Latest / Becker’s Healthcare Digital Health + Health IT / Kevin Yearick, Chief Information Officer at the University of Mississippi Medical Center

Transcript

Kevin Yearick, Chief Information Officer at the University of Mississippi Medical Center · Becker’s Healthcare Digital Health + Health IT

• 0:00
  - Prepare to dive into the forefront
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  of healthcare innovation at our 14th annual meeting coming
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  up on April 8th
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  through 11th at the Hyatt Regency in Chicago, with thousands
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  of industry leaders converging over four dynamic days
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  of discussions on crucial topics from health IT
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  to executive leadership.
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  It's where the future of healthcare takes shape.
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  We can't wait to connect with you in person
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  and engage in these important conversations.
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  - Welcome to the Becker's Healthcare Podcast, made
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  for the people who power US healthcare.
• 0:31
  I'm Molly Gamble with Becker's,
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  and today I am sitting down with Kevin Uric, CIO
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  of University of Mississippi Medical Center
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  to learn more about his role
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  and his top priorities as of late.
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  Kevin, welcome to the podcast.
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  Thanks so much for being my guest. How are you today?
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  And where does the podcast find you?
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  - Hey, Molly. Life is good.
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  I'm in Jackson, Mississippi today,
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  and the spring has sprung down here.
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  My kids are finishing up spring break
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  and looking forward to summer break. So all is well.
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  - That's great. You know, and,
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  and looking up University of Mississippi Medical Center,
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  Kevin, I was doing some more research
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  and I didn't realize Jackson Mississippi is on a volcano.
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  - Yeah, I didn't either until you just told me that.
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  No, actually I heard about
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  that about three or four years ago.
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  It's wild, isn't it? ?
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  I think our cols, our cosm was
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  actually built right on top of it. How wild is that?
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  - ? I was hoping your response.
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  I was hoping I got the right Jack
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  and you had me nervous for a
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  second , so, okay, .
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  Um, well, you know what, for, for listeners
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  who might be less familiar with the University
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  of Mississippi Medical Center, can,
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  can you share a few key facts about the hospital
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  and the organization just
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  to help us better reacquaint ourselves?
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  - You bet. We're in Jackson, we're about two
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  and a half hours, um, south of Ole Miss, which is in Oxford,
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  but Ole Miss is our mothership.
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  We are the only, uh, academic medical center in the state.
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  We are the only level one trauma center in the state,
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  and we have the only children's hospital in the state.
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  So it's, um, quite, quite a lot of onlys here for us.
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  And from a volume perspective,
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  we have about a million ambulatory visits a year
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  and about 285,000 inpatient days.
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  - So the, the, the one and only in a number of ways, as
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  as you just helped us understand as CIO of such the,
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  the state's sole academic medical center,
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  sole level one trauma center.
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  Kevin, do you feel a heightened sense of responsibility to,
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  to pioneer specific tech innovations
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  to the benefit of the state?
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  I I'm curious how your work might be accentuated being the
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  only in, in a number of ways, like you just said.
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  - Yeah, I, I, that is,
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  that's a convicting question, isn't it?
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  ? Oh, you're the only and what are you doing?
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  Our, um, it's cool
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  because I think our leadership, um, here at UMMC, uh,
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  talks all the time about making a healthier Mississippi.
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  And so whether it's an internal message
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  or an external message, we're constantly reminding ourselves
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  about making it healthier here in Mississippi.
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  And, um, so our researcher, look, our researchers are kind
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  of looking for an edge all the time.
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  Our clinicians are sort of just wanting things to be easier
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  with fewer touchpoints,
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  and typically our administrators just want
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  to cut out expenses and maximize payments.
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  And so I feel like, you know,
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  I'm constantly battling this promise of some new technology
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  that's gonna fill out one of the things
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  that I've just mentioned that's normally in the hype cycle.
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  You know, it's in the news and,
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  and so I'm, I'm getting an email
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  or a text about it here or there.
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  And, and then what do I do?
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  You know, when we have razor thin margins here as one
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  of the poor states in the union, how do I pick,
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  how do I select and what should I do?
