Latest / Becker’s Healthcare - Clinical Leadership Podcast / Dr. Navneet Dang MD MBA, Chief Medical Officer, Geisinger Community Medical Center Scranton Pennsylvania

Transcript

Dr. Navneet Dang MD MBA, Chief Medical Officer, Geisinger Community Medical Center Scranton Pennsylvania · Becker’s Healthcare - Clinical Leadership Podcast

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  This is Laura Dierdahl with the Becker's Healthcare
• 1:17
  podcast.
• 1:18
  I'm thrilled today to be joined by doctor
• 1:19
  Navneet Dang, chief medical officer at Geisinger Health.
• 1:22
  Doctor Dang, it's a pleasure to have you
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  on the podcast today.
• 1:26
  Thank you, Laura. It's my pleasure to be
• 1:28
  here with you today, at Becker's,
• 1:31
  podcast, and, thank you for the opportunity.
• 1:34
  My pleasure. And, you know, I'm really looking
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  forward to hearing from you because I know
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  Geisinger
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  is really a leader in innovation,
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  and you're doing a great many things right
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  now, that could really be instructive for a
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  great deal of our audience. And so I'm
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  excited to dive in. But before we do,
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  could you tell us a little bit more
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  about yourself and your background?
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  Yeah. Sure.
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  So my name is Navani Dang.
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  I'm an internal medicine physician by trade,
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  practicing medicine and has been in health care
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  for about 20 plus years.
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  I have been a health care executive and,
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  joined Geisinger Health about 8 years back.
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  And since then, I have been in various,
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  leadership positions within Geisinger.
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  For last 3 years, I am in the
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  role of chief medical officer,
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  and,
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  oversee
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  clinical operations, medical affairs,
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  service line growth, business development in the Scranton
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  market.
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  I oversee a Tertiary Care Medical Center in
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  Scranton,
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  which is a level 2 trauma center
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  and also the teaching hospital
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  for Geisinger Commonwealth School of Medicine
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  and,
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  our various northeast residency and fellowship programs.
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  We are the busiest medical center in Scranton
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  area, and, we accept transfers transfers
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  from all the other outlying hospitals in the
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  area.
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  And our vision as a health system is
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  to make better health easier for our patients
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  and communities.
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  We serve in northeast Pennsylvania.
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  I'm glad to be here with you today,
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  Laura.
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  Oh, absolutely.
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  My pleasure. You know, I I love that
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  tagline of making health care better for your
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  communities.
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  I I think, truly, that is such an
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  important mission and vision. And, you know, given
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  your journey and, how you evolved your career,
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  what do you see as being some of
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  the top priorities for the rest of this
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  year? I know health care is in such
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  a transformational time right now, and so I'd
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  love to get your perspective on what's top
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  of mind for you.
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  Yeah. No. Thank you for the question. This
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  is this is a great question. So I
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  will say a couple things.
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  Patient safety,
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  journey to 0 harm,
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  and,
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  focus on
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  providing overall high quality care for our patients
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  has always been top of mind for for
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  us.
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  I would say that, for rest of the
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  year, that is going to be,
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  our main focus,
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  in terms of how can we improve,
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  patient safety for our patients? How can we
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  reduce
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  hospital acquired infections?
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  How can we
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  make journey to 0 harm a reality for
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  our patients.
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  And,
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  the other
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  focus for rest of the year,
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  is going to be optimizing
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  access.
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  While we continue to provide
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  care for,
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  very sick patients in the in our emergency
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  rooms
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  and,
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  they continue to get admitted in the hospital.
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  But how can we move the care
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  upstream
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  and, make sure that our patients have appropriate
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  access in the primary care office,
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  and also
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  access to specialty care and access to,
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  screenings
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  so that we can
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  move
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  the care upstream
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  and reduce our emergency room utilization and also
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  inpatient,
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  utilization
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  for our patients and
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  communities we serve in Northeastern Pennsylvania.
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  So the goal is always to,
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  keep our communities and patients
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  healthier
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  and,
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  see if we can avoid the hospitalization.
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  But if they need hospitalization,
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  and ER visits, we are there for them
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  as well. So I would say those are
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  some of the key priorities for rest of
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  the year.
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  That makes a lot of sense. You know,
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  really aligns with a lot of what I'm
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  hearing from leaders across across the country in
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  thinking about access and trying to figure out
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  the best way to and most streamlined way
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  to, direct patients. Like you said, some will
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  need the inpatient care of the hospital, while
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  others,
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  you know, could use more access to specialty
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  care, primary care, and some
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  of the other clinical services within the community.
