Latest / Becker’s Healthcare Podcast / Cory Jones, System AVP of Oncology Services at Banner Health

Transcript

Cory Jones, System AVP of Oncology Services at Banner Health · Becker’s Healthcare Podcast

• 0:00
  Welcome to the Becker's Healthcare podcast.
• 0:03
  I'm Elizabeth Gregerson, a reporter here at Becker's,
• 0:06
  and I'm thrilled to be joined by Corey
• 0:08
  Jones,
• 0:09
  AVP of oncology services at Banner Health on
• 0:12
  the podcast today.
• 0:13
  Thank you so much for joining me. I'm
• 0:16
  so grateful to share your insights with our
• 0:18
  podcast audience.
• 0:19
  Before I dive into my questions,
• 0:21
  could I ask you to introduce yourself and
• 0:23
  just tell us a bit about Banner Health
• 0:26
  and your role with the oncology line specifically?
• 0:30
  Thank you, Elizabeth. I appreciate the opportunity and
• 0:33
  and having me today. I am, again, as
• 0:35
  you indicated, Corey Jones. I'm the ABP of
• 0:37
  the oncology service line at Banner Health.
• 0:40
  So we're one of the largest nonprofit
• 0:42
  health care systems in the country.
• 0:45
  We have a provider sponsored health insurance program
• 0:47
  that we serve over three and a half
• 0:49
  million,
• 0:50
  people. We have 33 hospitals
• 0:53
  and over 450
• 0:55
  care
• 0:56
  services across the the states of Arizona,
• 0:59
  Colorado, Wyoming, Nevada, and Nebraska.
• 1:02
  That includes physician groups,
• 1:05
  imaging services, retail pharmacy,
• 1:08
  rehabilitation
• 1:08
  physical therapy, so the whole gamut of services
• 1:11
  that are provided here.
• 1:13
  As part of my role, I actually oversee
• 1:15
  the oncology services that are related to the
• 1:17
  BannerMD Anderson Cancer Center program, which falls under
• 1:20
  Banner.
• 1:21
  And it is among,
• 1:22
  it is located across 10 different sites.
• 1:25
  Again, we focus on specifically services
• 1:28
  in Arizona
• 1:29
  and,
• 1:30
  Colorado.
• 1:31
  We are partnered with MD Anderson, which is
• 1:34
  one of the leading cancer centers
• 1:36
  across the country
• 1:37
  where we really are sharing and providing best
• 1:40
  practices and protocols and delivering cancer care services.
• 1:44
  It's been a relationship that we're very excited
• 1:46
  to be a part of with that partnership
• 1:48
  over the last ten plus years.
• 1:53
  Perfect. Thank you. Yeah. I I think that
• 1:56
  partnership is such a a wonderful one to
• 1:58
  highlight, so I thank you for sharing that
• 2:00
  and kind of cluing our listeners in on
• 2:02
  what that relationship looks like. You know, our
• 2:05
  audience
• 2:06
  might
• 2:07
  be specialized in oncology, but they might come
• 2:09
  from a different background, be more administrative or,
• 2:12
  you know, across all the other service lines
• 2:14
  at health systems across The US.
• 2:17
  Zooming in on oncology, I'd love to hear
• 2:19
  from your perspective
• 2:21
  what major trends or innovations
• 2:23
  are you following right now in the oncology
• 2:26
  space?
• 2:27
  Yeah. I think it's really exciting what's happening
• 2:29
  within the therapeutic innovations, specifically about how care
• 2:33
  is being or how cancer is being treated,
• 2:35
  specifically with new drugs and obviously new technologies.
• 2:38
  I think it's really giving, our
• 2:41
  physicians an opportunity to really kind of fight
• 2:43
  this
• 2:44
  these diseases
• 2:45
  with new kind of tools and obviously ways
• 2:49
  of of dealing with this, disease. And I
• 2:51
  think the therapeutic specifically as we look about
• 2:54
  targeted therapies and immunotherapies
• 2:56
  and how those are being leveraged to support,
• 2:59
  the care delivery is obviously changing the landscape.
• 3:02
  Of course, there's a lot of different indirect,
• 3:04
  impacts of that related to costs, of course,
• 3:07
  that obviously have an influence on that and
• 3:09
  how we actually are receiving that or providing
• 3:11
  that care. But that's clearly an area of
• 3:14
  great opportunity and excitement, I think, that, is
• 3:16
  changing the landscape.