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  And, and there is that, that idea of, okay, well if,
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  if UMMC is not gonna do it, that kind of leads the way
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  for the rest of the state and, uh, healthcare in the state.
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  And so that is something that does
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  convict me on a regular basis.
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  And I would say where I land on this is sort of just,
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  you know, maximizing the potential
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  of the solutions that we've already purchased.
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  We've invested in an awesome EMR and an awesome ERP.
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  Can we utilize those bad boys to make the, make it better
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  for our clinicians or for our administrators?
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  And then, you know, thinking about like something specific,
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  how do we do things to make it healthier in Mississippi?
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  And, and some of what we're we're finding out is
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  if we can't keep our clinicians happy and they're,
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  and they're constantly, um, thinking about being burned out,
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  it takes away from that patient experience.
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  And so I would say one of the things
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  that we really are trying to do is,
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  whether it's on the nursing side
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  or on the physician side, how are we making it
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  so nurses are at the bedside more doing the things
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  that they like to do for the patients
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  and physicians are actually interacting with the patients,
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  uh, the patients and not doing quite
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  as much administrative overhead.
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  And so, so that's, those are some of the initiatives I'd say
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  that I, that, that we're taking, um, a bigger
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  and we're doing more towards those.
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  - Mm-Hmm, . Kevin, do you know what
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  UMCs operating margin is as of late?
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  - It is thin. I think it's like one, one
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  to 3%, something along those lines. Okay.
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  - I mean, that's sensitivity the hype cycle.
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  I I understand what you mean.
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  What have you been seeing the hype cycle
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  around tool solutions tech?
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  Is there something that you feel like is really being
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  hammered home a lot that,
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  and maybe you're craving some other solutions
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  or your needs look a little different than
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  what the hype cycle is spitting out at you?
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  - Well, I'm sure I'm not the only one that's been speaking
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  of, you know, ai, but I I do feel like it's hit differently
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  today than a lot of the other, you know, the cloud and data
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  and all these things that we've, we've heard of in the past.
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  I feel like AI is, is here to stay and,
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  and generative AI specifically is one of those things
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  that the e our EMR is even looking at this and, and,
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  and taking it serious and they're developing.
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  I was chatting with someone from them,
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  from their company recently,
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  and they're like, we've never seen our company kind
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  of develop as fast as we are in this space.
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  And so, um, we are doing, um, we're, we are,
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  we're looking at something that we're looking at right now
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  for our physicians is this, um,
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  ambient listening for our providers.
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  So you, you have an app on your phone, you set it up,
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  you make sure the patients are aware and you start recording
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  and you, you know, have a normal interaction
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  with the patient and the app itself
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  and the AI in inside the app knows enough
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  to take away the ball game results
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  or the spring break trip that they took
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  and only inputs into the medical record
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  and just the discrete fields, um,
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  that which is relevant for them.
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  And that enables the physician to no longer have
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  to be typing in the medical record the entire time.
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  And that's, you know, gosh, this has been around
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  for a little bit, but the, the, um,
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  the major players in this space, that's come a long way.
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  And that's, to me, one
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  of the most promising things from our physician perspective.
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  - We'll talk a little bit more, Kevin, about some
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  of the initiatives or areas of your work lately
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  that are commanding most of your attention, your energy,
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  what are you putting the most into as of late?
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  - Yeah, that's it, that's another great question.
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  We, we have an awesome telehealth group here,
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  and our telehealth group has been working
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  with another company that is, um, I think they,
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  they would tout themselves as ai.
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  And um, what they're doing is they've got a video solution
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  that has AI built in
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  with some algorithms that are localized.
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  So it, it uses our patient demographics
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  and some of the things associated with
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  that patient through our EMR.
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  And they, through video, they are able
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  to predict if a patient's gonna fall out of bed
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  or get out of bed, I guess I should say.
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  Or if the patient hasn't been moved in a while,
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  they're using video and they're alerting the nurses
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  and the clinicians, um, Hey, be, be aware of this.
