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 Welcome to this Week in Health It, it's Newsday. My name is Bill Russell, former Healthcare CIO for a 16 hospital system and creator of this week in Health IT at channel dedicated to keeping Health IT staff current and engaged. Special thanks to Sirius Healthcare Health Lyrics and Worldwide Technology, who are our new state show sponsors for investing in our mission to develop the next generation of health IT leaders.

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WWT is a sponsor of today's show, so if you wanna find out more about them, you can do that at wwt.com/this week in Health it. Now let me explain that a little bit 'cause it's wwt.com/this-week-in, dash health dash it. So wt.com/the name of the show this week in Health it. It's Newsday, and today we have Dr.

Eric Quinones, the Chief Healthcare Advisor for Worldwide Technology with us. Welcome to the show, Eric. It's first time on. It is the first time on Bill. And, uh, thank you for having me. I'm looking forward to diving in some, diving into some really good discussions. Yeah, me too. I, you sent over some great stories.

I mean, clearly, uh, you, you really want to go after where, where digital transformation and disruption happening in healthcare. It's, it's, it's interesting. I have conversations with a lot of my colleagues. I've been at this for 21 plus years in, in healthcare IT clinical information systems in one way or another.

And, you know, in all this time, you know, clinicians have, you know, we know what we want. You know, we want, you know, things to be less frictiony le, you know, more smooth. We wanna be able to interact with our patients. We've known all these things for years. And finally I think we're starting to see real traction with some technologies.

I mean, the pandemic is, you know, it took a pandemic, right, unfortunately, to, to help realize some of these things. But yeah, I think right now the time is. and we're, we're seeing some really great, and I don't like to say disruption, um, in techno, in, in, in, or I like to use more like evolution, right? Yeah. So, yeah.

Well, but the, the evolution happened so fast, right? It, it went from Telehealth is a great example. It went from, I don't really wanna do telehealth. It's not a part of my practice to, okay, we're gonna do telehealth to, yeah. You fast forward like a couple months and they're saying, look, I need one click.

Telehealth visits with my patients. I need to text them a link. They click on it and they, they show up. And by the way, that needs to be integrated with the EI mean, you see how far that went in such a short period of time. It's really ama, that's why I say disruption from time to time because that's, that's an amazing amount of movement in healthcare.

It, it really is. And you know, , where would we be if we didn't have the Covid virus? You know, if we didn't have, you know, SARS CO two, maybe we'd still be having these discussions pre, you know, pandemic in terms of, in terms of virtual care. But I think we. You know, we go through these experiences, we have to, we have to pivot quickly and then, you know, it wasn't good enough.

Even when we got it now we want it better and quicker, faster. So that's kind of human nature. So I think that's good. Yeah, absolutely. So 21 years. And tell us, tell us how you, you got to, to, to this current role and as Chief Healthcare Advisor, how did you get into the technology space? Oh, that started early on.

So I was at Dartmouth Hitchcock. And we were working on a project there to actually build our own EHR. So we were building the ambulatory side of the house. Now they're an epic shop, but we were doing that. So I was involved as a liaison working with clinicians and working with the engineers and doing a lot of QA process with that rudimentary EHR at the time.

And mostly it was, it was a glorified, you know, documentation and, and lab system. At that time. So, but, uh, it was interesting because I saw the writing on the wall for me and that I knew the way we were practicing medicine had to go in this direction some way somehow. But yeah, and then from there, so I have an ED background, but from there I really got involved with Allscripts, Allscripts Healthcare Solutions, and I was their clinical director for several years.

Had also taken some opportunities to work with some consultancies. Deloitte Slalom was also the Director of Clinical Clinical Information Systems over at Healthcare Partners, which you probably know very well. Yeah. So, and that was prior to the DaVita acquisition. So we were, but that was very interesting because we had did the first Dall of Epic.

Because we were, we had both Allscripts and Epic , so it was the first de-install in history of Epic. And that was, that's a whole nother story. But anyway, we , we had, we made that happen, and it was a financial decision, of course. And then. I, I had an opportunity to work with a startup over in Houston that really works in clinical decision support in the hospital space, identifying patients that may be decompensating early, and so to let the right people at the right time know about these patients and within their particular workflows.

So, yeah, I've been on one side as a, you know, as on the provider side, as the administrator side on the vendor side. I've had a little taste of everything. Wow. Which is phenomenal. I look forward to the conversation. We can go in a lot of, a lot of different directions. We have, we have six stories. As I told you earlier.

It'll be a miracle to get through. There's, there's a handful that are, are knitted together 'cause they're Amazon stories. You have a story here from Healthcare IT News around a new group that is talking about hospital at home initiatives. We have the fierce healthcare story. What, what healthcare can learn from from big tech, which is always interesting to me.

The Humana. Access to virtual care, and that's an interesting partnership and an interesting way that Mercy has gone to market. I think I have a stat news story, which is also an Amazon story, so we'll knit those two together. That's just the, you know, the, the 18 new locations that that Care Medical, which is Amazon Cares partner has filed to operate in those states.

