Latest / Becker’s Healthcare Digital Health + Health IT / Driving Innovation and Transformation at MedStar Health with Bill Sheahan

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Driving Innovation and Transformation at MedStar Health with Bill Sheahan · Becker’s Healthcare Digital Health + Health IT

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  Hello, everyone. This is Jacob Emerson with the
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  Becker's Healthcare Podcast.
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  Thanks so much for tuning in today where
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  we're gonna be talking about how MedStar Health
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  is transforming care with artificial intelligence and telehealth.
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  So to dive into some pretty big topics,
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  I'm joined today by Bill Sheehan, who is
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  the chief innovation officer at MedStar Health. Bill,
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  thanks so much for taking the time to
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  sit down with us. Oh, thank you. Thanks
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  for having me, Jacob. Absolutely. And before we
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  dive into everything we wanna talk with you
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  about, can you tell us a little bit
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  more about yourself, your background in health care,
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  and what it is that you do today
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  at MedStar?
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  Yeah. It's
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  been a really interesting journey. So I started
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  my career in health care as a firefighter
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  paramedic in New York.
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  York, spent about fifteen years in public safety,
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  leading to about a decade led leading a
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  county based emergency services system up there in
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  New York. So I have a provider background
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  in that sense and then came down to
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  MedStar about twelve years ago, all in our
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  innovation pillar, but leading different things like learning,
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  training, education,
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  simulation,
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  digital care delivery, and now I serve as
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  the chief innovation officer for the system. Fantastic.
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  So,
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  let's get to the heart of what you
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  do in the day to day at MedStar.
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  We hear from health systems all the time
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  about their struggles with fragmented digital tools,
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  underperforming
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  patient portals.
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  So from where you sit at the health
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  system, what are some of the biggest missing
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  pieces and how most systems are approaching innovation
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  and how MedStar specifically is working to fill
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  some of those gaps? Yeah. It's such an
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  interesting question. As we look back at the
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  experience of the pandemic and the rapid adoption
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  we saw in digital tools, both on the
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  consumer side,
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  and on the provider and health system side.
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  What was missing, and I think this is
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  a bit of the the secret sauce to
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  answer your question,
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  is a a purposeful
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  an opportunity to step back. Right? In that
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  crisis moment, we had to change.
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  But I think coming out of the pandemic,
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  there's this imperative on us as health systems
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  to really take a step back and and
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  rationalize our care model, truly go through a
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  care model redesign
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  that is in service of patients and access
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  and,
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  making health care easier to navigate and higher
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  quality and and safer, using digital tools, which
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  have all kinds of capabilities that can help
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  us with those things.
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  And then on the health system side, really
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  thinking about the processes and how we use
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  people and and processes differently,
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  in the ambulatory setting, in the acute care
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  setting,
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  to leverage the power of those technologies.
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  But at the end of the day, I
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  think the key here is
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  technology is just technology. Right? And unless you
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  can really take that step back and focus
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  on the people and process changes,
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  it's difficult
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  to realize all of that opportunity and value
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  that that we all know exists in in
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  digital care. Yeah. And it really gets to
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  the heart of what we hear from individuals
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  like yourself all the time of always keeping
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  the patient that's at the end of this
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  in mind. In terms of challenges,
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  around what we're talking about, we've heard you
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  speak publicly about balancing innovation with
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  legacy infrastructure,
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  technical debt, things like that. So how do
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  you ensure that these new initiatives like AI,
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  telehealth, digital tools in general, those are not
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  just layering on more complexity, but actually driving
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  scalable transformation?
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  Yeah. And I think this is what we
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  spend a lot of our time thinking about.
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  Because if you ignore the context that we
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  operate within today, which has all of those
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  pieces you just mentioned, it has,
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  legacy hardware infrastructure.
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  Health care is a very fixed,
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  you know, kind of real estate based,
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  you know, for for many years.
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  And so layering technology on top of that
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  tends to find cracks that you didn't know
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  existed in that infrastructure and that foundation.
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  And similarly, I think our our people in
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  process has long been highly manual and,
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  not as digitized as we would all want
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  despite the introduction of things like electronic health
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  records and meaningful use. Sure. And so I
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  think, again, coming back to the point of
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  really thinking deeply about what's possible with current
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  infrastructure,
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  current
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  limitations in that, and then really going at
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  those edges of where we can make the
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  movement fastest and have the greatest impact on
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  patients or on clinician well-being, etcetera,
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  by by just with context of all of
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  that, finding the right places. Yeah. And and
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  I think we've we've spent a lot of
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  time at MedStar Health focused on ambulatory transformation.
