Latest / Becker’s Healthcare Podcast / Matthew Love, President and CEO of Nicklaus Children's Health System

Transcript

Matthew Love, President and CEO of Nicklaus Children's Health System · Becker’s Healthcare Podcast

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  Hello, and welcome to the Becker's Healthcare podcast.
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  My name is Will Riley with r one.
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  I am joined today by Matthew Love. Matthew
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  is president and CEO of Nicholas Children's Health
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  System. Matthew, welcome to the podcast. Hi. Good
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  morning. Great to be here. Great. It's lovely
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  to speak to you today. Thanks for joining
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  us.
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  To start off, can you tell us a
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  bit about yourself, your role? Tell us about
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  Nicholas Children's and the community that you serve.
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  Yeah. Great. Yeah. As you mentioned, I'm Matt
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  Love. I'm the I'm honored to be and
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  privileged to be the president and CEO of
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  of Nicholas Jones Health System in Florida.
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  One of, four, special licensed Children's Hospital in
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  the state of Florida.
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  And, you know, Children's Hospital's they're they're a
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  special place. Right? So we're about 325
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  beds.
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  We've been around seventy five years. This is
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  our our birthday year. So lots of excitement
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  along those lines.
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  You know, we are the premier children's hospital
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  in South Florida, you know, highly ranked on
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  US News and World Report,
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  expanding.
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  We see about a million visits every single
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  year. Four out of five kids in Miami
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  Dade have come to our organization in the
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  last three years. And so when you think
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  about pediatric health systems,
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  you know, we are the one, in South
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  Florida.
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  And as I said before,
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  host hospitals are special places. They're different than
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  adult systems. Adult systems are great,
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  but, you know, host hospitals are special.
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  Yes. Yes.
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  I agree.
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  Tell us a bit about some of the
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  priorities that you have as a, you know,
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  uniquely
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  pediatric
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  institution,
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  as you go into 2026?
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  Yeah. So we spent 2025
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  doing a lot of prework and some several
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  big initiatives,
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  had the support of the board to really
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  become,
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  you know, the player in South Florida for
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  pediatric health care. So there's two or three
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  big ones. The first one that we're really
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  excited about is our partnership with Broward Health.
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  So Broward Health is a county to the
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  North,
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  of Miami Dade.
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  We're working with, the CEO there, Shane Strom,
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  great guy, great friend around expanding pediatric services.
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  So what does that mean? It means kids
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  in Broward will be able to get care
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  in Broward County. They don't have to travel.
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  And so, working with Broward. So in in
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  February, we'll go live with that initiative,
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  and in terms of taking great specialists
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  to Broward, it's about just put in perspective,
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  it's probably about forty five minutes to an
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  hour drive north,
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  Miami Miami, miles. Right? So it's it's it's
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  not very far, but it's a long long
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  time in the car.
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  And really the the purpose is to keep
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  kids close to home. Keep them in Broward
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  County.
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  Of course, when they need that very high
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  end tertiary care, quaternary care, they'll have to
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  come down to the hospital, but that should
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  be few and far between. Mhmm. It's really
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  the this great initiative. So February of of
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  next year, we'll be celebrating opening, that component.
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  The other one is around,
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  pediatric cancer.
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  You know, the state of Florida does not
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  have a highly ranked, pediatric cancer program. And
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  so we're an initiative to develop that
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  with, three other Jones hospitals in the state
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  of Florida, spread throughout the state, Northern, Central,
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  Western, and then Southern Florida.
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  Just yesterday,
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  I was, in in Jacksonville receiving a 7
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  and a half million dollar check from governor
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  DeSantis to help kick start this initiative.
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  You know, too many kids have to leave
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  Florida for cancer care,
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  and that shouldn't happen. Mhmm.
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  We're we're the third most populous state,
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  growing every single year. It's a great state.
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  Right? Florida's a great state. People are coming,
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  from all over the country. And so, there's
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  no reason that kids should have to leave
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  for care, cancer care specifically.
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  The support systems, everything around pediatric cancer,
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  it's different.
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  Right? You need mom, dad, brother, sister,
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  everyone around you when you're when you're a
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  sick child.
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  Yeah. Wonderful.
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  That's great to hear about. Thank you.
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  I wanna start by talking a little bit
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  about,
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  technology, actually, and how how you're adopting technology.
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  Healthcare's
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  historically moved pretty conservatively
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  in implementing new technologies.
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  But it feels like with AI, that might
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  be a bit different.
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  Do you agree with that?
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  Is is is AI got a sort of
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  pool factor about it that you haven't seen
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  with other technologies?
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  Yeah. Yeah. So I've been, you know, I've
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  been doing this for,
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  what, three decades now. And, you know, early
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  on, I do believe that
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  industry generally is just slow to adapt.