We have, gosh, what else do we. You know, money for nothing. Making sense of data collaboration, which is a really good story. I don't know if we'll get to that one. I hope we do. And then there's a, uh, story about transitioning back to the office, which raises some questions for it. So six really cool stories.

Do you wanna, do you wanna try to kick us off with one of these? Sure. How about ? You know, basically what hospitals can learn from big tech. Sure. Amazon, et cetera. Yeah. Let's go there. Why don't you tee it up and, and we'll, we'll head into it. Yeah. So, you know, I think Amazon and, and others, apple and Google, they're all really, you know, I would call these non-traditional, right.

That are getting into the healthcare space as we know. And they are really, you know, pushing the envelope and, and kind of, you know, putting. Traditional healthcare, uh, providers on their heels. So one, they have the technologies, and two they have, I think if we're speaking particular about Amazon, they have the experience in terms of, you know, evolving.

I like, like to say evolving, not disrupting, but evolving different industries. Retail, grocery, . You know, think of anything, you go on Amazon, especially during the pandemic, we, those that weren't using Amazon, they definitely had that experience, I'm sure. And, and it's a seamless experience for the most part.

So that customer experience, they really have nailed down. And being able to have the data, I think is really helped them. So they, they see that, you know, that's, there's a play obviously in healthcare. They've tried it with, with Haven Health. I think they're way ahead of the game there. We can have that discussion as well.

But, but yeah, they, they're placed really well and I think, again, like Apple as well, I mean, they just know that the patient experience is so critical. I mean, the, the client experience and consumer experience is so critical and they really focus on those things so that, that really positions them differently.

Well, let me, let me see if I can throw something out and see if it resonates with you, which is, you know, Amazon, apple. And some of these other big tech players, they're consumer centric. I mean, and Amazon is notoriously, you know, consumer centric. They don't, everything they do is around the consumer and how to make their lives better and how to, uh, make it more efficient.

Health systems are provider centric and have been for decades, and that's.

C.

Which is you will go into this queue and wait for us, and when we're ready to see you, we will, uh, we'll, we'll call you. We are maximizing the time of the provider and so everything is about the provider, so that what that I think is the most stark. Contrast between a big techs approach and they're always thinking, how can we make this better for the, for the consumer and health systems approach, which is how do we make this better for, for the provider?

And I'm not against making it better for the provider, I'm just saying, is there a gap there that health systems have to close in order to not be, you know, evolved I guess is what you're saying? Uh, I would say disrupted, but evolved. Yeah, I think there is a gap and, and you know, but I think they're becoming painfully aware that the gap exists.

You know, we as patients, we, it, it, you know, I think of like, you know, when I used to go to the doctor when I was a kid or when I would go with my grandparents to the doctor, it was like, you know, it was that old school relationship. Right. You just, like you said, you'd wait in the waiting room for, you know, your, you know, 45 minutes past your, your appointment time.

I. If not longer. The ED is worse, by the way, as you know. Yes. So, you know, so it, it just, that's what we got used to. And I think what's happened, especially as, you know, the consum co consumeristic demographics have changed. That's not what consumers are used to anymore. Again, they're seeing these experiences they're having such as, you know, the, the, with retail applications that they're using.

You know, that . Financial applications they're using, it's very seamless. I mean, you can walk near, you know, a Starbucks, you don't, you're not going to get a coffee, but you can walk near it and all of a sudden your phone shows you your favorite drink and you're like, oh, that's right. And maybe you do want a coffee.

So it makes it, it's predicting what you want. Right. I love it. Thank you for reminding me that I'm thirsty and I wanted one of your coffees. Oh, come on over. Flying over to to la we'll have one. No, I just, I mean that's, I mean, that's how they think. They're like, you know, we don't know who's gonna walk across our front door, but we're gonna have the technology set up to remind you of our relationship, remind you that we're here to serve you and we have something that you want, and you need.

Right. Right. Right. And that, that I think is the, the, the secret sauce. Right. And I think, again, the expectation of patients that are con, they're consumers, they're expecting that now. And I think, you know, healthcare organizations are realizing that, and you're starting, you obviously you're seeing this in, you know, and revamping digital front doors and, and that kind of, you know, play.

And that's very important. They need to do that. I'll give you an example. So at St. Jude's, we did some really amazing work with them. So you think of a children's hospital, right? A cancer, you know, specialty hospital, people coming from all over the world where they had a problem and like, how do we make their experience, you know, desirable, less friction based?

And you know, they brought us in to help them with that. And we created a, you know, . An award-winning app. It won two Webby awards. And what this, what the application does, and even if they don't have the families come in and they don't have the technology, they're provided the technology while they're there and, but it wave finds them from literally from the airport to their hotel, to the hospital wave finding within the hospital shows 'em where their appointments are.

