Latest / Becker’s Healthcare Digital Health + Health IT / Raymond Lowe, Senior Vice President and Chief Information Officer at AltaMed

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Raymond Lowe, Senior Vice President and Chief Information Officer at AltaMed · Becker’s Healthcare Digital Health + Health IT

• 0:01
  The Becker's team is excited to announce the
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  launch of our new CFO and Revenue Cycle
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  Tune in for conversations with finance experts from
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  revenue cycle podcast wherever you listen to episodes.
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  This is Laura Dirdo with the Becker's Healthcare
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  podcast. I'm thrilled today to be joined by
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  Ray Lo, senior vice president and chief information
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  officer at AltaMed. Ray, it's a pleasure to
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  have you on the podcast today. Well, Laura,
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  thank you for inviting me and letting us,
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  share some great things that are happening and
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  challenges of that here in, at AltaMed.
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  Absolutely. Absolutely. Well, I'm excited for our conversation.
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  I know, you're certainly a leader in this
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  space and very well respected in health IT.
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  So we can dive right in. I'm wondering
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  first and foremost, can you tell us a
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  little bit about AltaMed? What makes you unique?
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  Yeah. So,
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  Ultimate. So we're a regional,
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  community health center actually in Los Angeles and
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  Orange County. We're actually the largest or second
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  largest,
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  in the nation. And that means we're a
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  Medicaid provider.
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  So we provide care
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  to,
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  about 500,000,
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  folks most underserved. Right? We provide care for
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  everybody.
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  Independent of their ability to pay. And so
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  we have a very unique mission that, meeting
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  the underserved communities,
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  helping take care of them, improving the overall
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  health health literacy
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  and the quality
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  of the lives of those folks that could
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  be marginalized
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  are often forgotten.
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  The other thing that's also great about ultimate
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  is,
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  that's side of our
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  We also have PACE programs, which are all
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  inclusive cares of the elderly
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  and these are these really amazing dynamic programs.
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  You'll see these seniors that,
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  and they come to our centers and we
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  take care of them clinically, but also socially
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  and it gives them a very vibrant opportunity
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  to socialize,
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  thrive, you know, and still live their family
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  units. And but still, you know, can kinda
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  get out. And then in our for profit
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  sector,
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  we have a Medicaid insurance product, and we
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  also have a managed services organization.
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  Oh, that's huge. And, you know, a lot
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  to be accountable for and responsible for,
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  but such an important mission in in population
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  that you serve. Now I I'm wondering, if
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  you look back at the last year or
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  so, what is the accomplishment that you're most
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  proud of?
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  Well, I think,
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  it's kind of a bragging moment.
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  EPIC 10 gold stars was at the absolute
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  highlight,
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  for AltaMed to be recognized that. And that
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  speaks to our clinical teams as well as
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  our technical teams and our partners that helped
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  us achieve it. It's no small feat to
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  be recognized by epic as a top performing
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  organization.
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  And I think we are probably one of
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  the first community health centers to ever achieve
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  that recognition.
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  So those that aren't familiar with that, there's
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  probably two thirty some odd
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  areas that you have to work across and
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  you have to
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  fulfill the requirements of epic and score to
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  me. It's pretty arduous. It's like the top
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  3%.
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  And so I think,
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  allowing
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  us to achieve that through the hard work,
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  but more importantly.
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  You know, instantiating
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  the delivery of medicine to the underserved communities
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  And we've seen that our quality scores are
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  really good Medicaid.
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  He just measurements are, like, in the eightieth
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  percentile, which is, which is outstanding
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  and we've been awarded and recognized on many
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  health plans for the quality service. We provide
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  Even on the Medicare side, you know, we're
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  pushing four and a half stars as well
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  for CMS ratings. So that's also great. So
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  you look at how do we do that?
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  That is, you know, technology
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  enabling providers, case managers,
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  etcetera, so that they can provide the right
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  care
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  at the right time.
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  That's great to hear. You know, what a
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  huge accomplishment.
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  From your perspective, how were you able to,
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  achieve that recognition from Epic? As you mentioned,
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  something that most organizations don't even approach. So
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  what made,
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  Ultimate different and ultimately,
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  push you over the line to to get
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  that achievement?
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  I think it's it's all team. Right? I'll
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  I'll tell you. I'll just say it. When
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  I was at Epic
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  in, 2023,
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  we reached nine gold stars. And I was
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  pretty happy about that to get a plaque.
