Latest / Becker’s Healthcare -- Pediatric Leadership Podcast / Dr. Amy Thompson, Chief Executive of Covenant Children's Hospital

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Dr. Amy Thompson, Chief Executive of Covenant Children's Hospital · Becker’s Healthcare -- Pediatric Leadership Podcast

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Welcome to the Bector's Healthcare podcast. I'm Chris
0:46
Sosa, your host, and I'm thrilled to be
0:47
joined today by doctor Amy Thompson. She's a
0:50
pediatric hospitalist and the CEO of Covenant Children's
0:53
Hospital in Lubbock, Texas.
0:55
Amy, thank you for joining us today.
0:57
Thank you so much.
0:59
Amy, for those in our audience who are
1:00
maybe not familiar with you and your work,
1:02
could you please just introduce yourself and give
1:04
us a bit about your background?
1:06
Absolutely. So,
1:08
I always say I didn't wanna grow up
1:09
to be a,
1:11
hospital CEO, I wanted to be a doctor.
1:13
So that's what I did,
1:14
first. And so I
1:16
went to Texas Tech University and then followed
1:19
that with medical school and residency at the
1:21
Health Sciences Center here in Lubbock, Texas. I'm
1:23
a West Texas girl, so I grew up
1:25
in this area.
1:26
And I became a pediatric hospitalist and practiced,
1:29
in in that capacity for many years,
1:31
in my career and loved the bedside. Was,
1:35
not really looking to make a a change
1:37
from the bedside, but, in about 2013,
1:40
I actually was approached to become the chief
1:41
medical officer,
1:43
of the children's hospital here in Lubbock.
1:45
Took that opportunity and, just an an unusual
1:49
and,
1:50
set of circumstances with a previous CEO whom
1:53
I adored,
1:55
got sick. And so I had the opportunity
1:56
to stick it or stand in,
1:58
as an interim CEO. And then about a
2:00
year later became the CEO of the Covenant
2:02
Children's Hospital. And so I've remained
2:04
in that capacity until about two years ago.
2:06
I still am the CEO at the Children's
2:08
Hospital, but now also have,
2:10
responsibility for our adult, tertiary quaternary hospital here
2:14
in Luck.
2:15
So you're wearing a lot of hats these
2:17
days.
2:18
A lot of hats. Keep it all straight.
2:21
Yeah.
2:23
Amy, you're here on the podcast to talk
2:26
about several things. But one of them is
2:28
how I understand that Covenant Children's
2:31
relational health center, it's a big important part
2:33
of your efforts to treat patients' mental health.
2:35
So how has Covenant Children's strategy evolved with
2:37
respect to this area?
2:39
Yeah. This is, this is a topic that's
2:41
very, very near and dear to my heart.
2:43
And I say this this was born out
2:45
of just many years, at the bedside.
2:48
And, you know, Lubbock is not unlike other
2:50
places in in the country where we just
2:53
don't have a ton of services kind of
2:55
in that mental and behavioral health,
2:57
space.
2:58
And as a pediatric hospitalist, because we don't
3:00
have inpatient beds, here in Lubbock when I
3:03
was when I was practicing,
3:05
a lot of those patients would be would
3:06
be admitted to our hospitalist service. So I
3:09
kinda had this, you know, front row seat
3:11
to these kids that were coming in in
3:13
crisis.
3:15
And we would, you know, send them our
3:17
really our only options were to send them
3:19
to adult centers that were, you know, nearby,
3:22
not anything that was child and adolescent,
3:24
specific.
3:26
And then, you know, I certainly was having,
3:28
you know, what we all call the frequent
3:29
buyers and and that's because they they just
3:32
kept coming back. And what that speaks to
3:34
is that we just weren't able to provide
3:36
services for them that were actually causing them
3:39
to be stabilized. And so, you know, when
3:41
folks are coming back, in and out of
3:43
your hospital, the the same kid that you're
3:45
seeing that's, you know, been on your service
3:47
three times, from a, you know, from a
3:49
suicide attempt.