It, it connects the, you know, them with their care teams. It, you know, in terms of the patients, the children, it, it allows them to connect to other children that may be going through the same thing. And then again, they may be. The patient themselves, the child may be separated from their family 'cause their family went to go to, you know, have dinner and they could break reservations from this app, you know, go have dinner and, and the, the child can speak to, you know, their family while they're having dinner and the child, you know, it's just, it's a whole different ballgame now.

And, and I think that's that just as consumers we're expecting that. Yeah. You know, it's. It, it's interesting we've seen all those technologies and you just gave a great use case at St. Jude where, you know, it's, it's, it's, it's taking wayfinding, it's taking open table and reservations and it's just taking all those things nitum together and saying how, if we're gonna be consumer-centric in healthcare, what does it look like?

And that's, you know, just one example of what is possible when we step back and say, what does. Let me, let me tee this up a little bit because you have, uh, and I'm gonna steal one of your stories. So you have the, the story of the A group that launched a hospital at home initiative. Lemme read a little bit.

So, founding members of this coalition include Amazon Care, Ascension Dispatch, health, AARA Caring, Intermountain Healthcare Home instead, landmark Health and signify Health among the group's policy priorities expand the services covered in a home-based setting. Retain important Hospital without Walls.

Site of care, flexibilities support, home-based hospital services. Ensure equal access for seniors through fair reimbursement for home-based evaluation and monitoring codes. Advocate for bundled payment models for extended care in the home. Encourage greater flexibility for home-based care services to meet commercial and Medicare Advantage network adequacy standards.

There's, uh, you know, so this group is advocating for that set of policy initiatives, which is, Hey, you know, the home is a great place and there's, there's a lot of statistics to support it. In fact, I think they have some of the statistics in here. Let's see. Moving Home, moving Health Home members point to an array of statistics that say, bolster their case for more technology.

Virtual care, they.

Four adults 50 years preferring to age in.

Are apparent, they said noting CMS estimates that show home healthcare in Medicare saves at least $370 million a year. That's like real money. And, uh, there's a couple other statistics in here. So we know that the home is, is, you know, that the next frontier and so does Amazon

from Amazon. To the malls mall and, and the stores that were all thriving at the time when they came up with their model is they just skipped the malls. They didn't put a facility in each city. They, uh, now they've gone back and done that after the fact. But what they did is essentially is they went to the home.

They said, do people really want to go to the mall? Do they really wanna shop for something?

And it turns out they placed a bet on it and they were right. So lemme tie that with the last story on Amazon, which is stat news story. And we alluded to this ear earlier, care Medical, Amazon Cares partner for pr. PR providing Amazon cares, their concierge level service for their employees that they were offering in the Washington market.

They've now filed to operate in 17 more states. So they are, and they will essentially concierge level service. They'll meet you in your office. They'll meet you in your home. They will care for your family wherever they're at. Uh, they'll get you same day medications shipped to your home. And you know, if, if you have a serious problem, they sign deals with.

Organizations like City of Hope, and it's similar to what, what Walmart did and they signed deals with, with, with Mayo and, and Geisinger and others for specialty care. And so you have these interesting things evolving around the home. And I think people have asked me goes, is Amazon gonna build a hospital?

Don't high acuity care, but absolutely are. Start. Delivering care in the home. And that care in the home is going to be essentially hospital rooms in the home. The acuity of care is gonna continue to rise, that we can deliver in the home. And that is the, that's the chink in the armor that they've identified and said, look, we're gonna have.

Thousands, if not hundreds of thousands of hospital rooms across the country. We're not gonna pay for a single building. They're all gonna be in the home. And we're gonna technology enable those and we're gonna partner with people to deliver the care. That's, that's what I'm seeing. Am I, I mean, I mean, that's my crystal ball it.

How off do you think that is? Do you think there's another way of really interpreting these things? Uh, it's a great question, bill. You know, your crystal ball's pretty spot on. Matter of fact, I think we got it at the same store. Yeah, I, I think you wrote something in December and I responded to what you had wrote, and it was basically talking about some of the things we are talking about here with Amazon in terms of where they're positioned.

And I think in my response, I was just saying that. You know, can you imagine like, again, this is the quintess quintessential one-stop shop place to get everything done. Your primary care, your, you know, Amazon pharmacy pill pack, right? You get your, you know, drone delivers your medications. I may be ex, you know, going a little far, far out there, but yeah, dur, durable goods as well.

You can get your, you know, your crutches and anything else you might need. Right? And you know, oh my groceries. And et cetera, right? It's all one stop shopping and, and then you have Alexa in the house, you know, that could maybe with ambient, you know, technologies and, and things like that to be able to, if there's falls in the house and things like that, or you need help or, you know, a Alexa's just reminding you to take your medication or reminding you to, you know, to, you know, take your blood pressure, et cetera.

Again, with the . IoT, uh, play as well. So I think they are, they're positioned really well to be the juggernaut and to come out, I would say, of the coliseum victor in, in this play, for sure. Yeah. It's, it, it, it's going to be interesting. All right, so I'm gonna, I'm gonna push on you a little here and I'll think about it as well.