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  And there's probably very different reasons for for
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  for that in terms of, you know, being
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  patient centric and those types of things. But
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  AI feels like it's different. I agree with
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  you.
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  You know, I I hope folks don't think
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  it's
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  the the answer to everything. Right? Because I
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  don't think that really exists.
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  But it is it is interesting to see
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  how health care systems and and payers and
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  the industry in general is really looking at
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  this differently
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  than I think what we've seen with technology
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  over the last, you know, three to three
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  decades or so. Yeah. Yeah. And and
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  why why is that then, do you do
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  you think? Is it just that it that
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  it works? That when when you see it
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  actually doing something, it's genuinely helpful and people
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  just want more and more of it? Is
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  it as simple as that? I I do
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  think there's a component around
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  this immediate,
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  success. Right? Some of the early things we've
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  seen,
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  are successful. I mean, if you use it
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  personally, right, if you go and ask it,
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  you you get some pretty
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  reliable good things.
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  You have to double check it. Right? Because
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  not all all the time, it's it's not
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  always accurate to the t. And I think
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  that's one of the concerns,
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  we would have in the industry would have
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  around particularly around medicine. Right? It has to
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  be right.
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  And so this balance between those two components,
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  I also think the environment in health care
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  is different today than it was twenty to
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  thirty years ago, ten years ago, right, five
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  years ago.
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  The challenges that, you know, everyone's facing in
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  terms of the cost pressures, the reimbursement pressures,
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  the the payer pressures, you name it. It's
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  different. It's it's accelerated over the last, you
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  know, couple years, and it's gonna continue. So
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  finding solutions
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  that can help us become more impactful,
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  more efficient,
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  as well as keeping the patient in mind
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  in terms of the entire process,
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  I think that's really pushing the the acceleration.
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  Right. Yeah. Okay. Okay. So and and when
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  you think about that acceleration,
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  innovation in health care is often the there
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  are often two archetypes that people have in
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  mind when they think about innovation in health
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  care. They think about incumbents,
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  the traditional providers, payers, technology providers, right, who
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  have the data and the scale and the
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  the reach to be able to do things,
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  and insurgents,
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  like up and coming new technology companies who
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  are or or more disruptive. Right? And that
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  could be in terms of care delivery or
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  it could just be in terms of the
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  technology that people use.
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  When you think about those two,
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  ways of going about it, which sort of
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  approach are you taking when it comes to
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  innovation?
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  You know, I think this is one of
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  those that they had to look at, and
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  there's a an saying that's going around. You
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  know, this isn't an or. This is an
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  and. Okay. Right around,
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  you know, there's something to say about, you
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  know, these institutions, these companies, these processes that
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  have been around for a long time. Right?
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  They've been around for a long time for
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  a reason because they work. Uh-huh.
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  And they're stable.
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  At the same time, you know, these, I'll
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  use the word disruptor.
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  I think that's what you were referring to
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  a little earlier. Yeah. You know, we need
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  those too
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  because, you know, people have a hard time
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  thinking differently sometimes, radically different. And these disruptors,
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  help us think in that fashion,
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  think much differently. Think, you know, think you
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  know, it's
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  you know, everything's
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  impossible until someone does it. Right? I heard
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  that, saying, recently, which is true in AI
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  and technology and innovation.
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  And so I think that the the beauty
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  of this is gonna be is when those
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  two come together,
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  that's when the magic is gonna happen. Yeah.
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  Okay. Okay.
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  How are you as a leader approaching governance
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  of some of these new technologies?
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  Because it
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  creates new demands, I would think, in terms
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  of how you're using data, for example,
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  maybe some new challenges and responsibilities in the
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  c suite.
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  How how you think about AI governance?
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  Yeah. AI governance
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  is a topic that I think needs more
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  conversation Yeah. To be honest with you.
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  You know, we're approaching it in a way
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  similar to what we do, you know, other
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  things. It has to be a multidisciplinary
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  team. Right? It has to we have to
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  have the lawyers there. We have to have
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  the finance folks there. We have the the
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  IT folks. The operators, the physicians, the providers
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  really have to come together around,
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  looking at things,
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  in in two fold. Right? One is what
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  do we bring into the organization and how
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  do we bring it in, such that it's
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  safe? But, also, if we're providing some solutions
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  externally to some startups and some other companies
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  around problems that we have that they can
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  help solve,
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  how do we have governance around that as
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  well? And it's a bidirectional,
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  component. I think anyone has the answer on
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  it. Yeah. It's new. Yeah. But the core
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  principles around the governance have to be around,
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  being safe,
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  being patient centric, being efficient, having an impact.
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  The things that we would have governance on
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  other things as well. Right. It's just this
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  view of AI,
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  has to be brought into it. Yeah. Okay.
