Latest / Becker’s Healthcare - Clinical Leadership Podcast / Brian R. Carlson, Vice President of Patient Experience at Vanderbilt Health

Transcript

Brian R. Carlson, Vice President of Patient Experience at Vanderbilt Health · Becker’s Healthcare - Clinical Leadership Podcast

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  Would you like to exchange best practices and ideas to improve care,
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  enhance operational efficiency,
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  and address financial challenges with your peers?
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  Becker's Healthcare is facilitating these conversations at their eighth annual
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  health, IT digital health and RCM meeting.
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  You can check your eligibility for complimentary attendance at the Lincoln,
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  the description. We are excited to welcome you in October.
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  This is Laura Dedo with the Becker's Healthcare Podcast.
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  I'm thrilled today to be joined by Brian Carlson,
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  vice President of Patient Experience at Vanderbilt Health. Brian,
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  it's a pleasure to have you on the podcast today.
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  Thank you, Laura. It's good to be with you.
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  Now. I know we have a lot to talk about right now.
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  It's such an important and incredible time in healthcare.
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  But before we dive into my questions,
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  can you tell us a little bit more about yourself and your background?
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  Absolutely. Um, I, uh,
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  currently serve as vice president of patient experience at Vanderbilt University
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  Medical Center or Vanderbilt Health in Nashville, Tennessee.
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  I've been in this role for about 10 years. In prior to that, I was in, uh,
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  group practice operations, uh, running physician group practices.
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  Got it. Wow.
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  So definitely very closely aligned with the physicians and now the patient
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  experience. Um, given your current role,
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  what do you see as being some of the biggest issues that you're following in
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  healthcare right now? I can imagine, you know,
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  there's so much happening with the evolution of patient experience and
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  consumerism in this space, so I,
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  I'd just love to hear what's top of mind for you.
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  Yeah, I, I think first that's top of mind and, and I think this is probably on,
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  on most colleagues' minds as well, is just the,
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  the financial pressures that most organizations are facing.
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  It's a difficult time right now in the healthcare space, uh, with, uh,
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  the financial headwinds we have,
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  but we're working our way through that and obviously trying to stay true to our
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  mission, uh, and visions in each organization,
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  and also holding to safe quality care and, and outstanding experiences.
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  So sometimes the financial pressures don't, uh,
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  always butt up well against an ideal experience,
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  but I think that we're weathering the storm pretty well here at Vanderbilt and,
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  and doing a nice job. I think the second issue that I would put out there, and,
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  and I heard this at the annual conference last month at, uh, Becker's, is,
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  is is the,
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  the concept of culture and the importance of it and the focus on it and the
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  intentional need to be, uh, focusing on culture within our organizations.
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  Absolutely. I think that makes a lot of sense. You know, and,
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  and certainly especially during times when there are, you know,
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  budgets are tightening and trying to really, uh,
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  continue to provide great patient care.
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  A big part of that is the staff and the team, uh,
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  within the organization that makes the, the experience that much better.
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  And so when you think about the culture, um,
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  and the intentional culture that you've built at Vanderbilt, you know,
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  what does that look like? How have you, uh,
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  continued to grow and develop within the internal team so that you can make sure
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  patients are receiving great care and a great experience, uh, on the flip side?
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  Yeah, that's a, that's a, that's a great question. I think that there's,
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  there's kind of four, four steps that, that I think about. And the first is,
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  is the importance of the foundational items, the mission, vision, values,
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  those behavioral standards, uh,
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  that really are the guideposts by which the workforce gauges on,
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  on what do you expect me to do.
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  And then from there is the expectation or the need that we're transparent in
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  talking about, you know, those behavioral standards.
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  And we need to do it continually.
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  We can't just talk about it in new employee orientation and then stick it on a
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  wall and expect people to live by it.
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  They need to see it in action day in and day out,
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  and you need to continually reteach the culture.
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  So you need to be transparent about it. You need to be discussing it.