3:51
That's, I mean, that's just screaming to you.
3:53
We've gotta have, you know, more services and
3:55
we've gotta we've gotta have better,
3:58
you know, care for these kids. So very
4:00
much,
4:01
you know, kinda what we wanted to do
4:03
in this space was born out of that
4:04
time,
4:06
at the bedside.
4:07
I also had, I was really affected by
4:10
several people when I was a resident.
4:12
And, there was a a physician who was
4:14
a child and adolescent psychiatrist named Valerie Robinson,
4:18
who has since passed away.
4:20
But she was just very, very influential for
4:22
me, when I was in residency.
4:26
And her big thing I talked about, I'm
4:27
a West Texas girl. And so, you know,
4:29
I'm from this area.
4:31
And before she died, one of the things
4:33
that Valerie talked with me about was really
4:35
her. She was like, I know you believe
4:37
in this. I know you believe in making
4:39
services for these kids, like promise me
4:42
that you will do this. What's funny is,
4:45
she said this years before I would ever
4:47
have the opportunity as an administrator
4:50
to step into that space. And when I
4:52
talk about, you know, why I've been able
4:54
to embrace administration,
4:56
it's because you actually then have the ability
4:59
to bring to fruition, you know, some of
5:01
these dreams and things like that, that you
5:03
had,
5:04
at the bedside. And so really that journey
5:07
that for us, you know, started,
5:09
at the bedside for me was really able
5:11
to come to fruition, once I became the
5:13
chief executive at the children's hospital.
5:16
And we have a great partnership still with
5:18
Texas Tech University Health Sciences Center, with that
5:21
department of psychiatry.
5:23
Got to be good friends with,
5:26
a child and adolescent psychiatrist, doctor Sarah Wakefield,
5:29
who is part of that program.
5:31
And just as our careers both kind of,
5:34
you know, advanced,
5:35
it you know, we would dream about what
5:37
we wanted to do in this space.
5:40
And
5:41
then as, you know, luck would have it,
5:43
I become the CEO of the children's hospital.
5:45
She actually becomes
5:46
the chairwoman of the department of psychiatry at
5:49
Texas Tech. And so really what that did
5:51
is provide us an opportunity
5:54
to work together,
5:55
and and really bring this, you know, into
5:57
fruition.
5:58
Your next question should be why do you
6:00
call it relational health? Why why is that
6:02
the, you know, like why why is that
6:04
the thing that we're gonna call it? I
6:06
will also tell you that,
6:08
one of the other things I really learned
6:09
at the bedside
6:11
was I just didn't love that stigma that
6:13
came
6:14
with, you know, the terms mental health and
6:16
behavioral health and especially the way that the
6:18
kids just would interact with that. And one
6:21
of the big things that we wanted to
6:22
do, I did not coin that phrase.
6:24
I always said doctor Wakefield coined this phrase,
6:27
but she's told me, I think she read
6:28
it somewhere. So we didn't we didn't come
6:30
up with this name. But the reason that
6:32
we really latched onto it and liked relational
6:35
health center is, you know, mental and behavioral
6:38
health is all about your relationships. It's about
6:40
the relationship that you have with yourself. It's
6:43
about the relationship you have with the people
6:44
around you. It's also though the relationship that
6:46
you have with your environment
6:48
and, you know, specifically kids who can't control
6:51
those environments. And, you know, just learning that,
6:54
we wanna teach you skills,
6:56
that help you relate better both with yourself,
6:59
your environment,
7:00
your world, you know, and and how to
7:02
to do those things. And so I'll have
7:04
to I I can't remember the exact date,
7:07
that we opened,
7:08
but what we wanted to do is we
7:11
wanted to start in the outpatient area.
7:14
And I and I'll talk about the reason
7:16
we wanted to start in outpatient is for
7:18
that the the way that I described this
7:20
to you earlier. That when you have these
7:22
kids that keep coming back, what that tells
7:25
you is that they're not getting enough outpatient
7:27
services. They're not getting enough services to help
7:29
that stabilization,
7:31
you know, when they go from your from
7:33
your facility. And so we felt very, very
7:35
strongly,
7:36
about wanting to start with outpatient services.