So, if I were at a health system today, I really have to sharpen my consumer-centric. Skills. Skills. I have to have a team that's good at interacting with patients and, and no. And consumers, right, and finding out what they're looking for. One of my favorite stories on this was we spent six to nine months working on our portal.

We were developing a custom portal, and it had, and, and my gosh, we spent all the time working on how the medical record was gonna appear. And it finally dawned on somebody, you know, we should, we should talk to consumers and find out what's important to them. And sure enough, how the medi getting the me medical record and how it appeared was like number eight on their list of 10 things that they prioritized.

And number one was scheduling, as you would imagine. Number two was communicating with their doctor via text messaging. And, and I just remember when we got that information back, I was like, it was like that old VA commercial where you hit your head and go, wow, that makes. Perfect sense. I, I can't believe we were, we were spending this much time, but I mean, that's, that's my advice to health systems.

Start interacting with the patient, ask them what they want, and develop that consumer centric capability and then figure out who you need to partner with and, and build in order to, to, to start meeting some of those needs. You hit it right on the spot, you know, per usual. The, the one thing I think, you know, your, your example that you used from this was at St.

Joe's. Yeah. Okay. So at St. Joe's, I mean, you know, we know, we know, and we don't know what we don't know sometimes. Right. So, you know, and, and we tend, we tend to go towards what we know. And I think, you know. Organizations are getting more sophisticated and they're realizing, Hey, how are other organiz? How are other re outside of healthcare?

How are other industries doing this? How are they making their, you know, consumer experience, you know, a platinum level? How are they doing that? And. I, I would say they're really, like you just said, they're going to the, the users, they're going to the consumers. They're going to the patients. They're doing journey mapping and they're asking 'em these things.

What, what are the frustrations you're encountering in your experience, in your care journey? You know, what are the things you would like to have? So when you think of like. Bringing that to, again, an experience to, let's say, you know, a digital front door, you know, they would like to have, as you said, scheduling and not just scheduling.

Being able to pick the time, the date right, with their doctor. And maybe I have the option to do, am I gonna be physically there or can I, does it need to be physically there? Can I do a telehealth visit? You know, so I have that, you know, again, one app to rule them all. And again, I could do my telehealth visit right there.

They would like to be able to, obviously prescriptions, they would like to do all those things that they need to do to get their healthcare stuff done, I think is really critical and, and stitch those things together, as you said with, and people use different apps but really bring it into one place, but you have to go to the patient and do that journey mapping with them and not just the patient.

Obviously you should be talking to, you know, the nurses, the doctors again, what is their experience, . And what are they hearing? And I think bringing that all together I think is extremely important. Well, and actually I think it's interesting that you bring that up because I think that's the thing that keeps us from moving forward is, is uh, we absolutely wanna be clinician centric in our technology and the build of our technology.

I mean, some of the stuff we put in front of clinicians has been incredibly wasteful of their time. And their energy, and so we wanna be cognizant. But when you're talking about consumer things, it's disruptive to their current practice. I, it, it would be as if, you know, you go to the, the, the purveyors in the malls way back when and say, Hey, we're gonna start competing with, uh, Amazon and we're gonna start doing shipping in this way and whatever.

There's the mall's full. There's people here every day. They're, they're hitting our stuff. Why do we need to change? We don't need to change. And so you end up having these very long conversations trying to convince people that they need to change until, you know, until all of a sudden the malls are empty.

Right. Yeah, I, I mean, . So I, I think that the gap, or you wanna see this to reduce the gap and reduce the friction on both sides is very critical. So, again, we may have new interfaces or new experiences for the patient, but it has to, like, that's what, that's why I said, you know, we, we need to talk to the, the clinicians as well.

The administrators as well, family members as well, to really understand the journey mapping so that we can really, whatever we're using technology for, you know, technology, data, people, process, whatever we're we're doing, that it's gonna help reduce the friction on both sides of the equation. So, yeah. Yeah.

I remember going into the Southern California market and you were there. I mean, you remember this Kaiser. This is one of Kaiser's strongest markets now Northern Cal and Southern Cal, but Southern Cal is, is a strong market for them, and they came in, their quality numbers were not that good, quite frank.

Frankly, they, they didn't hold a candle to us at first, and then they got better and they reduced clinical variability. They did a lot of really excellent things, and then their quality numbers exceeded ours. And we're like, well, but nobody really wants to work there 'cause they don't have the creativity and all this other stuff.

And then they started hiring some of our doctors away and people were like, Hey, what's going on? Well, you talked to some of those doctors and they're like, Hey, our quality of life's better over here. Mm-Hmm. . I'm like, wow. That's interesting how that just sort of snuck up on everybody. It's, it was, you know, hey, low quality, not a great place to work to then all of a sudden, extremely high quality, great place to work.

Well, they didn't have a hospital. Well, now they have a significantly huge hospital in, in Southern California as well. And I, I, I, I'm afraid that we're not, we're not taking some of these things serious enough and, and it could just sneak up on us and, and we just need to have honest conversations of what does it mean to be.