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  This person may have something that is, you know,
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  looking like they need to be rolled over
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  so that you don't get the bed source.
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  These are things that we have had predictive models
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  for a long time for our nurses,
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  but when you actually have a, a video and an
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  and a an audio alert that's gonna tell you when
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  that's gonna happen, it to us,
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  that seems like it's something that will really reduce all
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  of those, um, the, the indicators for that and,
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  and we're excited about that.
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  One of the other things that, that,
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  that may sound, I mean, that's cool.
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  I actually think that that's one of the things
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  that's revolutionary and could change the way that we do.
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  And this, and the, you know, the, uh,
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  from a clinical quality perspective, how great will that be?
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  It could also help with hand washing.
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  If you're just walk walking by, um, the room and they,
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  and the video captures you actually foaming
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  and foaming out, then you don't have to have these
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  witnesses across the, uh, hospital system that are,
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  you know, sort of spying on you.
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  I think that's really cool too. Same technology.
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  One, um, one additional thing that,
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  that I think is we constantly are talking about security
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  and, uh, I am reminded,
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  and I almost get a little bit of a chuckle now,
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  but we are seeing more
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  and more, um, events where a normal email
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  or a normal SMS message, you know, that comes through
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  that can't be blocked
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  because it's just coming from your typical mail provider.
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  But all it says is, Hey, I'm busy.
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  I can't talk on the phone. Can you reach, can you,
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  can you reply to me to me
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  and, um, I've got some actions for you.
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  And it gives the name of who it is
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  and, you know, typically it's a very important person.
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  And so naturally someone will just reply to that email,
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  and ultimately what's happening is gift cards are being
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  created for all of these bad guys out, um, out in the world,
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  and our folks are getting duped.
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  And there's really no technology way for us to solve
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  that other than just education.
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  But we're seeing that happen over and over and over.
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  And so I'm reminded on a regular basis that, um,
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  we can put in the most sophisticated tools
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  and techniques that that will,
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  you know, stop some of the bad guys.
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  But really what's happening is just a simple SMS message
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  from your air quotes boss that from a, from a number
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  that you don't recognize is what's actually getting
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  through and hurting us. Right?
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  - Right. I am, you know, not
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  that long ago was emails looked like, you know,
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  I'm a I'm a prince, or I'm a king
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  from this country. Do you remember those
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  - ?
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  Yeah, of course. Yeah, of course.
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  - I mean, they've gotten a lot more, to your point, a lot,
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  uh, more subtle and and tougher to detect.
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  And the nature of a lot
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  of these ransomware incidents too has just gotten in some
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  ways so much more cruel.
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  Like it feels more personal in some ways. Mm-Hmm.
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  , whether it's attackers revealing hospital
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  employee information or photos of patients, it feels like
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  it's really become like an intimate act where in
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  what time there was a level of anonymity to it
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  where it didn't feel as, as personal.
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  - Yeah, you're right. And for, you know, for those
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  that get duped, there's an embarrassment component to it.
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  And there's, you know, from the company perspective,
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  what do they do if everybody's getting duped?
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  Are we supposed to refund, you know, everybody?
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  And so it becomes challenging
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  because that personal aspect is nobody wants to feel shame.
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  You know, we talk about leadership all the time about the,
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  the, the, that concept of shame
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  and how damaging it could be.
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  And yet what are, you know, how do we, how do we remedy
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  that when, when the reality is we've been
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  duped, you know? Mm-Hmm.
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  - . Mm-Hmm. - one other thing
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  as it as it relates to security,
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  and I, you know, this is somewhat of a boring topic,
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  but I have had my eyes opened recently about
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  this, you know, change healthcare.
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  I don't know how familiar you are with that,
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  but you know, they have had to take themselves offline
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  for a significant number of their services.
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  And while we're not intimately partners with them,
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  and so I wouldn't even say that we have had, you know,
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  material impacts to it, um, where I do get
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  to listen into some of the calls that they're having
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  and the amount of,
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  of impact across the United States from them.
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  Um, having some difficulties is a challenge.
