Latest / Becker’s Healthcare - Clinical Leadership Podcast / Advancing Quality, Patient Flow, and Value Based Care at WellSpan Ephrata with Ericka Powell

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Advancing Quality, Patient Flow, and Value Based Care at WellSpan Ephrata with Ericka Powell · Becker’s Healthcare - Clinical Leadership Podcast

0:01
This is where health care leadership comes together.
0:04
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 Dierda with the Becker's Healthcare
0:34
podcast. I'm thrilled today to be joined by
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doctor Erica Powell, vice president of medical affairs
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at Welspun Ephrata Community Hospital. Doctor Powell, it's
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a pleasure to have you on the podcast
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today. Thank you, Laura. I am excited to
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be here and share a little bit about
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myself and WellSpan and and some of the
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things that are facing health care in 2026.
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Fantastic. Well, I I'm excited about this too.
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I mean, I think there's so much in
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health care. It's such a dynamic space, and
1:00
so I'm looking forward to spotlighting some of
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the things you're doing. But before we dive
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in, can you tell us a little bit
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more about yourself in the hospital?
1:07
Yeah. So I'm an emergency physician by training,
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but have been in a leadership role for
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about twenty years,
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in various positions. But my current role really
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is
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to oversee the quality and safety along with
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the dyad partner,
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at WellSpan Ephrata Community Hospital.
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WellSpan is an integrated community based health system
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that that serves Central Pennsylvania and Northern Maryland.
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We have about 23,000
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team members, eight hospitals, and a comprehensive network
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of
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ambulatory specialty and behavioral health services.
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We're really here to provide exceptional personalized care
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and inspire hope in communities.
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Our real focus is on clinical excellence and
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innovation
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with the goal of delivering
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high value health services,
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to the community.
1:56
That's great to hear. And, you know, a
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huge, huge and important responsibility that you have
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within the community to, make sure you're having
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that access to care and continue to providing
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great outcomes. Now if you think back the
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last
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year or so, could you tell us about
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the most important initiative that you led? What
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did you do, and what were the result?
2:13
One of the big initiatives that we led
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was around length of stay
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and really how do we align clinical quality
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and operational
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across the entire cube care division
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focusing
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on patient flow, reducing variability,
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and strengthening physician engagements. I mean, some of
2:30
the key components to that are interdisciplinary
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rounds,
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managing care escalation pathways,
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and really improving documentation
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accuracy to support the quality and financial integrity
2:43
of our system. And what that really has
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led to is
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reducible,
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avoidable variation
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in length of stay across multiple service lines,
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better metrics,
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in ED to,
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admission, in
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overall length of stay.
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But the real
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beauty of focusing in on this was the
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strength in collaboration
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between operations,
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nursing, and medical leadership.
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And this when you get sort of the
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whole team engaged in this, it really helped
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us to deliver
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high reliable patient centered care
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while managing our capacity
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much more effectively.
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That's helpful to understand and, you know, really
3:24
great that you've been able to make,
3:27
movement and measurable impact on some of those
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things. I think especially,
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having that overall length of stay be managed
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closely is critical,
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because capacity continues for many hospitals and systems
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to be constrained right now. I think, you
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know, when you were looking at,
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those interdisciplinary
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rounds, can you tell us a little bit
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more about that, what really occurs during those,
3:50
conversations that has moved the needle in making
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a difference on some of the metrics you
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talked about?
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One of the things that we sat down
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as a health system to do is to
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put together a playbook.
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What are those best practices that are really
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going to
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help us move the needle? And by creating
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that playbook for the health system, not just
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the individual hospital I work at, we were
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really successful
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at creating standardized
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processes and strategies.
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One of those was multidisciplinary
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rounds.
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And so
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at each entity, we have a standard for
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that work
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and what it should look like. And we're
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really focused in on geometric length of stay
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and how we are addressing that for each
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patient
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in their care continuum. And by doing that
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with each patient
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at every
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one of our eight hospitals, we were really
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able to identify what are the true barriers
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to getting a patient through the system. And
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so some key opportunities came up for each
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of our hospitals that were similar, and then
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we could solve,
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to root for those barriers
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and put new,
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countermeasures in in place that help us to
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be successful. And I'll just give you,
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a quick example.