7:39
And really the, you know, I I say
7:41
that the vast majority of the brain, you
7:44
know, child part of this was doctor Wakefield's.
7:46
And
7:47
one of the other things that we realized
7:49
is
7:50
the time that it took kids to get
7:52
in to see a provider was very, very
7:54
long. And so when we were trying to
7:56
solve for some of the problems
7:58
with this relational health center, we wanted to,
8:01
a, start with outpatient so that we could
8:03
provide services for kids, you know, once they
8:05
were not in that inpatient setting. And then
8:07
secondarily, we really wanted to create an atmosphere
8:10
where we could get somebody in very quickly.
8:13
And so that was kind of the the
8:15
two things that we put forward,
8:18
to want to start with that. I have
8:20
some statistics
8:21
if you're, and I'll just talk about these
8:23
are actually from
8:24
Yeah, from '24 and '25 just to give
8:26
you an idea,
8:28
what we've done. So
8:30
the first is when I look at just
8:32
outpatient,
8:33
completed visits for 2024,
8:35
we did almost 3,000,
8:37
patients that we saw in that in that
8:39
outpatient center. Now the crazy part about that
8:43
is,
8:44
that what we also have in the center,
8:47
West Texas, I don't know if you've ever
8:48
been to Lubbock, Texas, but where Lubbock, Texas
8:51
is, is we'll call it the hub city.
8:53
And it's because we live in a rural
8:55
part of our state.
8:56
They call it the hub city, like the
8:58
hub
8:59
of a wheel because a lot of things
9:01
will happen in Lubbock, Texas, but we have
9:03
a lot of rural areas,
9:05
that we serve. And so we are part
9:07
of some programs, that are actually out of
9:11
the state of Texas.
9:12
T chat, is one of those. And what
9:16
that allows us to do is that allows
9:18
us to connect
9:19
with both school systems.
9:22
And so when I say this, we are
9:23
in about a 178
9:26
school districts,
9:28
across West Texas through T CHAT. And so
9:31
in our behavioral health,
9:33
relational health, I'm sorry, center, what we have
9:35
is we have a, a space where we
9:38
do tele, in there. So we have telebase
9:41
and so we're able to do telehealth and
9:43
connect with those school districts. And when you
9:45
look at that,
9:47
our completed visits that we did with as
9:49
part of T CHAT and as part of
9:51
the school districts was over 10,000.
9:53
And that just kinda gives you
9:55
the the numbers that
9:57
in our, you know, rural area, we saw
9:59
about 3,000 of those in person in clinic,
10:03
but actually almost, you know, more than triple
10:05
that number that we were able to help,
10:08
treat and triage and or, you know, get
10:10
into our services
10:12
by that connection, with the school district.
10:15
And then I'll I'll kinda talk about where
10:17
we're headed and I'll let you ask me,
10:18
you know, any other questions that you have,
10:20
about that.
10:22
We now that we have been up for
10:23
a couple of years and we feel,
10:26
we feel like that that we have kinda
10:28
stabilized some some of those outpatient services,
10:31
the second thing that we really wanted to
10:33
do was to start,
10:34
intensive outpatient and partial day hospitalization,
10:38
programs that we had. And that's kind of
10:39
that that step that, you know, you need
10:41
something more than just a a weekly visit
10:43
or, you know, something you need some more
10:45
intensive therapy than that, but it's still not
10:47
that inpatient stay.
10:48
And so we have started both that in
10:51
intensive outpatient, and partial day hospitalization,
10:54
and it's been very, very successful,
10:56
for us kind of providing,
10:58
those services.
10:59
We recently were actually able to get some
11:01
funds, that we made application for from the
11:04
state of Texas. I'm so, so grateful that
11:06
we were able to receive those funds. And
11:08
so I'm happy to tell you, in fact,
11:09
this morning in a meeting that I was
11:11
in, I was able to look at our
11:12
plans.