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  And the arch, you know, the arch technical architecture
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  of our healthcare system, they're, they're,
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  they're vital, it seems like.
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  And so not thinking through, you know, some of these things
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  that we think about from a DR perspective
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  or business continuity, I would not have factored them in
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  to, you know, something that's happening to the, to us.
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  'cause we don't really use them all that often,
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  and yet they are impacting.
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  And so these are eye-opening things that we need
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  to make sure, and I think the government is, is, you know,
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  gonna be helping out with figuring out what is vital
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  and how do we get our, how do we make sure that we have, uh,
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  proper controls in place or,
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  or alternative methods to do the things that these, these
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  critical components are, um, you know,
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  that are impacted. Mm-Hmm.
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  - , did it feel a little bit like there's some
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  checkers being played and then in other ways the attackers
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  or nation states or who are these groups are playing chess?
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  - You got it. You got it. Yeah.
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  It's, it's, um, what is that?
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  The, the, the old adage, you know, you're only as strong
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  as your weakest link and the reality is that, you know, the,
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  the bad guys are, are able
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  to better a attack your weakest link
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  far more than we thought they could. Mm-Hmm.
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  - , you know, Kevin, going back
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  to your point too about telehealth and working with AI
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  and the ability for video to predict if patients may fall,
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  for instance, how, what, what types of brick
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  and mortar changes come up when those projects are pursued?
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  Because I'm, you know, there's the
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  obvious, the camera installation.
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  I'm, I, that seems like relatively simple,
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  but are you having to adjust brick, brick
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  and mortar strategy or expansion plans at all around
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  what you're able to do now with this technology?
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  - Yeah, that's a, that's a great question.
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  And, and it it draws me to, you know,
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  what do we do in the actual room
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  that we're gonna put this in?
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  Because it, there is an infrastructure cost.
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  You've got cabling
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  and you've gotta make sure
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  that from a a network perspective, you can handle it,
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  but you also have the TV component.
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  And I think a lot of like, where,
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  where these vendors are going, um, they are fully aware
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  that most organizations are doing patient care on the
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  television that exists in the room.
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  And so they're adapting and being
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  able to use that infrastructure.
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  I think that's amazing. The, you know, what else do we need
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  to have in order to make this a, um, um, a product
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  that's use useful?
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  I, I think setting up cameras in rooms maybe seemed scary
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  for organizations a while ago,
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  but it almost seems like it's, it's, it's a, it's gonna have
• 13:20
  to be something of the future if you're gonna be able to,
• 13:22
  um, attack some of these quality problems.
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  And so maybe, maybe if, if, if I'm answering your question,
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  um, or interpreting your question the right way,
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  I just think it's not that hard for us to put cameras in.
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  Um, but there could be some, uh,
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  underlying infrastructure issues that you'll want to,
• 13:36
  you want to address and, and we're having to do that too.
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  And you know, the alternative is to just wa
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  to roll in a cart.
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  There are, uh, solutions that are, you know, cart based,
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  but that doesn't, it, it, it almost seems like it,
• 13:47
  the harder you make it for the clinician to order
• 13:49
  and then roll in, the harder to the,
• 13:51
  the less likely it is that they're gonna use it. Mm-Hmm.
• 13:53
  - . Well, Kevin, we've covered a lot in the
• 13:55
  time you've already spent together today.
• 13:57
  Are there any closing thoughts for our listeners
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  or message you'd like to leave them with as we wind down?
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  - Yeah, I, um, I was meeting with a group
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  of physicians just this, this week actually.
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  And, um, amazing interaction, just, they were
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  that I was chatting with them
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  to pick their brains on a few things,
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  but also they were, they wanted me in the room
• 14:14
  to give my perspective on where the world is heading and,
• 14:17
  and you know, what we're doing at the U for technology
• 14:20
  and how we can make their lives easier.
• 14:21
  All that's great. We have those interactions on,
• 14:23
  on the regular, but I was struck by just
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  how smart they are on technology today
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  and how, um, many of them, if you recall,
• 14:32
  15 years ago when we were all doing our EMR implementations
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  and you had a few physician champions,
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  but you just, you didn't get a lot of buy-in
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  and it was really hard for you to do workflow changes
• 14:42
  because not everybody wanted to do things differently.
