
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  to their preferred,
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  destination to kinda get away from
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  multiple transfers and gets them to their preferred
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  destination.
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  In instances where we can provide self-service to
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  the patient, whether it's scheduling, rescheduling,
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  medication refills,
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  things of that nature. We try to provide
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  that integration
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  so they don't necessarily need to speak,
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  to a live,
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  operator. However, if they wanna speak to an
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  agent, they're certainly available. You know, what the
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  goal is to self contain,
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  those interactions where we're not entirely dependent on
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  waiting in a call queue or speak to
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  a live person. And within the last year,
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  we've been able to,
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  capture about 25% of the interactions
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  with the digital assistant have been self contained,
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  meaning that they've been resolved within the digital
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  assistant space, and they haven't had to go
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  into a call queue or speak to a
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  live person. So that's really exciting.
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  That's great to hear. And, you know,
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  a a fascinating way to tackle, I know
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  what it is, some big challenges in health
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  care in terms of making sure you have
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  access and scheduling
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  and patients are able to get where they
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  need to go. And so a a great
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  use of technology, and it looks like great
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  results. Now looking ahead, what are some of
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  the big priorities and headwinds that you're focused
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  on for 2026?
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  I would say we're not to the end
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  of the journey yet in terms of our
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  access with our,
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  with our automation.
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  We still need to
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  continue
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  to build,
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  automation with our phone system, provide more self-service
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  across all our specialties.
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  Right now, we have,
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  scheduling self-service for primary care, which has gone
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  really, really well. We're in the process of
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  building that that out for our women's,
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  service line, but we need to build that
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  out for all our specialties. So we need
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  to continue
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  to build that infrastructure
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  to,
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  provide her patients more seamless access,
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  to our system and to be able to
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  do it, you know, even at off hours
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  when they call the digital assistant, they're able
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  to interact with the digital assistant and in
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  many instances,
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  resolve their concerns. In terms of headwinds, I
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  would say
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  continue to provide our team members,
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  more tools to do their job better. From
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  my perspective as a call center leader, provide
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  them more support in a scheduling process,
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  whether,
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  it's a more
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  integrated
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  knowledge based system that has an AI,
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  feature where, for example, within the course of
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  the conversation,
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  we can provide screen pops
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  to our agents to provide them talking points
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  and or
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  data,
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  to provide patients just a more seamless experience
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  and then make the,
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  allow our team members to just function at
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  a higher level.
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  Got it. That is really cool to hear.
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  And I think especially when you're looking at,
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  you know, how can you uplift it and
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  support continued growth and development and,
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  the the scheduling process. I I know it's
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  a journey, especially. So,
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  when you are thinking through this change management
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  process, what do you think has helped it
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  be
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  more efficient or effective or getting people on
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  board to make sure that,
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  they're integrating the technology
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  within their workflows,
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  appropriately?
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  That's a great question. So
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  change management
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  is slow and omnipresent.
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  We are not there yet,
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  in terms
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  of where we'd like to be,
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  but providing
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  positive results and data on the changes we've
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  made and the growth that we've
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  made so far, I think is crucial to
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  kind of verify
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  the trust. But everyone
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  doesn't always see change as positive.
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  It's
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  been
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  a journey, but we are we'd like to
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  continue to standardize
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  our scheduling process, provide
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  self scheduling and automation when
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  applicable,
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  and then also,
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  provide
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  more growth opportunities and development opportunities for our
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  agent. And we're doing that with a workforce
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  management platform where we're able to provide our
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  agents,
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  feedback in real time, be able to pull
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  calls
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  based on sentiment or what's said or not
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  said. It kinda really drill down on things
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  potentially that are missed for development and coaching
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  opportunities.
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  Got it. That's helpful to understand. Thank you
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  for, digging a bit deeper there. Now what
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  do you think the hardest thing you'll have
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  to do in the coming year will be?
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  You know, I think it's just to remain
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  patient. This is a journey.
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  It's definitely a marathon, not a sprint. And
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  when we first kind of undertook this initiative,
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  I thought
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  just from
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  my background and doing this before, it would
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  go
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  a little faster. And as we've kind of
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  built this out,
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  you're reliant on third party vendors,
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  other,
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  working cross functionally.
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  And it's just it's not it's
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  I've had to reprioritize
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  my thinking and it's really a it's a
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  journey. And we're gonna get there, but just
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  not as quite
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  as fast as I would like. And so
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  always kind of trying to provide that feedback
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  to others to kind of like we're making
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  progress, we're making incremental steps, but we just
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  can't flip the switch and say, okay, all
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  the automation is built. Everything is seamless.
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  Go. This really takes a lot of time
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  when it's looking at data, making changes across
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  the way. And we do have some great
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  vendor partners, and we've learned a lot in
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  the process. But it's really kind of just
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  remaining patient
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  and not and not get ahead of ourselves.
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  That makes a lot of sense. You know?
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  And it is really critical to have that
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  type of foresight, and knowing, you know, hey.
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  We're pushing forward change, but also
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  understanding, you know, areas where you need to,
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  be very mindful and,
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  make sure you're you're being patient, as you
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  said.
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  I'm curious. Before we wrap up here, what
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  do you see as being some of the
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  best opportunities for organizational growth?
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  You know, from an organizational standpoint, we're gonna
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  we're continuing to build our IT infrastructure
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  to,
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  provide,
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  our patients,
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  access to our system and to have more
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  seamless experience to provide our team members that
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  work on-site and remotely
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  more access and better,
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  efficacy
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  in terms of their job. What I'm,
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  really focusing on is to, like I said
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  before, is to really provide our team members,
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  better tools,
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  AI,
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  automation
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  to do their job more seamlessly and to
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  redo and to reduce the burden on the
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  workforce.
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  And if we're able to streamline our processes,
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  if we're able to
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  validate our patients more seamlessly,
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  so we for example, we've rolled in a
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  customer relationship chip management platform or what we
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  refer to as CRM. It's through,
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  our EMR,
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  Epic, and, it's called Cheers. And it's really
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  to provide a really overview of the patient
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  journey and provides our agents
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  really the understanding of the the interactions that
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  the patients have with the system, maybe things
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  that they're calling for based on what they
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  previously called for. We document all that information.
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  And this to really capture the patient journey,
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  not not only to know them better, but
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  to get into the
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  resolution of a call more quickly and just
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  make that a more seamless experience.
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  I love that. Steve, thank you so much
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  for joining us on the podcast today. This
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  has been a really fascinating conversation. I have
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  learned a lot, and, certainly, it's been great
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  to to connect with you, today. And I
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  I know I'll be looking forward to seeing
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  you as well at our annual meeting as
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  a speaker,
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  on one of our panels. And so I'm
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  sure we'll dig deeper into some of the
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  things we talked about today as well as,
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  you know, other,
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  areas that are are really gonna be critical
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  for success going forward. So thank you for
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  your time, Steve, and I look forward to
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  seeing you soon.
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  Absolutely. I enjoyed our time and, definitely look
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  forward to seeing you in Chicago in the
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  spring.