11:13
And so we now have the money that
11:15
we are going to be able to do
11:17
the second half of that unit and are
11:19
actually gonna be able to open some inpatient
11:21
beds, probably within a year,
11:23
as part of that.
11:24
So really, really excited about where this is
11:27
going and mostly
11:28
excited about the, the services that we've been
11:30
able to provide in West Texas.
11:33
Amy, thank you for sharing all of that.
11:34
I mean, it's just incredible how far
11:37
this program has come in just a couple
11:39
of years and the fact that you and
11:41
your your colleague
11:42
are able to
11:44
put all this together. And and as you
11:46
said, it's it's gotta be just a more
11:48
feeling to be able to say, okay. Here's
11:50
where we were in terms of services for
11:52
children in West Texas, and now here's where
11:54
we are.
11:55
What are some of the early returns that
11:57
you've had,
11:58
from patients in terms of how you've been
12:01
able to affect them and bring these,
12:03
mental health and relational services to them? Yep.
12:06
I think that, I one of the most
12:07
overwhelming, things that happened for me really actually
12:10
very early on. I wanted to be there
12:12
on the day that we opened the relational
12:14
health center.
12:15
And I wanted to meet the first patient
12:17
that got to come into the, you know,
12:20
to the area.
12:21
Just because it was so exciting for us,
12:23
you know, to kinda see some of this
12:24
come to fruition.
12:26
We've had a ton of feedback from kids.
12:29
The kids love,
12:31
the programs, they love the space, the space
12:33
we just lucked out with, you know, the
12:36
brilliance of architects who can go in and
12:38
just create a space that feels safe. You
12:41
know, stuff that I never think about. I'm
12:42
a doctor, I don't think about, you know,
12:45
is this actually a space where a kid
12:46
who's coming in in crisis is gonna feel
12:48
safe. And so even just a ton of
12:49
feedback that we've had just on even the
12:52
architecture,
12:53
and stuff of that space. But one of
12:55
the most influential things that happened for me,
12:57
I actually have a very good friend who
12:59
is the school superintendent,
13:01
and she has served on our boards. Actually,
13:04
right now, she's on my adult,
13:05
hospital board. And very early on in the
13:08
process,
13:09
we received a letter from a mom
13:11
who was like, I have struggled for years.
13:14
I haven't known where to go.
13:16
We haven't had any programs. Every time that
13:19
we would talk about, you know, some of
13:21
the care that we had single providers in
13:22
Lubbock who were doing a fantastic job, but
13:25
just, you know, didn't have all of the
13:27
services. The wait times were super long. And
13:29
she said, all, you know, all the time
13:31
really my,
13:32
you know, my hope was to to have
13:34
to go out of town and, you know,
13:35
to do these things. And it was one
13:37
of the most heartfelt letters that really affected
13:39
that superintendent because it was, it came from
13:41
a mom that said, I don't know who
13:43
these people are at Covenant, but I wanna
13:45
give this letter to them because I've been
13:47
struggling for years with my daughter and just
13:49
haven't known what to do. And she actually,
13:51
that the daughter that she was talking about
13:53
was part of one of our, intensive outpatient
13:55
and
13:56
programs and, like,
13:58
and I remember her talking about the day
14:00
that her daughter kinda graduated from that program
14:03
and just how their entire life had changed,
14:05
not just her daughter's life but their but
14:07
their home life. And when you hear those
14:09
kind of stories,
14:11
you know, we need more services, but those
14:13
are the kind of stories,
14:15
that that help you understand, you know, the
14:17
kind of impact that you're having.
14:19
Well, here's hoping that's that is one of
14:23
thousands and millions of three.
14:25
That
14:27
that come your way
14:28
before long.