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  And I looked over.
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  It was, another health system, and they got
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  10 gold stars, and they got a trophy.
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  And I went, here we get a trophy.
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  You know, and, I'm I'm a leadership right
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  at its best. And so as we were
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  looking where we were in terms of our
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  assessment,
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  in there, I challenged the team. I think
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  we're sitting at seven gold stars,
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  in February. I said, why can't we make
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  it to 10?
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  Right? What do we need to do? Let's
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  let's really push it. Why not? Let's go
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  for it. Right?
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  I love Ultimed because we're very scrappy from
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  a technology, clinical informatics delivery perspective. And here's
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  how we push the envelope and transfer the
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  care,
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  you know, for our patients. So, you know,
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  we, it was concerted effort,
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  for us to make it. Another highlight again,
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  this was our CEO, Costello Rocha, was invited
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  to speak in the CEO Council at EPIC.
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  And really talk about a whole community approach
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  to health care. And he also talked about
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  the journey of AltaMed being here fifty five
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  years, growing from a storefront
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  in in East LA to being, you know,
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  a multibillion dollar organization that we are today.
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  That's truly impressive in in, you know, driving
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  that, spirit of greatness,
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  in order to achieve those stars, ultimately for
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  the betterment of the patient community. So that's
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  amazing to hear. Now looking ahead, where do
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  you see big growth opportunities for the next
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  twelve months or so?
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  Yeah. So we're an interesting inflection point. So,
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  like, we are all in on the,
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  augmented intelligence. So we are, working with the
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  bridge for Amity Clinical Voice.
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  I love that product.
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  You know, it's gonna allow our providers
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  to work with non English speaking,
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  patients and actually do kind of a seamless
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  translation,
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  for this. So, if there is, I'll say
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  Spanglish for that term and the conversation goes
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  back and forth, they'll actually pick out what's
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  important to the subjective part of the soap
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  note on there. The other area we're making,
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  you know, a big push and it's on
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  patient engagement.
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  So we are redoing our whole patient engagement
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  strategy. It's it is February 2025.
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  We've gone live with hello world. We're going
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  live with cheers on quality campaigns.
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  You know, and then the other area we're
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  focusing on is on our clinical analytics perspective.
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  You know, with the,
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  current challenges and revenue,
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  we have to be extremely productive and extremely
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  effective.
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  So how do we put, you know, the
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  right analytics information,
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  access, quality,
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  census in front of our providers?
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  So that they know where or how they
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  need to flex or our case managers, you
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  know, or our patient service centers. Who do
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  we need to reach out to?
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  You know, so we're doing a lot of
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  looking at how do we make those real
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  time analytics,
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  evident, you know, and actually went inside of
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  epic right to the care providers.
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  Those are some of our kind of our
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  big areas. You know, we're doing pharmacy programs
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  as well.
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  And,
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  you know, we're we're continuing to lift the
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  overall
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  level, you know, of our of our delivery.
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  That's great to hear. I love that. It
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  seems like so many opportunities to do new
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  things,
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  and create
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  a better and healthier community.
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  Now I know we've talked a lot about
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  the exciting things ahead, but there's headwinds as
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  well. What are some of the big challenges
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  that you're anticipating and starting to work through?
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  Yeah. You know, I,
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  I mean, the,
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  with the new administration that's come in, right,
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  and the overhaul of DHHS, I think it's
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  it's a, interesting
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  inflection point for the industry in terms of
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  way reimbursement will be happening.
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  You know,
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  you know, folks may or may not come
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  into
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  our system in order to have care. So
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  we have to be really good at telehealth.
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  We have to be really good at educating
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  our patients and the community. We don't want
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  people to get sicker. We want to keep
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  them well, you know, and and again, providing
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  all inclusive care for everybody
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  is what our mission is. So, you know,
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  we're looking at how do we continue
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  to do that? How do we continue to
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  have those type of outreach programs that will
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  support the community and
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  grow the overall wellness.
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  And the other part of it is on
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  a value based care perspective.
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  It's, how do we reduce hospitalization,
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  etcetera?
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  How do we do the interventions
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  transitioning patients from the hospital
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  having the right care plan care providers, you
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  know, I too tied to them. So that
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  they actually progress a wellness
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  right versus, you know, versus getting sicker. So
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  we're looking, you know, on those dimensions
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  really like, how do we, you know, keep
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  our patients involved? How to keep them educated?
