Latest / Becker’s Healthcare Digital Health + Health IT / Robb Wetmore, MHR, Director of Digital Health at Variety Care

Transcript

Robb Wetmore, MHR, Director of Digital Health at Variety Care · Becker’s Healthcare Digital Health + Health IT

• 0:00
  Welcome to Becker's Healthcare podcast. I'm Chris Sosa,
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  your host, and I'm thrilled to be joined
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  today by Rob Wetmore. He is the director
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  of digital health for Variety Care in Oklahoma
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  City. Rob, thank you for joining us today.
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  Thanks, Chris. Thank you for having me.
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  Yeah. We're so glad you could be here.
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  Rob, if you could please introduce yourself and
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  tell our audience a bit about your background.
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  Sure thing. As Chris mentioned, my name is
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  Rob Wetmore. I am the director of digital
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  health care at Variety Care. We are a
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  federally qualified health center out of Oklahoma City.
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  We
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  have around 20 clinics within the Oklahoma City
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  area and a couple into rural Oklahoma.
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  And we currently serve responsible for,
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  little over a 100,000 patients, So a fairly
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  large system.
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  My path kind of coming here into this
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  realm
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  is a bit different than what,
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  is the usual. So I spent sixteen years
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  working in inpatient mental health.
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  Everything from utilization review and prior authorization
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  into clinical program management. And then I even
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  was working under supervision for my LPC licensure
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  before my career kind of went off on
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  a tangent
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  and I ended up being on an epic
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  implementation build
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  as an instructional designer.
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  And then that transitioned again into what we
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  called care transformation where I was able to
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  work with some physician leads
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  to develop best practices for that health care
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  system
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  to standardize care and processes
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  throughout the whole entire thing. And so that's
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  really where I got a huge exposure into
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  the transition between a clinical vision and operational
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  reality and how those things worked for and
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  against each other.
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  That does seem a little bit like a
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  meandering path through health. But but by and
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  large, it just sounds like you've had
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  a breadth of experience in in the industry.
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  What got you what made you go into
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  health care? What made you pursue that in
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  the first place?
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  So
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  kinda going back even further, I entered undergraduate,
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  with this whole idea of, like, I'm gonna
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  be a business major. I'm gonna be a
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  CEO and, you know, do all this and
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  make all this money. And then those classes
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  put me to sleep.
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  And
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  so I realized that probably wasn't the direction
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  I wanted to go. And I took an
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  intro to psychology class
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  and realized that it was very interesting to
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  me. It's very intriguing, the psychology, the social
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  sciences,
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  and I ended up getting a double major
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  in psychology and sociology.
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  Ended up in Oklahoma after
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  undergrad and quickly realized that a bachelor's degree
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  in psychology and sociology was gonna get me
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  nowhere.
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  And eventually got into a master's program at
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  the University of Oklahoma and focused on my
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  LPC licensure.
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  At the time, I was working for the
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  inpatient mental health facility, so I was able
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  to translate that
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  real world experience into the classroom and vice
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  versa. So it was a really cool way
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  of getting that accomplished.
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  So that's how I got into health care.
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  It just fell in my lap kind of
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  a thing, and it's something that
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  definitely
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  is a part of who I am. It's
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  in my it's in my DNA, really. I
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  I I enjoy it. No one's in my
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  family has been in health care, but it's
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  definitely something that's just ingrained into me. It's
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  it's really just I'm a helper, and
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  I can't help but be in a helper.
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  Even on this side in digital health
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  and looking at the systems of things,
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  it's in that helper role of, like, how
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  can I better the system, not just for
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  the system? I mean, sure. That's great. They
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  they sign my paychecks.
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  But to me, it's all about the patient
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  and patient first, patient engagement, patient care. And
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  that was driven in on the behavioral health
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  side way before it was on to the
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  medical side. So I feel I got a
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  head start on that patient first mentality before
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  it really got into the medical side of
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  health care. And now in digital health, that's
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  what it has to be about. There's such
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  a divide
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  between
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  technology
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  and the human experience
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  that with me that I live on that
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  divide, that that gray line between those two
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  realms of basically anywhere in life. I live
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  in that gray line. And so for me
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  to be able to
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  take digital technology
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  and use it to transform
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  the human experience
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  in health care is just like
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  a win win for me, I guess.
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  Certainly,
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  if there's any indication sure indication that you're
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  in the wrong place, it's if it's not
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  inspiring you and putting you to sleep. But,
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  fortunately, you found your way into the WR
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  now. I love the way you put it.
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  That that's a a gray line. I hadn't
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  heard that before, but it certainly, I think,
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  speaks to a lot of leadership in health
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  care that you as you said, you have
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  to live between these two worlds of, you
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  know, what
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  digital and other technologies can provide and how
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  you actually translate that to the patient.
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  So along those lines, could you let us
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  know what exactly are your top priorities today?
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  Well, I mean, I kinda hit on it.
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  My top priorities are really,
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  serving the the patients,
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  reducing those disparities
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  and providing access to the underserved communities.
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  That
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  is always been true for federally qualified health
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  centers, and it's really it's always been true
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  for
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  what I've been trying to do.
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  But
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  now it's even more so. The the pressures
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  that are being put on us at the
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  federal level,