14:29
I also wanted to ask,
14:32
you mentioned, stigma. Now this is something that
14:34
every single,
14:36
medical provider deals with in in in some
14:38
way, shape, or form. So as a hospitalist
14:41
and now a CEO, do you do you
14:43
feel that's evaporating at some point in in
14:45
some way, shape, or form? I do. And,
14:47
you know, the reason is because I think
14:49
more people are talking about it, and I
14:51
think more people are willing, you know, to
14:53
talk about it. And and I have some,
14:55
you know, everybody doesn't have to do it
14:57
this way, but I I felt very, very
14:59
strongly
15:00
that we wanted to have the relational health
15:01
center inside of the children's hospital.
15:04
And part of the reason that I was,
15:06
you know, kind of a stickler for that
15:07
piece of it,
15:09
is because I didn't want it to feel
15:11
like
15:11
this is where, you know, the sick kids
15:13
go. So when you have pneumonia, you come
15:15
to the children's hospital, but when you have,
15:16
you know, you know, behavioral or mental health,
15:19
we send you to this other building. And
15:21
it was just really important for me to
15:22
say,
15:23
we believe that relational health is part of
15:25
the health of kids. And it's the same
15:28
as when you have pneumonia, you need to
15:30
go to the hospital and get antibiotics.
15:32
And when you have
15:34
suicidal ideation and depression and those things,
15:37
we want you to feel the same about
15:39
that and not to feel the stigma, to
15:42
understand
15:43
it's just something that we can help you
15:44
with. And we do have not just medicines,
15:46
but we have therapies and we have you
15:48
know, these different kind of things. And so
15:50
I think that that is is starting to
15:52
disappear because I think more and more people
15:54
are talking about it. And look, I'll be
15:55
honest enough to tell you, I am a,
15:58
53, just turned 53,
16:00
this week. So,
16:02
and look, I'm a person who has dealt
16:03
with,
16:05
with these issues in my life. I've had
16:06
depression,
16:07
in my life. My husband and I, were
16:10
fortunate,
16:11
and and were able to raise his brother.
16:13
His brother came to live with us when
16:15
when he was 14,
16:17
and he came to live with us because
16:18
of a suicide,
16:19
in their family. And so what I always
16:21
say is,
16:22
part of the reason that you want to
16:24
destroy the stigma is I always say these
16:26
are not the people out there that are
16:28
dealing with the issues. Like this is us,
16:31
this is our kids, this is our brothers,
16:33
this is and this is me.
16:35
It's not just, you know, these people out
16:38
there that are dealing with these issues, it's
16:40
us. And,
16:42
I've just become very, very comfortable
16:44
sitting in the space of,
16:46
you know, this this is our family and
16:48
these are the issues that we have had,
16:50
and these are all the things that we've
16:52
done to to try to, you know, work
16:53
through those. And so I think the more
16:55
that we have conversations like this where we
16:58
just call those things out and we're willing
17:00
to talk about that it's not just out
17:01
there, it's in our families.
17:03
I think that that's the stuff that continues
17:04
to just tear those walls down.
17:06
That makes a ton of sense, Amy. Thank
17:08
you so much for sharing, your personal insights
17:11
and
17:12
experiences with that with mental health.
17:15
Next, I wanna give you a chance to
17:17
discuss some of the other
17:19
programs and innovations that are happening.
17:21
Yeah. Absolutely.
17:23
So I know you you have a transportation
17:26
program, kite flight. That's a big deal there.
17:28
So between that and and other projects, what
17:30
would you like to put on our audiences
17:32
like that? Yeah. Let's talk kite flight. This
17:34
is also one of my one of my
17:36
favorite, you know, things.
17:38
This is not necessarily innovative. You know? There's
17:40
a lot of of folks. I will say
17:41
it was innovative for West Texas because you
17:44
know, of where we're at. And I always
17:45
talk about one story that I share,
17:48
when I was at the bedside is, you
17:50
know, there was a rural community, it's a
17:52
couple hours from us. They had called me
17:54
about a kid that had a simple, we
17:56
call it a cellulitis, It's a skin infection.