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  I think the,
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  the third item is really around goal alignment and ensuring the goals you
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  have, uh, for the organization are aligned. And, uh,
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  everyone's working in the same, in the same direction, uh,
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  because that causes frustration.
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  Which effects can affect culture if people aren't rowing in, in the same, uh,
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  in the same direction. And then, um,
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  and then the last part is really, uh, around the, um,
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  uh, the cul the, the transparency again, and that's just with data,
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  patient experience, quality data. It's just being open and honest.
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  Financial situation is being very transparent with the workforce about here's
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  where we are, here's where we want to go,
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  and here's what we need to do to need to do to get there.
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  Absolutely. I love that. I think that, you know,
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  is so important and definitely is a great roadmap to building the type of
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  culture that you need in, in, um, comfortability amongst team members to,
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  to then, um, be able to deliver patient care. So that's amazing to hear.
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  What are you most excited about right now? What makes you nervous?
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  Well, you know, I'm gonna actually go a little different direction, uh,
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  because I,
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  there's been a lot of discussion and explosion lately with the concepts and the
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  discussion around artificial intelligence and how to use it. And I really, I'm,
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  you know, I work, uh, in our digital health space as well here at Vanderbilt.
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  And, um, the prospects of that are so exciting, you know,
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  to make our jobs more efficient, easier to be predictive,
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  using big data and algorithms to, to do that, that's exciting to think about,
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  but it's also nervous because things can go wrong. We have, we have, um,
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  privacy, we've gotta think about, we've got security, we've gotta think about,
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  uh, we've got, you know, misuse that we have to think about and, and,
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  and the prospects for that. So it's,
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  it's the same concept and I'm both excited and nervous about it.
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  Absolutely. That makes a lot of sense. And I know, you know, right now, overall,
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  artificial intelligence is experiencing a huge renaissance, you know,
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  evolving every single day in terms of its capabilities and how people are using
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  it to grow in different industries. And healthcare is no different.
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  Now from the healthcare perspective, I know, as you mentioned,
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  those discussions can be very varied, um, that has a lot of potential,
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  can do some really great things from operational and clinical side,
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  but also the areas privacy, security, um,
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  in making sure that it's used in ethical way are hugely important. Healthcare.
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  So what are those discussions like with your, your broader team?
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  How do you really set some of the guardrails?
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  And I can imagine still in the very early stages of the technology's evolving
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  every day. Um, what are those discussions like and how do you, uh,
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  develop that on the digital health side?
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  Yeah, yeah. And it, like you said, it's, it's, it's developing, it's ongoing.
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  But I think that starting with both the, what are the opportunities,
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  what are the things that we want to do, what do we wanna get involved on?
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  But then the guardrails really come into play around what's the governance we
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  need to set up to oversee this? And of course, you know,
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  you don't wanna be too stringent,
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  but you gotta be stringent enough where you make sure you're dotting all your I
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  and crossing all your T's. So that's,
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  that's still an ongoing conversation and we haven't, we have not figured it out,
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  uh, as most organizations ha have, have, not either. But, uh, the,
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  the prospects of, of that governance aspects and how we, uh,
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  think about safety, you know, privacy, ethics, ethical uses,
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  all of that stuff, our ongoing conversations we're having,
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  and it's that core group of governance individuals that we need to establish and
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  keep, keep talking about it and learn from each other.
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  We need to be sharing across organizations as well so we don't duplicate and we
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  can learn from each other in, in those setups.
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  Absolutely.
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  I think that's so important and definitely something that we aim to do, uh,
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  at our meetings. As you mentioned, our annual meeting earlier, uh,
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  in the conversation,
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  being able to just be on the forefront of what's happening on a day-to-day basis
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  is, um, so crucial.
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  And so thank you so much for bringing that in and mentioning it. Now,
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  before we wrap up our conversation, I wanted to look into the future.
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  We've talked a lot about some of the ways that healthcare is changing,
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  whether it's focusing on the patient, the consumer, and then two,
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  having artificial intelligence, uh, really mm-hmm.
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  takes center stage in many ways.
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  So what will effective healthcare leaders need to be successful over the next
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  two to three years?