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We realized that we had some delay with
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processing
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how we use our consultants.
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And so we really worked hard to identify
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how we
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order the consultation,
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how it gets completed,
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and really streamline that streamline that documentation
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so that now we have a
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dashboard where we can sort of see how
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our consultants are engaging with our hospital teams
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in order to improve that that throughput.
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And by adding an escalation pathway, that really
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was the turbo boost
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around making sure that the people who needed
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additional resources
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from other team members were able to get
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them in the fashion.
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That's helpful to understand. Thank you so much,
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doctor Powell, for digging a little bit deeper
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there. Now looking ahead, what are some of
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your big priorities and headwinds that you're focused
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on for 2026?
5:59
I think, like, every hospital workforce stabilization
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and optimization are going to be key.
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We need to ensure that we attract, retain,
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support clinical talent while addressing burnout and the
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complexities in clinical practice.
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I think everyone's sort of focused on
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how we can improve
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the use of technology
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to
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stabilize,
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and optimize our workforce.
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The other piece that I'm really
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interested in focusing on is value based care
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performance
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and really being able to deliver high quality
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outcomes at a lower cost using data,
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that supports care redesign. And I think between
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these two things,
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we're gonna put a lot of energy into
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optimizing both pathways,
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to get a different different product
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without losing sight of
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the patient experience. And and that always is
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first of mine
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is the patient.
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Got it. That's helpful to know. And, you
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know, I love the ability to keep focus
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on what's happening with the patient, the patient
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experience, those outcomes, and making sure they have
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quality care. And to your point in looking
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at the transition to more of the value
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based care performance, looking at ways that you
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can get the best possible outcome,
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for the patients.
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I I'm curious. How are you approaching,
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that type of of,
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transformation thinking through not only the technology that
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you'll have to to get that in place,
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but then also,
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you know, having it be part of a
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a broader,
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shift in the way that you're thinking about
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care and care models.
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One of the things if you're gonna endeavor
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to do this work is to understand what
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your data's telling you
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about your community,
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about your hospital, about your practices,
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and then really leveraging that data to different
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outcomes.
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Every hospital is going to have some unique
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barriers in order to deliver
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amazing
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care at,
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a good cost. And so
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one of the things that I feel like,
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needs to happen in this space is to
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have good data analytic tools
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to be able to understand where your unique
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barriers are. And and, again, I'm an examples
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person. So
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one of the things that we've done in
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this space is really to
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understand
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down to the DRG
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how our physicians are diagnosing certain types of
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illnesses
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and where are the opportunities
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to create standardization
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in care pathways.
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We need all of our physicians to speak
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the same language,
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to understand the impact,
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of their documentation,
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and how we leverage that to,
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better outcomes for the patient. So we've really
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worked hard to implement
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ERAS,
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COVD pathways, heart failure pathways so that everybody's
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getting the same excellent
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high quality care,
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and we're also able to manage
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those cost pressures
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that exist
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for all of us.
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That makes a lot of sense. It's helpful
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to,
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kind of get additional detail,
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around those things. I think it's something that
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so many organizations are dealing with right now
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and trying to wrap their heads around. So
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thank you for some of the your insight
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and perspective on it.
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What do you see as being the hardest
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thing you'll have to do in the coming
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year? What do you think that will be?
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I think for anybody in health care leadership,
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one of the toughest things that we do
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is balancing short term operational needs with long
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term transformation work
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that we can't afford to slow down. So
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many of us spend time
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working day to day on the small things
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that are in front of us, but there's
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a lot of real work out there and
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the pace of change
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is exceptional. And we need to be able
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to lead people through that, support them, motivate
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them,
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and make some tough decisions about priorities, which
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takes
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a lot of communication,
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clarity, and empathy.