17:59
And appropriately,
18:02
you know, unfortunately, right after they called me
18:04
to to transport,
18:05
this kid, there was a woman who came
18:06
in that was having a heart attack in
18:08
the same community. Well, they've got one ambulance,
18:10
and so they made the appropriate decision,
18:13
sent the woman, you know, in the ambulance
18:15
having, a heart attack. But then by the
18:18
time the kid got to me, it had
18:19
been about nine and a half hours. And
18:21
so from the time, you know, that they
18:23
originally called to when we were able to
18:25
free up EMS and get that kid here,
18:27
the kid was, something that we call Sears,
18:30
which is a systemic inflammatory response. And I
18:32
say he was on his way to sepsis
18:34
because, you know, it just took so long
18:37
in transport.
18:38
And I have numerous,
18:40
you know, cases like that over my career.
18:42
And so one of the things that we
18:43
knew that we had to do was,
18:46
to step into that transport
18:48
space. So in in 2018,
18:51
we started, we started just with, an ambulance
18:54
and we we've always done, neonatal
18:57
transport. We've always used, local, you know, services,
19:01
here.
19:02
But again, you're kind of in this queue
19:04
of having to wait, you know, for when
19:06
when those helicopters and and those things are
19:09
free.
19:09
So in 2018,
19:11
we started a more comprehensive,
19:13
transport program that include both neonatal and pediatric,
19:17
transport. We started training that transport team.
19:20
About a year
19:22
later, we were able to get a helicopter
19:24
and so we actually have, a helicopter. We
19:26
lease it. People are always like, how did
19:27
you have enough money to buy a helicopter
19:29
in, you know, in,
19:30
in healthcare these days? And the answer is
19:33
we lease it from somebody who knows how
19:34
to take care of it. It's but it
19:36
is a Covenant Children's,
19:37
helicopter.
19:39
I've just had great, great, response from the
19:41
community. We had some folks that helped us
19:43
build a hangar.
19:44
So now what I have now is I
19:46
have,
19:48
I have both a a neonatal team, that
19:50
I have both nurses and, you know, respiratory
19:53
therapists, EMTs that are part of that team.
19:55
I have a pediatric team, who does, you
19:58
know, kids that are outside of that neonatal
20:00
period. But then what we have started,
20:02
most recently is what we call high Rob,
20:04
which is a high risk OB
20:06
transport service. And so I use some of
20:08
our women's personnel. So we also now have
20:11
the ability to transport moms.
20:13
And we, when you look at the growth
20:16
that we have had, as part of that
20:17
program,
20:19
it went from a few 100, the very
20:21
first year that we did this,
20:23
to over 900,
20:25
in this year. So it's just been an
20:26
exponential growth. And what we're seeing is, is
20:29
just our ability to get to kids quicker.
20:32
And even doing things like the hanger allows
20:34
us to take off directly from the hospital.
20:37
And man, when you're taking care of a
20:38
kid, that needs ICU status,
20:40
cutting off four minutes,
20:42
you know, of transport time is huge. And
20:44
so every, you know, time that we're able
20:47
to cut down, that time. I'm gonna give
20:49
an example in in West Texas. Unfortunately,
20:52
you know, that health care across The United
20:55
States has really taken a hit kind of
20:56
post that post COVID, you know, time has
20:59
been really, really hard. And as we see
21:01
more and more hospitals struggling,
21:03
unfortunately, in West Texas, a lot of them
21:05
have stopped doing OB services. And so that's
21:07
part of the reason we wanted to start
21:09
this high risk, you know, OB. And just
21:12
to give a flavor for that, across West
21:14
Texas,
21:15
one month ago, we transported 19 moms,
21:19
from our region that were in hospitals that
21:21
didn't really have access to,
21:24
you know, either either any OB services or
21:27
certainly, you know, not high risk OB services.
21:29
You know? And of that, 12 of those
21:31
kids ended up in our NICU.
21:33
And so, like, it it's just it's really
21:35
filling a void in West Texas, in terms
21:37
of the ability to go to get people.