Consumer centric in our approach. And, uh, quite frankly, if you walk around and, and see a fax machine, you're not consumer centric. If you walk around and see clipboards, you're not consumer centric. Right. Yeah. I, it, it's interesting, you know, you, you bring that up because it reminds me when I was back at Healthcare Partners, one of the, one of the initiatives I was trying to, to, to push was.

If we're gonna compete with X, Y, and Z, you know, it, it takes, it takes a lot of resources to find, you know, good, you know, good physicians and, and et cetera. So you, you go through that process. But if we're gonna make that, you know, we're making this investment, we're looking for those top, you know, top flight docs and nurse practitioners, et cetera.

Now, why would they come to, if we're gonna pay them the same amount? Versus the competition, what? What differentiates us versus them? It's like, why would they wanna come to us? So in other words, what I was trying, 'cause I'm, I was talking about at this particular, with this particular initiative, was also retention as well.

So how do we create an environment that is, you know, conducive that can reduce the friction for the physicians that they want to stay if they're gonna get paid the same? Right. Yeah. So I think we missed that boat. I was working on some initiatives and I think the, and that's when Davida came in and. And they bought us up and things just got really interesting then, and then, you know, the, you, you, you, so if I were again, you know, a primary care doctor and I'm working, you know, I'm seeing 30 patients a day and I'm staying till seven o'clock at night, but, or I have an, an, I get paid X and I have this other place that I can get paid x.

Say I see 30 patients a day, but I'm leaving like five o'clock. That's a whole nother story. We'll get back to our show in just a minute. The future of healthcare is powered by digital transformation organizations must leverage technology to solve complex clinical and business problems. WW T Worldwide Technology has real world healthcare experience to build and execute solutions that push healthcare organizations past the status quo and towards the successful transformation of their business model.

Together with Intel. WWT is driving innovations in telehealth, healthcare IoT, and data analytics, and AI making healthcare more connected, personalized, and intelligent. From strategy development to solution creation, WWT supports our healthcare clients every step of their journey. For more information, visit wwt.com/this week.

Dash in health dash it. That's the name of the show, wwt.com/this week, health it with dashes in it. And now back to our show. So you pulled up a story from, uh, Humana and Mercy. Do you tee that up? 'cause I think Mercy's, you know, they're, they're virtual hospital thing is pretty interesting and it, it sort of lends itself to, to this conversation.

Yeah. Well, so with Mercy, mercy Hospital, mercy Virtual, mercy Health, they did something pretty unique here. And you, have you ever been to the facility? Have you seen that? I, I haven't. So we're talking Mercy in St. Louis and they have a a, a virtual hospital essentially. Yes. And so it's a hospital without beds.

And it, it's quite amazing. I have been there and the. Uh, it's one of the highest tech places I've ever been to in healthcare. So they're, they are able to monitor patients either at home or in the hospital and to be able to be proactive in their care. So they're seeing those particular metrics that they're following to, you know, to be, you know, again, like I said, proactive and instead of reactive with these patients and they've had tremendous success.

I'll be shameless here to, and I'll plug it. I mean, worldwide technology in Cisco, we were the ones that helped, you know, mercy Virtual do that. So, but with Humana now, they're basically working together now. So they struck, struck this agreement, virtual Mercy Virtual, and in it's, it's a value-based play.

And it's, it's pretty cool. I mean, they're like Humana's like, yeah, take, take our patients, manage these patients like you do your own patients at risk and you know, you, you know, we're gonna have that arrangement. And Mercy Virtual has been able to show, you know, from the article there some really substantial, you know.

You know, I would say savings, especially on a virtual the, I mean, on the value-based care model, you know, reduce readmissions, they reduce sepsis, they reduce stroke incidents and things like that. So they've been really proactive and been really successful, but yeah. Yeah, and so they have, it's a virtual hospital.

They have three plus. Facility they're doing 7 24 monitoring. It can be to the home, it can be remote, ICU and and that kind of stuff as well. This deal is Arkansas, Kansas, Missouri, and Oklahoma. I would assume it can be expanded beyond that, couldn't it? Absolutely. I mean, there's, you know, think of, you know, surgeons at UCLA doing surgeries in Ghana, right?

It doesn't matter where, I mean, they're just. Be remote and be monitoring those patients. And so no, it can be just about anywhere. And I think it's interesting because I think we're gonna see more of that. I mean, again, in my crystal ball. And why it, we just, we don't have the resources. I think that we need to be able to care for a lot of these patients and again, instead of having episodic care, especially for the patients that are home, you know, episodic care to have more a longitudinal care.

On continuity of care for these patients, especially with the chronic disease, with chronic diseases. You know, it's so important to be proactive. So I think to be able to scale right, to to monitor the A population you're gonna have to have these kinds of technologies to be able to enable that. So I think we're gonna see more of that well, and to be able to compete with Amazon or whoever else really tries to get a foothold in the home.