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And so
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I would just sort of reiterate
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that it's easy to get lost in the
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day to day when you know that the
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overall
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opportunities for organizational
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growth and stability lie in that longer term
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transformation
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work.
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Well, doctor Powell, that makes a lot of
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sense. And I I know there's a lot
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going on right now in the health care
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space to both think long term, big picture
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strategically as well as getting things done on
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a daily basis. Now from your perspective, as
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you're thinking about
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leaders in the health care space, emerging leaders,
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and more, what advice would you have for
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them to really be successful as they're going
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throughout their own leadership journeys?
10:51
Laura, that's a great question. As I did
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on what I need to get done in
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2026,
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one of the things is to lead with
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clarity. People really are overwhelmed,
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and ambiguity is the enemy. I mean, we
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need to set fewer priorities,
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communicate them consistently, and reinforce them relentlessly.
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It's just getting back to the basics,
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in a very real way. So
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in other words, like, we need to go
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slower in order to move faster. I think
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sometimes the pace of change
11:23
in health care
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is so exceptional that it just overwhelms
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our frontline
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team members,
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and leaders
11:32
in order to get done. And then as
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I sort of weave through this, we need
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to prioritize
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patient connection in every initiative. I mean, the
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reason we went into health care,
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really was about the patient. And we need
11:47
to ask ourselves, does it make it easier,
11:49
safer,
11:50
or more humane for our patients and families?
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And if it really doesn't, then we need
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to take a pause
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and wonder whether this is the right pathway
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to go down. And so
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I just would say to anybody who's
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going to be
12:07
leading, in health care in 2026
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is we've gotta be more
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transparent about the tough stuff
12:15
and really
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protect
12:17
how we're doing things
12:19
in terms of
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just being clear
12:24
and concise and to the point until we
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build, you know, a new muscle in terms
12:30
of our leadership,
12:33
skill set.
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Fantastic. Now where do you see some of
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the best opportunities for organizational growth? I don't
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think leveraging digital tools and virtual care are
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gonna both help patients and clinicians.
12:44
As we know, particularly on the physician side,
12:47
there are multiple specialty
12:49
gaps
12:50
across the country in in various regions,
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and we're really gonna need to
12:55
make work efficient for those individuals
12:59
who are in the specialty, who wanna be
13:00
able to help as many people as possible,
13:04
but may not be located
13:06
exactly nearby. So being able to start, like,
13:09
virtual dermatology
13:10
and virtual rheumatology, which are specialties that we
13:14
struggle with across the country in various
13:17
areas
13:18
are gonna be key to
13:21
being able to deliver those patient outcomes that
13:23
I talked about,
13:26
earlier. I also think that,
13:28
we're gonna need to focus on building strategic
13:31
partnerships,
13:33
to improve care integration and support population health.
13:37
As we know, the pace,
13:40
the population is aging,
13:42
at a significant rate, and I think we're
13:44
going to need to
13:46
be able to work with people outside of
13:49
our individual health systems
13:51
to make sure that we're able to support
13:53
those patient outcomes
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both inside and outside of,
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our organization.
14:00
And that whole community wellness
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kind of lens is gonna be critical to
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the success of health care.
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I love that. Doctor Powell, thank you so
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much for joining us on the podcast today.
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This has been such an informative conversation.
14:14
You know, I I really appreciate everything that
14:16
you're doing and and the passion that you
14:18
bring, to health care, and I look forward
14:20
to seeing you as well at our annual
14:21
meeting. I know that you'll be speaking on
14:23
a panel there, and so it'll be great
14:24
to connect in person and and continue the
14:26
conversation.
14:28
That's awesome, Laura. I appreciate the opportunity to
14:31
be able to share some of my insights
14:33
here about what WellSpan is doing. I'm looking
14:37
forward to connecting with my colleagues,
14:40
at the conference in Chicago.
14:42
It's always an exciting time to be able
14:44
to hear and listen and learn from some
14:46
of the best in the in the country.