• 3:18
  Of course, we also know, like, how people
• 3:20
  are actually
• 3:21
  receiving care or how care is managed specifically,
• 3:25
  when we think about closer to home, when
• 3:27
  we think about virtual telemedicine,
• 3:29
  how that's applying to not only,
• 3:32
  providing or monitoring care,
• 3:34
  but also how to provide care closer to
• 3:37
  patients where they actually live. So I think
• 3:39
  that technology
• 3:40
  associated with that is obviously very exciting, and
• 3:42
  then we we track that and figure out
• 3:44
  how we can apply that appropriately.
• 3:47
  And then, of course, AI continues to be
• 3:49
  a big part of the conversation we have,
• 3:51
  and we know that just as a national
• 3:53
  or even a world,
• 3:54
  phenomenon as to what AI is doing. And,
• 3:57
  clearly, that trend, and innovation of how that's
• 3:59
  going to be applied is still being evaluated.
• 4:02
  At Banner, we're very much focused on how
• 4:04
  to kind of take advantage of that, but
• 4:06
  being very cautious about how to apply it
• 4:08
  to how care is being delivered, not only
• 4:10
  in the cancer space, but overall.
• 4:12
  And then the other part of is it
• 4:14
  specifically around how diagnostics
• 4:18
  patients are being,
• 4:21
  detected for cancer. We know that we have
• 4:23
  a large focus program on prevention.
• 4:26
  And so how do we use
• 4:29
  technologies
• 4:29
  and other types of means to
• 4:32
  reach out to populations that don't necessarily have
• 4:35
  access to,
• 4:36
  screening and diagnostic capabilities. But how do we
• 4:39
  leverage
• 4:40
  the imaging services that are coming out and
• 4:42
  how imaging is obviously a critical part? You
• 4:44
  know, precision medicine and genetic testing all play
• 4:48
  an extremely important part in this. A lot
• 4:50
  of advancements in that space, especially when you
• 4:52
  start to think about blood testings
• 4:54
  and and how that kind of applies. So
• 4:56
  those are some of the really major four
• 4:58
  things. I mean, there's a a whole gamut
• 5:00
  of different types of trends that we're focusing
• 5:01
  on, but those those stand out to me
• 5:03
  today.
• 5:05
  Perfect.
• 5:06
  As someone who covers, you know, oncology news
• 5:09
  for Becker's, I'm always, you know, amazed and
• 5:11
  surprised at how fast this these innovations
• 5:15
  come up, and, you know, and how quickly
• 5:17
  things change and are implemented and,
• 5:20
  like you said, all the discoveries that are
• 5:22
  being made when it comes to cancer treatment
• 5:24
  and therapeutics.
• 5:25
  Have there been any specific achievements or specific
• 5:29
  progress made within the past six to
• 5:32
  eighteen months maybe that stand out most to
• 5:35
  you?
• 5:37
  Specifically,
• 5:38
  the BannerMD Anderson of Banner, you know, the
• 5:40
  achievements in the therapeutic is obviously how are
• 5:43
  we applying and and integrating
• 5:46
  a lot of these advancements is is, you
• 5:48
  know, these are achievements that we're constantly kind
• 5:50
  of pursuing
• 5:51
  specifically on how we kind of scale them
• 5:53
  across different locations that we provide. We obviously
• 5:56
  have a very large hub of cancer care
• 5:58
  delivery that we have within our, system, but
• 6:01
  we obviously distribute that care. And so how
• 6:04
  are we distributing that and integrating that within
• 6:07
  the care delivery at different sites is obviously
• 6:09
  something that we're very focused on and but
• 6:11
  done a very exceptional job. Our experts, our
• 6:14
  physician
• 6:15
  experts obviously integrate their conversations in multidisciplinary
• 6:19
  fashion of doing that. So how we do
• 6:21
  that and how seamlessly we do that is
• 6:22
  such a great focus. And I think we've
• 6:25
  achieved quite a bit in that space
• 6:27
  given the fact that Arizona and Northern Colorado
• 6:29
  and the other areas that we serve,
• 6:31
  can be very expansive. And so our achievements
• 6:34
  is really creating that integrative team amongst our
• 6:36
  caregivers and our our experts, our physicians, subspecialists,
• 6:40
  and so forth has been really kind of
• 6:42
  an achievement that I think a lot of
• 6:44
  programs probably envy just given the fact that
• 6:47
  we really have that,
• 6:49
  that model that really kinda supports that that
• 6:51
  kind of conversation
• 6:53
  and care delivery capability.