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  to perform, to
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  do what we're doing with less funding,
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  we have to figure out a way around
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  this, and it comes down to access.
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  And to me in in my world view
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  and, fortunately, my leaders as well, it comes
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  down
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  to things like telemedicine and remote patient monitoring.
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  Any sort of tool that improves access, increases
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  access, gets us in front of our patients,
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  and help them have healthier lives.
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  Along those lines as well, Rob. So
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  to say that things change quickly would be
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  maybe the understatement of the year with technology
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  and health care in particular.
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  And you've you've covered
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  some of the challenges that you're facing with,
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  respect to changes in the federal government and
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  and the like.
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  So
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  could you take this moment to just say
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  describe
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  to the audience how you anticipate your role
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  is gonna change and how the role of
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  your team is gonna change.
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  And lastly,
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  how you work through you said you're really
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  not alone in this. Not at all. So
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  who are the people and and other
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  systems, organizations that you're looking for to kind
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  of collaborate with? And that's a lot, I
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  so. So break it straight into it as
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  as as you wish.
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  No. That's a great question. So
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  to start things off with digital health is
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  the department of Rob. So I don't have
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  a team to wrap around me, but,
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  that doesn't stop me.
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  Yeah. I talk to myself probably as much
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  as I talk to anybody,
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  and, we have good conversations.
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  But
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  I have a good relationship with my leadership,
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  doctor Lydia Nightingale. She's our VP of medical
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  affairs, and we have a good relationship and
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  a good understanding of where we want this
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  organization to go on that medical clinical operational
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  front
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  and really shift how we're doing things within
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  the system.
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  And she and our CMO
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  and our,
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  like, chief of population health and all those
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  aspects. They're really working together with the synergy
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  to kind of bring this together. So, internally,
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  that's my team that I work with is
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  is doctor Nightingale and her chiefs that are
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  underneath her
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  to just transform the way that VerityCare is
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  doing care.
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  Externally, I have a great partner with Evisit,
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  Evisit Telemedicine.
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  They have been an amazing partner from the
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  first conversation I had with them. Gosh. It's
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  been
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  two and a half years now probably that
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  I've been working with them. They've been amazing
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  telemedicine partner. More than a telemedicine partner, they've
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  really been a partner just in digital health
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  and innovating and expanding what that looks like
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  and how people get involved in that.
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  So it's been a great partnership there.
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  Working with other vendors to try to bring
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  in
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  cleaner, better, faster, more efficient ways of doing
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  things.
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  Novena AI is a company that I've been
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  trying to work well, I've been working with
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  a lot. I'm trying to get them into
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  our ecosystem.
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  They're gonna allow us to look at the
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  medical record from a whole new level.
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  Novena uses its its AI to
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  not only comb through our record, and we're
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  an epic shop. We go through Ogen instance
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  of Epic. And so
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  not only to come through Epic and Nexus
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  or whatever you wanna call it, Care Everywhere
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  platform, all that stuff, but it also looks
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  out to the health information exchange and pulls
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  in information from that on that patient.
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  And so our providers right there in front
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  of them are gonna have all of this
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  information on
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  on these patients that they treat
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  and know a much more robust history than
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  they've ever been able to look at before
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  because it's pulling in information that we probably
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  don't have in our health system,
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  from records going way back. And the AI
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  will then
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  make suggestions
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  towards
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  what diagnosis the provider may wanna look at
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  to look at and and run through and
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  just kinda dive deeper into. So it's a
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  really cool technology. I'm very excited to get
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  it going. We have some internal
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  barriers that we're looking into to make sure
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  that once we decide to go forward with
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  it, that it's gonna be clean
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  implementation process, but it's something that I'm very
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  excited about.
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  I'm glad you mentioned that the excitement aspect
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  because, you know, that's really what's gonna keep
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  all of us going in in all of
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  our jobs really, especially when things can be
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  a little difficult as they are right now.
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  Beyond what you just mentioned, and thank you
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  for sharing all of that,
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  is there anything else that you think, hey.
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  This is really exciting, and I really wanna
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  share this as far as your job is
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  concerned?
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  Just me personally, the fact that digital health
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  care is isn't just like this side project
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  now. It's really looked at as a key
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  strategic initiative. It is one of our strategic
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  initiatives here at Variety Care is innovation within
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  that being the digital health innovation. So
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  the fact that that is my realm and
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  the fact that it's at that high of
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  level of engagement is, pretty rewarding and exciting
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  in itself. And
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  I'm hoping to be able to take this
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  from just, like, piloting tools and bringing some
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  stuff on to really making this something that's
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  sustainable
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  and culture shift
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  and
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  just
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  being able to make sure that we can
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  scale it across the organization and that it
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  sticks.
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  Rob, thank you so much for joining us
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  on the podcast today. I we're gonna see
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  you at a a conference coming up this
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  fall. And, you know, we can't wait to
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  share these insights and until next time.
• 10:56
  Alright. Thanks, Chris. It'd be good talking to
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  you.