21:40
I always say Lubbock only has about 300,000,
21:43
people in it, but we serve an area,
21:46
that is about the size of the state
21:48
of South Carolina when you look at at
21:50
the land mass.
21:52
And so having this transport team for us
21:54
and starting that program has really been a
21:56
differentiator for us just in the ability to
21:58
go get both kids and and women as
22:01
part of that. So super proud of what
22:02
we've been able to do in that space.
22:05
Yeah. One every other day more or less.
22:07
Yeah. That's crazy.
22:09
Yeah. But I'm just glad that they're able
22:11
that you're able to provide that now whereas
22:13
before it was,
22:15
not possible.
22:17
Lastly, Amy, I simply wanna ask you,
22:19
like to give our guests a chance to
22:21
Yeah. To discuss other things that might be
22:23
on their mind. So simply
22:25
what aspect of health care, whether it's related
22:27
to pediatrics or not, do you think deserves
22:29
a brighter spotlight? And how do you and
22:32
Covenant Children's fit into that? Yeah. So, you
22:35
know, we were actually discussing this. I thought
22:36
that was the hardest question that you that
22:38
you posed to me was, you know, what's
22:39
the other aspect of health care that you
22:41
think? There are always plenty of them. Right?
22:43
Yeah. There's always plenty of them. And you
22:45
know what, after talking with, some folks that
22:48
were in my office, about it this morning,
22:51
what I decided that I'm gonna say on
22:52
this is actually I'm not gonna talk about
22:54
a program or, you know, a service that
22:56
we're doing.
22:57
I lived through COVID. I both was at
23:00
the bedside during COVID and,
23:02
also was a hospital administrator during COVID. I've
23:05
seen the after effects of,
23:07
not just, you know, COVID, but also I
23:10
call that that post COVID world.
23:12
It it's our caregivers.
23:14
We call all of our employees caregivers because
23:16
we believe that,
23:18
everybody that works at Covenant Health, takes care
23:21
whether you are touching the patient or not.
23:23
If you're in the billing office, you still,
23:25
you know, have,
23:26
part of that care. And, look, this is
23:27
the hardest
23:29
environment
23:30
I've ever seen in health care in these
23:32
last, you know, really twelve years. And, you
23:34
know, I when people say, how did you,
23:36
you know, live through COVID? Listen. I'm not
23:38
trying to minimize COVID. COVID was was one
23:40
of the hardest things we ever dealt with,
23:42
but I'm not sure that what we're experiencing
23:44
right now in that post COVID era is
23:47
any easier, just because, you know, there's diminishing,
23:50
you know,
23:51
returns, there's, you know, inflation is high. And
23:55
I just think we've just never had as
23:56
much stress
23:58
as we have right now for our caregivers.
24:00
And so when I think about, you know,
24:02
what what deserves a brighter spotlight, it's the
24:04
people that actually each and every day are
24:06
standing at the bedside and or working,
24:08
in our hospitals.
24:10
And and I just think we have to
24:11
continue to have that conversation
24:13
about how we honor,
24:14
the people,
24:15
that are doing this work day in and
24:17
day out and, and make sure that we're
24:19
not burning them out, especially in this very
24:21
hard kind of post COVID environment. So I
24:24
I think that that we've gotta figure out
24:26
a way that we can,
24:27
you know,
24:29
pay people what they need to be paid,
24:30
but also celebrate people in the way that
24:33
they need. And then we have a long
24:34
way to go in this even at covenant.
24:37
It's something that's important to us. And so
24:38
I wanna continue,
24:40
just to grow in that because I know
24:42
how important that is for our caregivers.
24:44
Amy, I think that's the perfect place to
24:46
end. Thank you for covering all this ground
24:48
that you did today. I know I learned
24:50
a ton. I know our audience will feel
24:51
the same. Thank you so much for sharing
24:53
your insights, and I look forward to the
24:55
next time our paths cross. Awesome. It was
24:57
so nice to meet you. Thank you so
24:58
much for having me. Thanks, Amy.
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