You know, Mercy's set up for this as is Intermountain has something similar. And I think Mayo is also heading down this path. If I were an academic medical center, I'd absolutely be heading down this path. I think brands have an opportunity to win here, but they have to stand up these capabilities. And I think that's why what uh, clock is doing up at at, at Mayo is so interesting to just keep an eye on.

Right. No, it's, it's, it's pretty exciting stuff and I think, you know, so the last. Company I was with, uh, a company called Daio Health. It's a startup in, in Houston. We, this is something that we were working on in, in the sense where we were able to create a, a dashboard, right? This is more for the ICU or for the med surg environment and for the ed, so anywhere in the hospital space, but we're able to bring the data, disparate data.

In a way that the clinicians wanna see it at the bedside in real time. And again, each population's different. So your, you know, your E EED population may be very different than your, you know, shock trauma ICU. So they may wanna see different things and they, they can see those things come up in real time.

But then taking that model from . Let's say using, you know, a rapid response team to be able to monitor patients in the, on the, you know, on the floor. You know, 'cause a lot of problems happen on the floor. These patients decompensate and they, you know, you know, alerts and EHRs don't work, by the way. I mean, I've seen situations that you have to, you know, log in to the patient's record and oh, the alert comes off and that patient actually had expired.

So, and that alert was two hours old. So I've seen situations like that. So that's not an alert, you know, Hey, they already robbed my house, you know, and now you get an alert, you know, two days later. No, that doesn't help me. So, you know, we were very proactive in alerting the right people at the right time about the right patient according to their workflows.

So I think you're gonna see these plays, and we moved it outside of the, the hospital and we were doing work at . OHSU and oh with GE Healthcare and they have kind of built this model, a similar model, not just to monitor their hospital, but to bring that out to, you know, other hospitals outside the network as a service.

So, you know, I had someone say to me, it's, you know, we have the physicians. You know this, this, why, why won't Big Tech win? They're like, we have the physicians. I'm well until they start taking the money because.

And they just, they looked at me like, yeah, I guess that makes sense, . I'm like, yeah, that, that is, that is how it works. So I think this is one of the best plays I've seen for preparing for this, this new hospital at home type, uh, scenario. I think one is partnering with, with Best Buy, who is trying to reposition themselves as a healthcare company that delivers.

You know, equipment into the home and sets them up in the home. I, is that something worldwide technology does or do you partner with others? We partner with others. We have, you know, quite a few OEMs when we do a project. And we build, say we build something, we build, you know, the, the solution. So from idea to outcome and you know, we're not holding onto that IP that belongs to the, our client.

They, they, that's theirs, but we'll bring in others to help us do it. So, you know, an example is we have involved with an opportunity right now that is, it's a remote patient, uh, monitoring opportunity, but for a national qual uh, federally qualified. Environment and, and what they needed to do is to bring in the technology component and they have to, again, being mindful of the population, right?

So not everybody has an IO 12 Pro max, right? So they may have an older model. So you have to think of those technology technology gaps. And so the, and, and then they wanted the technology partner to be able to, that the remote patient monitoring partner to be able to integrate into Epic has to do that.

So there are some basics that they had and you know, we found one and, and they do a really good job. They worked in these, these kinds of settings before and. They use cellular technology, so you don't have to tether your, you know, your, this is a, my stigma manometer, my blood pressure cuff here, so you don't have to tether it to your phone.

It's cellular and it just goes right to the right to the cloud. I. And so yeah, those, those are, are, you know, partners we partner with to help, you know, bring outcomes to our, our customers. Yeah. You, you know, the home is not a slam dunk. I mean, it is, it's challenging. It's, I mean, the, the logistics of.

Putting technicians in the home, because we did this at St. Joe's. We, we had a pilot program. We, we sent our people out to actually set up the technology and then we learned a whole bunch of stuff of what happens to technology once you put it in somebody's home. We learned how simple the technology needs to be in order for the patients to use it.

I mean, there's a whole bunch of stuff we learned. The process. Process. And I, we didn't make any money at it for, I, at least while I was there. We didn't make money at it because we were constantly in the, in the learning phase. But that's, I I, I don't think Amazon's making money at this stuff until all of a sudden they aren't.

You know, it's, it's that kind of thing where you, you're learning, you're learning, you're learning. You get the model right, and then you move forward. So it.

I guess they're calling 'em virtual hospitals. I know that's Mercy's something to that effect. Intermountain calls theirs a virtual hospital and there's essentially no beds and there's, there's, there's really no rooms. There's just, there's just a, uh, command center with an awful lot of technology and they, they, I mean, the remote ICU stuff is really impressive.

The technology. I mean, they can, they can read the armband on a patient. I mean, it's really impressive. Right. No, that's a whole nother, you know, 'cause I consider like virtual care, like a big bucket and then there's, or yeah, big bucket with small buckets. And that's another example. So again, you know, really bringing in that virtual care into the hospital space is, is pretty awesome.

You know, not just. You know, the, like, I think InTouch Health, for example, they were able to, you know, they had the AV component done, they were able to document so they can zoom in really, really fine and see, like you said, the, the monitors and things like that. But the challenge was, you know, we were working with them as, as a partner back at DECI and we said, well, you, what they want is the clinical information.