• 6:55
  So that's kind of a critical part of
• 6:57
  that. We also know that our research capabilities
• 6:59
  within the arm of oncology is such an
• 7:01
  important piece, and so we really kinda look
• 7:04
  at how we are scaling that. I think
• 7:05
  there's a great achievement that we've done exceptional,
• 7:09
  things within that space as well as we
• 7:11
  continue to grow that out. We have a
• 7:13
  very good relationship with
• 7:15
  the University of Arizona,
• 7:18
  which we are, as part of Banner Health,
• 7:20
  we obviously work very closely with our partner
• 7:22
  of MD Anderson in expanding that piece as
• 7:24
  well. So, obviously, continuing to build that and
• 7:27
  strengthen that across the sites that we care
• 7:29
  for has been,
• 7:31
  a great achievement, not just over the last
• 7:32
  six to eighteen months, but over the the
• 7:34
  time that we've been around. So, we're very
• 7:37
  fortunate in that space. And then I would
• 7:39
  probably say the other part of that is
• 7:40
  such a critical part to,
• 7:42
  our
• 7:44
  our ability to serve our
• 7:46
  our our communities and so forth is really
• 7:48
  having the right physician expertise.
• 7:50
  And we do,
• 7:52
  we feel like we have recruited over the
• 7:53
  last six to eighteen months some exceptional physicians
• 7:56
  that really provide that care and that we've
• 7:58
  been fortunate to have part of the team.
• 8:00
  So we continue to push on that, but
• 8:02
  we are very excited about what we've been
• 8:04
  able to to achieve through recruiting the right
• 8:06
  people,
• 8:07
  for the right care.
• 8:09
  And you you touched on recruitment here, and
• 8:12
  then
• 8:13
  also
• 8:14
  just the expanse of the different Banner Health
• 8:17
  sites, right, across state lines and and integrating
• 8:20
  care.
• 8:22
  I'd love to know, you know, what advice
• 8:24
  do you give to
• 8:26
  physicians or emerging leaders in the oncology space
• 8:30
  when it comes to, you know, making an
• 8:32
  impact in care or innovation,
• 8:35
  like research?
• 8:38
  You know, as you're recruiting, what kind of,
• 8:40
  tips and tricks and mindsets do you advise
• 8:44
  them on taking
• 8:46
  through their career? Yeah. No. It's a great
• 8:49
  question, and and I appreciate the question. I've
• 8:51
  been in on the oncology world for over
• 8:53
  twenty years, and
• 8:55
  and,
• 8:55
  I've recognized that the oncology ecosystem is very
• 8:59
  complex. But but the value of that complexity
• 9:02
  is that there is
• 9:04
  there are individuals
• 9:05
  and care team members and,
• 9:08
  alike
• 9:09
  that really care for what they do. And
• 9:11
  and coming together from an inter interdisciplinary
• 9:14
  standpoint, a multidisciplinary
• 9:16
  standpoint
• 9:17
  is so important. So as a leader,
• 9:19
  I have felt like the most important thing
• 9:21
  is to understand
• 9:22
  the dynamics of that ecosystem
• 9:25
  intimately in the sense of understanding where everybody
• 9:27
  sees how things are connected, how they work,
• 9:30
  how they need to be supported in that.
• 9:32
  So really diving into understanding all the different
• 9:35
  parts of that ecosystem,
• 9:37
  I think, is very critical. And, obviously, we
• 9:39
  don't know all the details. I know my
• 9:41
  lane specifically as a as a administrative leader.
• 9:45
  I but I also know how I can
• 9:46
  potentially fit in supporting physicians and caregivers and
• 9:49
  providing the care. So
• 9:52
  building those relationships, asking,
• 9:56
  questions that really kinda push the thinking,
• 9:59
  trying to understand how and the services that
• 10:02
  they need and support they need, I think,
• 10:04
  is an important part of the leadership role.
• 10:06
  So you can help make those decisions. You
• 10:08
  can help make sure that you're partnering and
• 10:10
  you know the right people to
• 10:12
  to to bring along with you in the
• 10:14
  sport of building a program or strengthening what
• 10:17
  the capabilities of it may look like. So
• 10:19
  I think clearly getting into the weeds a
• 10:21
  little bit more, and understanding all the different
• 10:23
  parts is gonna be a critical part for
• 10:25
  any of the leaders
• 10:26
  and recognizing where you fit within that ecosystem
• 10:29
  is such an important part.
• 10:31
  And then I would also say that understanding
• 10:33
  how care is delivered and the innovations that
• 10:36
  we talked about a little bit earlier, like
• 10:38
  understanding how changes in therapeutic and technologies may
• 10:41
  influence that.