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  So, you know, when you look at that,
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  I know that, nationally,
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  we certainly have the booming shortage of specialists
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  in health care,
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  and physicians and clinicians in general.
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  How do you think about access? How do
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  you make sure that the patients
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  know where to go depending on,
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  what their challenges or what their issue is
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  and really direct them in the right way
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  so that, you know, you can be as
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  streamlined as possible in delivering that care and
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  making sure they've got,
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  clinicians as well are optimized
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  in their time and their schedules too.
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  Yeah.
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  Again,
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  great question.
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  I don't think there is a there is
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  an easy solution to this,
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  But,
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  our focus has really been on providing,
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  that team based care approach.
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  And,
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  we are really making sure that we are
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  providing right care,
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  at the right place at the right time
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  for our patients and communities
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  that we serve.
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  We are really
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  leveraging
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  our APPs
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  a lot
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  in this team based care approach,
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  And, we are also leveraging telehealth services,
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  to make sure that our patients have,
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  access to care,
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  at the right place and at the right
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  time. And we are always
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  not seeing them in the emergency room or,
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  you know, in the hospital.
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  One of the things that,
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  we have done
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  in terms of patients who get admitted to
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  the hospital,
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  we are leveraging our remote patient monitoring,
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  tools,
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  post discharge.
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  And there is a whole care team who
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  is able to monitor these patients after discharge
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  from the hospital
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  to prevent,
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  readmissions
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  and prevent ED utilization
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  from happening.
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  So I would say those are some of
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  the tactics that we have deployed
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  to make sure that our patients have, the
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  right access.
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  Well, that's great to hear. And, you know,
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  certainly,
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  some really powerful solutions, it sounds like, to,
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  kind of get,
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  the system
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  systems in place and the right support for
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  patients as they're going through their health care
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  journeys, whether it's with the APPs, telehealth, or
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  some of the remote patient monitoring,
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  to tackle some of those issues. So that's
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  great to hear. Thank you so much, doctor
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  Dang. And along those lines, you know,
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  are there any other programs or initiatives that
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  have been really needle moving for you in
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  the last year or so?
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  Yeah. Thank you. So,
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  couple things come to mind
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  in terms of, some of the,
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  work in 2023.
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  We have been really laser focused in terms
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  of providing high quality care, as I said,
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  in my introduction,
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  for our patients and communities in Northeast Pennsylvania.
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  CMS,
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  5 star is one of our strategic
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  focus areas
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  and is also one of our strategic priority.
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  Because I truly believe that if you don't
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  measure, you can't improve.
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  And under CMS 5 star,
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  there are more than 50 measures
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  into 5 big buckets of quality,
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  which are mortality,
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  readmission, patient experience,
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  patient safety, and harm measures are also part
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  of,
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  CMS 5 Star.
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  And,
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  there are KPIs under timeliness of care as
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  well.
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  What we did to make sure that,
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  we are improving our clinical outcomes,
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  we created a multidisciplinary
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  structure.
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  And as a part of
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  this multidisciplinary
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  structure, we have multiple teams
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  comprising of, physicians,
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  nursing staff, care management.
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  Again, a team based approach
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  who continue to look at our performance.
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  We use Vizient as our,
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  internal
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  data vendor and also look at benchmarking across
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  the industry
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  so that we are able to focus on
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  patient outcomes.
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  And we also focused heavily on
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  journey to 0 harm initiatives
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  so that we could improve our
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  performance and minimize patient harm. As a result
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  of all these efforts,
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  we achieved leapfrog a ratings
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  this year,
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  from,
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  in our spring 2024
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  ratings.
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  And, this is the 2nd year in a
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  row
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  that,
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  we maintained our CMS ratings as a 4
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  star,
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  medical center,
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  which we are extremely proud of. And that
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  means we are providing high quality care for
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  our patients and communities that we serve in
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  Northeastern
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  Pennsylvania.
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  That's amazing to hear. You know? And what
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  great results in thinking about, you know, the
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  CMS 5 star hospital league, frog a ratings.
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  Certainly a great reflection of the type of
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  carrier delivering in the operation that you run
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  at Geisinger.
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  And, you know, one thing stood out to
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  me about what you were saying and talking
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  about in terms of becoming more of a
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  data driven organization,
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  using tools like business platform and and a
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  partnership there.