• 14:45
  And I was struck by, you know, everybody's adopted this now
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  and it's just part of their daily life
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  and they've accepted it,
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  and now more than ever, they are aware
• 14:53
  of technology in the world
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  and they're aware of things
• 14:56
  that would make their life easier,
• 14:57
  much more than you are aware of it,
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  or at least I am, I shouldn't speak for everyone.
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  And so it is, it is cool
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  because we're farther along than we were 15 years ago,
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  and at the same time, it's hard
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  because they now have more intel than we do in some cases.
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  I think as it relates to, um, to ai,
• 15:15
  AI is the biggest buzzword nowadays,
• 15:17
  but I think it's going to be massive for us.
• 15:20
  Um, as it relates to that, I got a kick out of it
• 15:23
  because they're, they're concerned about the same things
• 15:26
  that we're concerned about.
• 15:28
  They don't want their jobs to be taken.
• 15:30
  They don't believe that, you know,
• 15:31
  the critical thinking component
• 15:33
  of AI is going to replace them.
• 15:35
  And yet they were told that three
• 15:37
  or four years ago, they worked alongside the AI components,
• 15:39
  you know, radiology and some of these specialties,
• 15:41
  and they were chuckling
• 15:43
  and they're like, I was so afraid of this before,
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  and now I laugh because it's not gonna replace us
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  right now in the current state.
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  My goodness. They would be done without us if we didn't have
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  our, you know, our brains working with, um,
• 15:55
  the visual components of this.
• 15:57
  And I got a, I got a a kick out of that too, in that many
• 16:00
  of the same feelings
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  that we have about someone taking our job
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  or something, taking our job
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  or the cloud or all these types of things.
• 16:06
  And the reason that we don't get adopt adoption,
• 16:08
  many times when we do it, it's like,
• 16:10
  oh yeah, that's complimentary.
• 16:11
  That's not actually gonna, that's not gonna hurt us.
• 16:13
  So I just wanted to give that as a little anecdote to it.
• 16:16
  It does seem as though most folks are way better off than
• 16:19
  they were from a technical perspective 10,
• 16:21
  15 years ago, obviously.
• 16:22
  Right. But it's helpful for us in the IT world to interact,
• 16:26
  um, with the business and to see that
• 16:28
  and to recognize that, my goodness, if we don't take them,
• 16:31
  um, if they don't, we, if we don't listen to their advice,
• 16:33
  then we're gonna be falling behind ourselves.
• 16:35
  - Mm-Hmm. . Mm-Hmm, ,
• 16:37
  I remember not around the same timeframe you're talking
• 16:39
  about 10, 15 years ago.
• 16:40
  I remember there were these stories
• 16:42
  and about rolling out new tech in organizations
• 16:46
  and change management around that.
• 16:47
  And one of the biggest action items
• 16:49
  or recommendations was always find your physician champion,
• 16:52
  sometimes singular Kevin. Yeah. So I think,
• 16:54
  - Yeah, yeah, - Your point.
• 16:56
  I mean, that's a whole class of employees
• 16:58
  and people now in organizations,
• 17:00
  you know, it's not one person.
• 17:01
  These people, their technology
• 17:03
  and their literacy around it has leveled up in so many ways.
• 17:07
  Um, so I think to just point that out, it, it's kind
• 17:09
  of an observation that it's very real,
• 17:12
  but it doesn't always go noticed.
• 17:13
  So, so thank you for ending with that note.
• 17:16
  - You bet. You bet.
• 17:18
  - Well, this has been Kevin Ric, CIO of University
• 17:21
  of Mississippi Medical Center, the state's only a MC
• 17:24
  with more than 800 beds.
• 17:25
  Kevin, thank you so much for visiting with me,
• 17:27
  catching me up on your work as of late.
• 17:29
  I hope we can do so again soon.
• 17:31
  - Sounds good, Molly. Thanks a lot.