• 10:42
  Again, knowing and kind of recognizing how to
• 10:45
  have those conversations within this space is is
• 10:48
  has served me well. Again, just enough to
• 10:51
  ask questions that don't seem like I don't
• 10:53
  understand, but knowing that there's a limit to
• 10:55
  how much I can actually
• 10:57
  understand of that. I didn't go to that
• 10:59
  school, obviously. But I think those are critical
• 11:01
  parts for any leader within this space to
• 11:04
  understand both sides of it. If it's the
• 11:05
  physician, understand the administrative side, understand the finances,
• 11:09
  and and the HR can can needs and
• 11:12
  and and capabilities that support that from an
• 11:15
  administrative side. Again, understanding the clinical space as
• 11:18
  much as possible so you can make kind
• 11:20
  of a a collaborative discussion,
• 11:23
  or informed decisions that way.
• 11:26
  Thank you. Yeah. And I feel like that's
• 11:27
  such great advice, you know, for a leader
• 11:29
  in any specialty or any part of the
• 11:32
  health care industry. Right? Kind of balancing that
• 11:34
  administrative clinical mindset,
• 11:37
  and being there for your team. So appreciate
• 11:39
  you sharing
• 11:40
  your viewpoint on that.
• 11:42
  Whenever I speak to leaders in the oncology
• 11:45
  field, you know, I'm just so excited to
• 11:48
  hear about what's coming down the pipeline and
• 11:50
  and all the innovation that's being made. I
• 11:53
  always like to ask them what gives them
• 11:55
  hope, you know, about the future of cancer
• 11:58
  care,
• 11:58
  and
• 11:59
  what specific areas
• 12:01
  maybe are you focused on and excited about
• 12:03
  today?
• 12:05
  Well, as I mentioned a little bit about
• 12:06
  the trends, I I think the advancements in
• 12:09
  the types of therapeutics are being,
• 12:13
  designed and obviously researched and and developed
• 12:17
  offer a lot of hope
• 12:19
  to those fighting the diseases. It obviously helps
• 12:22
  our physicians and caregivers,
• 12:25
  offer new opportunities that never would was there
• 12:28
  in the past. So I'm I'm very excited
• 12:30
  about, obviously, what's happening with immunotherapies. And, again,
• 12:33
  as I mentioned, targeted therapies and just the
• 12:36
  advancements and new technologies of for surgical interventions
• 12:40
  and so forth have really kind of helped
• 12:42
  create opportunities
• 12:44
  to fight this disease and provide others that
• 12:47
  maybe in the past have not had that
• 12:48
  opportunity. So I think that's exciting.
• 12:51
  Of course, that comes with how do we
• 12:52
  leverage all that and how do we incorporate
• 12:54
  that
• 12:55
  in in an environment that obviously has a
• 12:57
  lot of payer,
• 12:59
  reimbursement challenges and cost issues. But I think
• 13:02
  it's exciting to be able to figure out
• 13:04
  how do we deploy those and and
• 13:09
  offer those within the ecosystem that I designed.
• 13:12
  So that's a very important part. I also
• 13:14
  feel like what's exciting is the amount of
• 13:16
  data that continues to be produced and developed.
• 13:19
  Obviously, AI is going to play an extremely
• 13:21
  important part, maybe breaking down that data in
• 13:24
  more,
• 13:25
  usable fashions that can really kinda help support
• 13:28
  decisions with not only clinically, but,
• 13:31
  operationally
• 13:32
  as well as, functionally. So I think those
• 13:35
  are really exciting things that we focus on
• 13:37
  quite heavily And, of course, how to provide
• 13:40
  coordinated care,
• 13:42
  is really exciting to me about how we
• 13:44
  can do that better, how we can advance
• 13:45
  that, especially with new technologies to to be
• 13:48
  supportive of care to patients in in the
• 13:50
  homes or in different sites
• 13:52
  that are very difficult for patients to receive
• 13:54
  really the optimal care. So I think those
• 13:57
  are exciting how we figure that out at
• 13:58
  Banner and how we continue to push that
• 14:01
  and deploy those types of capabilities,
• 14:03
  really kind of excite me every day.
• 14:07
  Awesome. Yeah. I love, you know, speaking to
• 14:09
  health care leaders and and hearing those consistent
• 14:11
  themes about what's exciting them, what the future
• 14:13
  looks like. So I appreciate you, you know,
• 14:16
  cluing us in on on the oncology space.
• 14:19
  And thank you for joining me on the
• 14:21
  podcast. It's, you know, been a really amazing
• 14:23
  and informative discussion. So thank you for your
• 14:25
  time.
• 14:26
  Well, thank you, Elizabeth. I appreciate it, and
• 14:29
  I appreciate Becker just inviting me.
• 14:31
  Absolutely. And I invite our listeners to tune
• 14:34
  in to more podcasts from Becker's Health Care
• 14:36
  by visiting our podcast page at beckershospitalreview.com.
• 14:41
  Thank you again. I hope you all have
• 14:42
  a wonderful rest of your day.