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  I I know this is a a big
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  challenge for a lot of organizations as they're
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  trying to incorporate more data and information into
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  the care delivery processes and systems. Some,
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  clinicians, you know, jump on it right away
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  while others need a little bit more time
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  or need some convincing.
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  How easy it has been to really become
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  more of a data driven culture at Geisinger?
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  What have you done to,
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  really bring everybody on board and move in
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  the right direction when you think about the
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  type of information and type of data that,
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  you're producing for your overall team?
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  Yeah. Thanks, Laura. This this is again,
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  a great questions.
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  So one of the things,
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  that we have done, we wanted to make
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  sure that how do we
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  leverage
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  data and how do we change the data
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  into information
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  and create that knowledge sharing,
• 12:22
  that is needed for our teams to act
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  on. One of the things we did, we
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  created what we call as accountable care unit
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  model,
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  where there is a diet partnership
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  between a physician and a nursing leader,
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  who continue to look at all the patient
• 12:40
  outcomes on their specific unit, whether
• 12:43
  it's hospital acquired infections, like central line associated
• 12:47
  bloodstream infections,
• 12:48
  or catheter associated urinary tract infections,
• 12:53
  falls or pressure injuries, all the patient heart
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  measures
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  or whether
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  it's, length of stay or,
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  any other throughput measures.
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  And they work together as a diet leadership
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  team
• 13:08
  to drive performance and improve patient outcomes.
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  I would say that that has been extremely
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  successful.
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  Again,
• 13:17
  a team based approach
• 13:19
  where physicians and nursing teams,
• 13:22
  even at the middle management level and at
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  the unit level,
• 13:26
  are driving performance. I would say that has
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  been really impactful for us.
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  Well, doctor Dang, it's been such a pleasure
• 13:34
  speaking with you. I know we've talked a
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  lot about Geisinger's, some of the different goals
• 13:39
  around patient safety, zero harm, high quality care
• 13:41
  for your entire community, and the accomplishments you've
• 13:44
  achieved with the CMS 5 star rating as
• 13:47
  well as becoming more data driven in leapfrog
• 13:50
  a, which is amazing to hear and see
• 13:52
  those results. Now I wanted to look a
• 13:54
  little bit into the future before we wrapped
• 13:56
  up our conversation.
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  How are you thinking about growth and member
• 13:59
  experience going forward?
• 14:02
  Yeah. Thanks, Laura. Another great question.
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  I would say that for me,
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  we realize
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  growth has how do we improve access to
• 14:13
  care
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  and
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  move the care upstream.
• 14:17
  Whether it's primary care access or whether it's
• 14:21
  access to specialty care
• 14:24
  or whether it's access to screening.
• 14:27
  Whether it's mammograms,
• 14:29
  whether it's,
• 14:31
  colonoscopies.
• 14:33
  So I think that would be our main
• 14:36
  strategic focus
• 14:38
  and we are focusing heavily on providing value
• 14:40
  based care.
• 14:42
  We know that how can we move the
• 14:44
  care outside the four walls of the hospital
• 14:47
  closer to home has been a strategic priority
• 14:50
  for us.
• 14:51
  We know that when we take care of
• 14:54
  our congestive heart failure patients or COPD patients
• 14:58
  and patients
• 14:59
  who have other chronic diseases
• 15:02
  as a part of our primary care offices
• 15:05
  or in the specialty care offices,
• 15:07
  we are able to keep these patients healthy
• 15:11
  and keep them out of the hospital.
• 15:13
  So I would say that,
• 15:15
  providing
• 15:16
  access
• 15:17
  is one of our growth strategy.
• 15:20
  And, certainly, that also helps to improve our
• 15:23
  patient experience and our member experience.
• 15:26
  So that will be our strategic focus going
• 15:29
  forward.
• 15:30
  It's fascinating to hear. I know that transition
• 15:33
  to more care and monitoring in the home,
• 15:36
  is huge for the entire health care industry
• 15:39
  and great to know when,
• 15:41
  that you're thinking through that and, taking innovative
• 15:44
  approach of how to achieve quality,
• 15:47
  care and outcomes and and use that,
• 15:49
  appropriately.
• 15:51
  Doctor Dang, thank you so much for joining
• 15:52
  us on the podcast today. This has been
• 15:54
  a really fun conversation, and I look forward
• 15:56
  to connecting with you again soon.
• 15:58
  Yeah. No. Thanks, Laura, for your time, and
• 16:00
  appreciate the opportunity.