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  How do we keep them healthier?
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  And,
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  it's I think it's moving more towards a
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  virtual perspective, but we can't forget that, you
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  know, the human touch part of what's happening.
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  And how do we, you know, keep folks
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  warm and embrace. Right?
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  That makes a lot of sense. And and
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  truly, truly embracing, like you mentioned, that virtual
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  space, also keeping the human connection front and
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  center and and providing the right type of
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  information that's gonna help the communities.
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  Have you found anything that's worked particularly well,
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  to reach in terms of messaging or,
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  way that you're connecting with the community,
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  that you've really had success?
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  Yeah. It's it's, it's kind of kind of
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  a funny problem I'm facing right now. So
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  through through omnichannel communication, which means text,
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  email, phone calls, etcetera, on there. We all
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  have different tools within our systems. We use
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  them, whether it be CRM, whether it be
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  your EHR,
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  whether it be your,
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  your IVR system out there. How do you
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  con contact to connect them? So,
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  you know, I've I've been asked to to
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  really kind of,
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  align what what are we doing from a
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  central message management system. And this is, you
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  know, very business driven, you know, as as
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  kind of a CIO,
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  but really exposing from the systems what we
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  know what is being scheduled
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  so that we can leverage across. So from
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  our
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  staff model to our IPA for quality outreach,
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  we have things already built in. Let me
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  help you get there. Let me help you
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  get there faster. Right? From a selling and
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  marketing perspective.
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  How to be sure that the data is
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  correct so they can do the proper outreach
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  as we're moving folks more into Medicare Advantage
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  type programs we have here as well.
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  So,
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  you know, I think, you know, it's it's
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  an eye towards, you know, again, communicating the
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  patient the way they best understand
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  and it's that health literacy,
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  you know, I think we don't want to
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  over,
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  you know, over communicate to people. It needs
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  to be appropriate communication, which is very, you
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  know, challenging. But, again, the goal is, right,
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  keeping patients healthier. Right? Making our our providers
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  jobs easier. Right? Improving quality and reducing costs.
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  So
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  That makes a lot of sense. Thank you
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  so much for digging a little bit deeper
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  there and, you know, fascinating results. Now before
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  we wrap up, I'm wondering, what is the
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  number one most important thing you're doing right
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  now to set your organization up for long
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  term success?
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  Yeah. You know, I actually, I'm I'm I
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  would say it's back to basics.
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  That term may be overused. Right? I mean,
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  there's been a lot of investments that have
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  been made in there. And and I'm really
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  looking at how do we harvest
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  and how do we optimize what we're doing.
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  So, again, Epic
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  Systems, Epic has, you know, a large AI
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  presence. And then I go, I really wanna
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  understand which of those are of most value
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  to us, whether it be art, whether it
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  be other type of activities they have, and
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  then where we would really need to focus.
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  Right? And then the next part of that
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  is that, how do we change the workflow
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  and communicate
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  with providers? Right? So that they're aware how
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  this is going to impact you. And, of
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  course, also, even out to the patients, how
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  is this going to improve it? So, I'm
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  looking at that's an example, right? For, AI,
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  what we're doing on there, but but even
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  looking across my tech stack, you know, what,
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  what can we do more from an automation
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  perspective?
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  The world is pivoting.
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  The skills are changing for people what they
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  need to know. Right?
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  AI is allowed to identify.
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  Information to us, but the person still has
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  to review, approve it, and make sure it's
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  correct.
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  So how we build that? How do we
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  test that? How do we support that? It's
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  a changing game. Right? So I'm looking at,
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  how do I educate my staff? How do
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  I educate the organization? Right? So they're ready
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  to keep moving ahead.
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  That's fascinating to hear. Well, Ray, thank you
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  so much for joining us on the podcast
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  today. This has been a really fun discussion,
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  and I look forward to connecting with you
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  again soon. Yeah. Laura, thank you so much.
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  I'm looking forward to seeing you folks in
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  October
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  at, Beggars Healthcare in Chicago.
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  Yeah. It'll be an amazing event. I know
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  we're still planning on more,
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  adding more sessions and really curating some discussions
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  that'll be top and center for a lot
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  of the things that we talked about today.
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  So thank you, Ray. I'll be looking forward
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  to seeing you then.
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  Thank you for your time.