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  Mhmm. It's a little easier from that infrastructure
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  component than big legacy hospitals.
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  But the truth is our hospitals need it
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  desperately too. So that fixed infrastructure,
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  you know, we need to make it more
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  efficient, easier to navigate, and, really help, help
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  distribute expertise differently with these incredible new tools
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  that are at our disposal. No. Absolutely. It
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  makes a lot of sense. And in terms
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  of, navigating some of these challenges, we hear
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  pretty much every week, if not daily at
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  this point about health systems across the country
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  accelerating partnerships with tech companies that can often
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  be more nimble than the health care sector.
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  So what role do you think that these
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  partnerships, both at MedStar, but also, you know,
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  the industry level, how are they playing a
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  role in promoting this innovation you're talking about?
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  How can they help to operationalize
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  digital care at scale?
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  Yeah. And it's really important, and I think
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  our our partners are essential to our success
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  here. There is no doubt about that.
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  In that same moment, there are too many
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  point solutions out there. Right? As we think
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  about the the landscape of,
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  of, digital technology. I mean, there's thousands of
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  companies solving, you know, hundreds of problems.
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  And I think the the most important thing
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  I would say is it's really important to
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  understand how the solutions that you're the partners,
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  the solutions you're working with solve more than
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  just one problem. Yeah. Right? And, you know,
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  you can call this lots of different things.
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  People call them platform plays, etcetera. But it's
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  it's really, to me, about thoughtful partnership between
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  the technology companies
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  and us as health care providers to have
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  them know us, right, and really understand the
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  challenges and the opportunities in this digital care
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  transformation space in our journey of care model
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  redesign and the people and process components here.
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  And I've said this many times, but I'll
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  say it again here. I really wanna hear
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  from those partners how hard this is. Because
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  the truth is it is very hard work
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  to change
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  what our large ingrained processes and the way
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  we've operated health care for so long, And
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  the right partners get that and dig into
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  that work with you Yeah. And and really
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  help make sure that the technology isn't layering
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  that burden that you referenced. Right? It's really
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  layering
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  the support for the move from our current
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  operating model to the to the new operating
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  model.
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  And it's it's about more than just that
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  button push. Right? It's so much harder than
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  that. Sure. No. It's, it's great advice for
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  all the other systems listening and,
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  in getting very similar partnerships and and really
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  wanting that acknowledgment,
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  that this is a difficult sector to change.
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  Bill, before we go, what else are we
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  missing? You've got the ears of a lot
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  of other health system leaders from all over
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  the country right now. What else do you
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  wanna share with them from where you sit?
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  Yeah. I think it's, you know, in that
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  spirit that I've already been speaking about and
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  true taking a step back and and redesigning
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  our care model, I think there's a moment
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  for us as health system leaders and our
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  technology partners,
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  to really
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  find the the kind of parts of our
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  organization, substantive parts of our organization
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  that are ready for transformation
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  and bring not one, two, three, four solutions
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  to that, but really holistically
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  redesign those processes with
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  principles in mind that work will be more
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  automated in parts of our business as we
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  go forward. Artificial intelligence or, you know, even
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  robotic process automation or other aspects of automation
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  will play a larger role in how we
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  take care of patients as we go forward.
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  Digital technologies, telehealth,
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  you know, remote care delivery, remote monitoring,
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  these pieces are not singular things. What they
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  are are pieces of the larger puzzle
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  of what the care model of tomorrow in
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  three, five, ten years looks like.
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  And if we don't have clarity of that
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  vision and that point on the horizon,
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  we run the risk in any individual project
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  or implementation
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  of not serving that purpose, appropriately or or
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  well enough.
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  And so that requires you know, I often
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  say you can't do innovation and transformation to
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  the business in health care. You have to
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  do it with the business.
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  We need the operators of those parts of
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  the business, whether it's ambulatory, acute care, nursing,
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  physician
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  enterprise, to be at the table understanding that
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  vision at the endpoint very clearly
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  and working with us to get from here
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  to there with our technology partners,
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  and with our patients, quite honestly. Yeah. Absolutely.
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  No. It's it's great last piece of advice.
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  Really appreciate you taking the time to share
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  those with us, sit down with us, and
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  and sharing insights about what's going on under
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  your leadership at MedStar. So thank you, Bill.
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  Thanks, Jacob. Thanks for having me. And we'd
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  also like to thank our podcast sponsor, Evisit.
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  You can tune in to more podcasts from
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  Becker's Healthcare by visiting our podcast page at
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  beckershospitalreview.com.