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  And tell me a bit about how you're
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  using some technologies,
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  the AI or other technologies,
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  to to help you've you've talked a bit
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  about, like, looking for efficiency, for example.
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  So how how are you doing that within
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  your organization
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  either to make
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  providers' lives better or on just the pure
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  administrative side of of, care delivery?
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  Yeah. So, you know, we're looking at AI
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  in in several different buckets. Right? And so
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  one
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  and what we call is is really the
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  the kind of the back office support and
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  then front facing Mhmm. To patients and to
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  providers.
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  On the back office, it's actually a little
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  easier. Mhmm. Right? Because there's less risk to
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  patient care, less risk to providers.
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  So we have something we call ask Nick.
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  Of course, we're Nicholas Jones Hospital,
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  after Jack Nicholas and Barbara Nicholas.
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  So we have this tool a AI tool
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  called Ask Nick. And anybody in the organization
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  can go in, and it overlays all of
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  our policies and procedures,
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  all everything internally that that you would think
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  from an HR perspective, from a control perspective,
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  finance perspective, etcetera.
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  And so anyone in the organization can go
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  in and ask it questions. And just like,
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  you know, chat GPT, it goes out to
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  all of our policies and scrapes them and
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  figures out what the answer is. So you
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  could say, I'm a nurse. I've been here
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  three weeks.
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  I need to take some time off for
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  family reasons. What's the policy on paid time
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  off? Mhmm. And they'll come back and give
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  you the answers. And so that's really the
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  back office side of things, and and which
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  is pretty cool because we've seen a significant
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  reduction in the number of calls into our
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  HR call center. Mhmm.
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  So tremendous impact there.
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  And then on the front facing, patient facing,
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  provider facing side of things,
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  you know, we're doing some things around scheduling,
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  the ambient listening that you hear about, everywhere
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  everywhere you go around. How do you help,
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  give time back to providers to spend more
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  time with the patients,
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  you know, scheduling efficiencies, those types of things,
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  But also some on the clinical related to
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  aging of bones. Right? In pediatrics, that's an
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  important component
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  of how old is a bone. Mhmm. Right?
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  Just because someone may look a certain age,
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  they may not be. Right? And so technology
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  AI technology helping us in our imaging and
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  our radiology,
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  department,
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  is some of the areas that we're we're
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  exploring at this point.
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  Wonderful. Wonderful.
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  We see some aspects of health care shifting
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  from a a a very labor and human
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  centric approach
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  to more of a technology
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  centric approach. Right? You particularly in back office
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  administrative functions.
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  Do you see that playing out?
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  Yeah. You know, this is,
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  this this kind of
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  trend,
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  of becoming more efficient,
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  more impactful is something that is gonna continue.
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  It's it's been we've been doing it for
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  decades in health care. Right? Yeah. It's gonna
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  continue on a go forward basis.
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  I think what we have to remember is
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  that AI
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  is not a strategy.
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  Right? AI is a tool.
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  Just like in the old days when,
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  I remember Lotus or Excel when it came
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  out. Right? People thought that it was going
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  to decimate
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  the finance world, the accountants, the CPAs. It
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  was gonna eliminate all those jobs. It really
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  didn't. Right? It made them better. Mhmm. It
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  made them more efficient. It pushed some of
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  that analysis out to the, you know, people
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  closer to the operations where they could do
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  some of the analysis. So it's a tool.
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  And so
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  AI has to be viewed the same way.
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  It's a tool to help us.
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  Do we need to become more efficient? Yes.
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  Do we need to make sure, we're more
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  impactful? Yes. All those things are absolutely true.
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  But at least at Nicholas Jones, right, we
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  are a people organization.
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  Right?
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  People make it work.
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  Physicians make it work. Nurses make it work.
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  And AI has to be part of their
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  of their work streams and workflows,
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  but it's not intended to replace people. You're
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  still gonna have to have that judgment, that
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  clinical judgment,
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  that interaction,
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  talking with the patients and families.
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  AI is not gonna do that. Yeah. Right?
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  That's gotta be that that's gotta be
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  a a provider.
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  And that's really, in my mind, the heart
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  of medicine
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  that we can't we can't ignore.
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  Matt, it's been it's been lovely talking to
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  you. Are there are there any do you
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  have any other thoughts, anything else on your
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  mind before we before we close?
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  No. It just it's great to be here
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  and, and with you and talking about the
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  this exciting topic.
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  You know, health care is an exciting time.
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  Right? Pediatric health care, children's health care is
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  super exciting.
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  So many things ahead for us, for for
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  the industry, so many things ahead for for
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  Nicholas Children's.
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  It's exciting time. Mhmm. Wonderful. Well, thanks so
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  much for taking some of your time to
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  talk to us. We really appreciate it. Thank
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  you. Thank you. Thank you.