They wanna be able to survey surveillance, you know. Populations of patients and be, and, and I don't want the white noise, gimme the signal. So if I'm tracking patients, for example, that may be decompensating and I use a, a certain algorithm that's, that's, you know, accepted within our, our community, I. Then notify me about that patient when they reach a certain, you know, you know, score.

And then I can look at that patient, expand it, see all the, you know, current data and then I can make a decision if I need to do an AV consult. So, yeah, it, it's, it's pretty amazing. It's pretty cool stuff. Well, I'll, I'll give you the choice here. We can go in the data direction or we can do work. Let, let's do work from home.

Because I, I'm curious your, your perspective on this. Uh, you've worked in, in consulting, worked in, in a hospital setting. I try this consulting friends, there's something. Healthcare where people being in the same room, people being in the same building has a, I don't know, a significant amount of value. And I'm not sure this, I know, I know a lot of health systems are talking, going hybrid.

I've even talked to some health systems that are like, look, we're, we're remote now and we're never coming back. But I, I don't think that would've flown at Joe's. I think we would've brought people back at least, you know, at least three quarters of the time. And maybe we've gone to a, you know, a, a, a Friday virtual day kind of thing.

But because there was so much value in the culture in bringing people together and those kinds of things, where, where do you think this is? What are you hearing? And, and where do you think this is gonna go? Great question, and I, and I like what you bring up that the last part when I read that article, I'm like, uh, yeah.

A lot questions there and those. Some to me were a little, I don't know, uncomfortable, but he gets to the last part and he was talking about culture in which you mentioned, and I think that's an, a very important component of the team that you work with. Obviously when you're in the hospital, you know, you're in the trenches, you're in the ed, you know, you have a certain culture, you know, you're always with these people and you're, you know, you're, you're fighting the good fight and you get to know people you know very well.

As opposed to, again, working from home. So my experience from working from home, I'll give my latest experiences. So when I started with Worldwide Technology, I was hired remotely. Okay. I had my, my boss. I have never met, except through like how we're communicating on my team. One of our other Chief Healthcare advisors, uh, she's a close friend of mine I've known for years, so that was a, that's okay.

So I have a connection with her, but literally everyone else at, at Worldwide Technology, which is close to 8,000 folks, I don't know, you know, so how do we build? And then our team, our, our healthcare team is made up of four folks. and for, you know, clinicians and Yeah, with the exception of one, I don't know the, the, you know, the three quarters of them.

I, except for how we're interacting. But it, you know, not to say that, you know, we do connect on different levels 'cause we, we we're at that healthcare. Clinical relationship, you know, we can, we have stories, right? We can, we can, uh, pivots on those stories and, and, and we just, we connect that way. However, you know, looking at others that.

and I think it depends on the person too. I know I'm rambling on a little bit because I'm thinking, yeah, I'm okay with it. I would love to be with my colleagues and, you know, see them more often for sure. But I'm pretty, I get a lot of work done like in this environment, whereas when I'm, you know, sitting on the hospital more on the administrative side of the hospital.

You get a lot of interruptions. At least I did. Yeah. And a lot of distractions and things like that. And, and next thing you know, it's five o'clock, five 30 and you're still behind, you know, it's like, oh boy. You know? So I, it it depends, bill. I think there's that give and take. Now I, I'll just add this and I read the, I read this story.

I think at the end of the day when I finish that story, I'm like, it depends on the person's jaw. In some ways the cultural thing is important. I'm with you a hundred percent on that, but it de at the end of the day, you get hired for, for a position. Now, does that position require you to be there? You know, obviously if you're a clinician, you know, in the ED or you know, in the, you know, anywhere in the hospital, yeah, you probably need to be there, right?

You know, except if you're doing remote surgeries, you know you can be, shoot, if you have the technology, you can do it at your house. So as opposed to, you know, maybe somebody, maybe one of the IT folks, they don't have to be there necessarily. They could be monitoring the infrastructure from somewhere else and be taking care of problems somewhere else.

So I think it depends. Yeah, and, and I, I have heard from some CIOs who are going through the different roles and saying, okay, this role never needs to come in. This role has to come in every day. And they're sort of breaking it down that way and, and breaking it down. So I think HR gets involved with that too, right?

I would suspect. Yeah. I'll, I'll tell you, it's, it, it's, it's hard for consultants and, and, and here's why. Because we're, we're, we're used to this, right? We're, if we're not, if we're not remote, we're in an airplane. If we're not in an airplane, we're in a hotel. If we're not in a hotel, we're at a client site.

I mean, that's how we, we generally function. I've managed.

Building culture across that was almost impossible. They ended up aligning themselves more with local markets and those kinds of things, and you ended up with some goofy problems, to be honest with you, , I mean, you ended up with stuff where people just didn't get the culture and they just did. I mean, you ended up with expense reports that you were looking at going, how could you possibly have thought that?