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  Yeah, that's a, that's another really good question. I,
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  I think the first thing that comes to mind for me is, is the idea that,
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  that healthcare is the ultimate team sport.
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  We can't operate individually and we need to surround ourselves with le with
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  with individuals that we trust and that are working towards the common goal.
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  Cuz if we have, if we trust each other, if we can put that to the side,
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  we're gonna be much more effective in our ability to handle the,
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  the very challenging problems, uh,
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  but also exciting ones that we have ahead of us. So the,
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  the team aspect of it in the leadership space and across the organization and
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  who you're working with and, and are you tied to the,
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  the goal of the organization is very important.
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  I think the second thing that I would say is keeping an eye on the workforce and
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  that, that cultural aspect, you know,
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  the last couple years have been with Covid and then coming out of Covid and, um,
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  you know, the, now the financial headwinds,
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  people want to believe in something that's bigger than themselves.
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  And healthcare has the,
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  is the ultimate place for that to happen because we do miracles every single
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  day,
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  but we need to continue to translate that to the many thousands of individuals
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  that come, come in our organization and wanna be part of that,
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  that bigger picture. So how can we support them?
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  How can we make their jobs a little more effective? How can we make it easier,
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  uh, for them so they can feel that pride in the work they're doing? I think the,
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  the third thing is just, is the continued explosion of,
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  of technology and our ability to assess, uh, accurately assess,
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  you know, what are the problems we're trying to solve,
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  and then how can that technology help us? We,
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  we can't add technology just because it's the shiny dollar and it looks great
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  and, and we, we think it's gonna solve something and it may solve something,
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  but actually may cause other problems down the line.
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  So you have to be very intentional these days about what's the technology we're
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  gonna introduce, and is it truly solving a,
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  a workforce or a patient problem to make things a little easier and a little
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  more effective? Um, and I,
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  the last thing I would say is back to that team aspect is,
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  and also back to the financial headwinds,
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  is in the experience space now is not the time to,
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  to use the financial headwinds to reduce the experience,
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  you need to lean into it further because the experience is human experience,
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  it's both patient and employee.
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  And having intentional conversations and professionals working in that space
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  will make the organization not much more effective. And,
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  and now's not the time in the financial pressures to cut those types of
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  programs.
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  Absolutely. I think that's a really great point,
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  and certainly that human human relationship makes, you know,
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  all the difference in the world when you think about the experience in patient
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  care. And it brings up a really great point, um,
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  as we've been talking through healthcare resources are precious right now more
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  than ever. And, and so from the patient experience lens,
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  if you know you're a hospital or health system that is facing some of these
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  challenges in a tightening budget, um,
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  but still want to be supportive of these initiatives and,
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  and move forward with the great patient experience and great patient care, uh,
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  what you,
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  you prioritize when you're thinking about your investments and thinking about
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  what needs to, um, come in, whether it's from the personnel side or technology,
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  what do you really need to prioritize to, to have a, um,
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  great patient experience team in, in, uh, culture within your organization, uh,
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  but also being mindful of the budget?
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  Yeah, I, I, I mean, I go back, it's the, it's the effective workforce. I mean,
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  um, happy employees, equal happy patients,
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  and we need to continually lean into, you know, working,
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  uh, across disciplines. So hr, marketing, operations,
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  patient experience with the lens and the focus on what are we doing
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  for the workforce to make their jobs a little easier, a little more effective.
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  And then the ways to do that is also being how can we introduce technology into
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  and, and, and technology solutions to make process processes easier. Um,
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  but I always, always go back to the behavioral standards,
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  the values of the organization. Are you continually reminding the workforce,
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  the guiderails or the guard posts for how you expect the care to be delivered
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  and how you expect individuals in the organization to interact and,
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  and work with each other. And if you do that,
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  if you have those and you do that consistently,
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  you're gonna win on the experience side.
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  I love it. Brian, thank you so much for joining us on the podcast today.
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  This has been a really fascinating discussion and I look forward to connecting
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  with you again soon.
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  My pleasure. Thank you for having me.
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