And the culture's not there. Now, Worldwide's has a phenomenal culture. I, I remember Dave, uh, Stewart came out to, uh, meet with me when I was CIO at, at St. Joe's. And I, when he left, I was riveted. I mean the, just such a presence. And his, his, his ethos is throughout the entire organization. And there's some, there's some organizations that are.

Joe's is, their ethos is, but it takes, it takes stewardship. It takes a, a constant retelling of the stories that the sisters came to Orange County with essentially 67 cents in their pocket, and they started a $7 billion health system that that. You know, one third of all people in Orange County were coming through their front doors.

We all knew the stories because they got retold over and over again. That's it. That's, that's an intentional thing. That's not, that's not to be taken for granted. It just doesn't happen. You're, you, you hit it totally on the head. I was, I was talking with my team and, and we all have different, come from different experiences, different places, and which makes us

You know, awesome. Right? So we all have these different, you know, life stories and, and I, this is the only place Worldwide technologies that I have, that I have worked at that literally walks the walk and talks the talk. Others have mission statements, other have visions, et cetera, and all that stuff. And you know, you hear it once a year.

You know, at the annual meeting or et cetera? No, this is a daily thing. We live it, we breathe it, and we hold people accountable to it. So, you know, Dave Stewart and, and, and Jim Kavanaugh, you know, the founders. They really wanted to have that kind of a company and, and I'm so glad to work here. I'm so happy to work here because, you know.

People, not only do they hold themselves to that higher level, that higher standard, it's an expectation. So, you know, I and I, I like that, you know, I, I've been in places where it's like, boy, how did you get hired here? You know, and, and you know, not just, I'm shocked, you know, . And, but then here now I get to, I have the, the fortune to work with some extremely talented, smart folks.

Way smarter than me for sure. I mean, a lot of times the discussions are woo, you know, there's a lot of technical discussions, but you know, these are brilliant folks, and again, they're all driving towards, you know, humility, truth, you know, honesty, et cetera. I mean, it's really, yeah. David Stewart, something else.

His story is an amazing story too, by the way. Yeah. Well. He sent me a copy of his book, had a handwritten note in it, and I thought, I guess this guy has time. No, he doesn't.

I've moved so many times, I dunno where all my books are. So , I apologize. I wish I could just pull it out and show it to you, but I'm sure it's in, in, it could potentially be in a box with all my other books. Do we still have books? Do you still have books? Do you have a bookcase? I, you know, I do all my medical books though.

They're in the garage and, but like, all the stuff that I, and I like to hold books, you know, personally. Matter of fact, digital transformation is one that I'm reading right now by Patty. and it's a, it's a great book. I'm reading it like a second time now. There's a lot of exceptional nuggets in there and, but yeah, I still have books.

So to answer your question, well, my, my wife was asked, she, she goes, well, we need some bookshelves. I'm like, do we, do we really need bookshelves? She's like, well, we have a lot of books. I'm like, we do have a lot of books. I books.

Can't we just put like two kindles up on a, a shelf somewhere and say, that's our, that's our bookshelf. And it just, just doesn't have the same, I'm, I'm not trying to show off that I've read books. I, I've been in those homes. Have you been in those homes where you walk in and you're like, have you read all these books and and some of 'em have read all those books?

After you had the conversation, you realize it's like, I don't.

A story. I was visiting somebody back east and they were at Dartmouth, some family, and again, new England style home, you know, they, they come from that lineage. And I walked into the, the library, which this was an office and . And I couldn't believe the books that they had there. And these are like first editions.

And, and I'm like, I, I didn't even ask the question, did you read these books? I just assumed they did, and I just felt really dumb after I walked out. First Edition, Edgar Allen Poe. Oh, yeah. Uncle Edgar. Yeah. He wrote that, that that was a good book. Yeah. Never. Hey, one piece of advice. I'd say your wife. Told you to build those, those shelves.

Happy wife, happy life. Uh, yes. I, and we will probably, and, and build is giving me an awful lot of credit. I will be, I'll be purchasing some bookshelves. I, I assume they still sell 'em, so I, I, I should be okay. . Awesome. Well, Eric, this, this has been a pleasure. I'm, I'm looking forward to doing more of these as if people don't know.

The worldwide technology is a sponsor and one of the is they're rotating the various advisor. This show with me and it's, it's great conversation with, and I.

It's gonna be awesome, and we appreciate it. And, and Bill, I kind of feel like you're a celebrity. I've known you for, you know, followed you for a while and I think we met way back in, in your, uh, Providence Day, I mean, or St. Joe's days. And, you know, we, we know a lot of the same people, so it's just really nice to have a face-to-face and hopefully someday I really get to meet you.

So, uh, yeah, I'm looking forward to those days where we finally get into the, you know, everybody flies into the.

Thanks. Thanks for, appreciate it. Thank you, bill. Take care. What a great discussion. If you know of someone that might benefit from our channel, from these kinds of discussions, please forward them a note. Perhaps your team, your staff. I know if I were ACIO today, I would have every one of my team members listening to this show.

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