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Yo, Our mission is clear.

Yo, Our mission is clear.

It's time to change healthcare. Have no fear. Today's the day. This is the hour together.

It's time to change healthcare. Have no fear. Today's the day. This is the hour together.

You know, we've got the power drop, the silos. We're all the same team experience. This is tech and marketing.

You know, we've got the power drop, the silos. We're all the same team experience. This is tech and marketing.

How can anyone be satisfied with the way things have always been? Yeah, we tried. So join us now.

How can anyone be satisfied with the way things have always been? Yeah, we tried. So join us now.

Join the Revolution. Consumer First Health Is.

Join the Revolution. Consumer First Health Is.

The revolution status quo or like status? No. Yeah. This is the health care, y'all.

The revolution status quo or like status? No. Yeah. This is the health care, y'all.

New choices, new platforms, new care models and the health care of tomorrow, consumers win. But who will design it? What will it look like and how long will it take? We are here to answer those questions with some provocative thinking about how to create the health care that people actually want. Ready to roll up your sleeves, Look at the world a little differently and explore the frontiers of consumer health together. Join us. This is the health care wrap. Welcome back. I'm Jared Johnson from Shift forward Health. And here's what's going to go down today. We have the flavor of the week about driving growth through consumer centricity. It's time to push the conversation from kind of important to strategic driver. So how will you champion the strategic business value of consumer centricity in your organization? I'll talk about that then. We welcome Denise Warrell to continue our series on building up the consumer muscles in health care organizations. Denise outlines her role and responsibilities as VP of Consumerism at Memorial Hermann Health System and some of the successes and challenges that come with being a consumer transformation champion. It's time to dive right in. Are you ready? Let's go. Flavor of the Week. The conversation about improving the consumer experience. Too often it's getting cut off in the boardroom where too busy fighting staffing shortages, flat operating margins and burnout, we're told, come back after the adults figure out the important stuff and then you can make the case for your pet project. It's a familiar tune that was also sung in the early days of Digital Transformation, a website that's cute, a patient portal only because we have two virtual visits. Nobody wants them. Meanwhile, if we're able to set aside the status quo and think like human beings, deep down, we all know that health care needs to be easier, especially all of the experiences that happen before you encounter care, access, scheduling, multimodal visits, retail services and understanding care choices are all aspects that tend to be taken for granted. What catalyzed the conversation about digital health back in the day? Even with meaningful use mandates and penalties hovering in the air, there was serious resistance to providing health information in digital channels. It's almost laughable now to look back at the excuses from clinicians and administrators for trying to maintain the status quo. But at some point the catalyst was the proliferation of success stories that helped the decision makers understand the benefits to the bottom line. A critical mass of champions had to share a vision for digital initiatives and usher them through that pesky trough of disillusionment. So where are we with consumer first care today? I would say we don't yet have widespread access to that social proof and those success stories from peer organizations that are needed for consumer initiatives to be taken seriously. If only we could communicate that being consumer first can actually drive growth and become a competitive advantage. McKinsey recently published an article titled Driving Growth Through Consumer Centricity in Health Care, and it attempts to do just that. It makes the bold claim, bold in air quotes that providing consumers with the experiences they increasingly expect and demand at every stage of the health care journey could substantially improve care and cost outcomes. It points to the concept of driving strategic growth by attracting care defers those who are actively avoiding coming in and seeing a clinician. So can this become the baseline? Can we align around a common entry point and start talking more about driving growth? Making consumer centricity a competitive advantage requires us to acknowledge that care deferral has serious consequences for consumers and health systems, and telling that story effectively is going to take an organized effort. It's time to push the conversation from kind of important to growth. Driver How will you champion the strategic business value of consumer centricity in your organization? It's time to find out and then share our success stories. That's another way that will build the health care of tomorrow. And that's the flavor of the week.

New choices, new platforms, new care models and the health care of tomorrow, consumers win. But who will design it? What will it look like and how long will it take? We are here to answer those questions with some provocative thinking about how to create the health care that people actually want. Ready to roll up your sleeves, Look at the world a little differently and explore the frontiers of consumer health together. Join us. This is the health care wrap. Welcome back. I'm Jared Johnson from Shift forward Health. And here's what's going to go down today. We have the flavor of the week about driving growth through consumer centricity. It's time to push the conversation from kind of important to strategic driver. So how will you champion the strategic business value of consumer centricity in your organization? I'll talk about that then. We welcome Denise Warrell to continue our series on building up the consumer muscles in health care organizations. Denise outlines her role and responsibilities as VP of Consumerism at Memorial Hermann Health System and some of the successes and challenges that come with being a consumer transformation champion. It's time to dive right in. Are you ready? Let's go. Flavor of the Week. The conversation about improving the consumer experience. Too often it's getting cut off in the boardroom where too busy fighting staffing shortages, flat operating margins and burnout, we're told, come back after the adults figure out the important stuff and then you can make the case for your pet project. It's a familiar tune that was also sung in the early days of Digital Transformation, a website that's cute, a patient portal only because we have two virtual visits. Nobody wants them. Meanwhile, if we're able to set aside the status quo and think like human beings, deep down, we all know that health care needs to be easier, especially all of the experiences that happen before you encounter care, access, scheduling, multimodal visits, retail services and understanding care choices are all aspects that tend to be taken for granted. What catalyzed the conversation about digital health back in the day? Even with meaningful use mandates and penalties hovering in the air, there was serious resistance to providing health information in digital channels. It's almost laughable now to look back at the excuses from clinicians and administrators for trying to maintain the status quo. But at some point the catalyst was the proliferation of success stories that helped the decision makers understand the benefits to the bottom line. A critical mass of champions had to share a vision for digital initiatives and usher them through that pesky trough of disillusionment. So where are we with consumer first care today? I would say we don't yet have widespread access to that social proof and those success stories from peer organizations that are needed for consumer initiatives to be taken seriously. If only we could communicate that being consumer first can actually drive growth and become a competitive advantage. McKinsey recently published an article titled Driving Growth Through Consumer Centricity in Health Care, and it attempts to do just that. It makes the bold claim, bold in air quotes that providing consumers with the experiences they increasingly expect and demand at every stage of the health care journey could substantially improve care and cost outcomes. It points to the concept of driving strategic growth by attracting care defers those who are actively avoiding coming in and seeing a clinician. So can this become the baseline? Can we align around a common entry point and start talking more about driving growth? Making consumer centricity a competitive advantage requires us to acknowledge that care deferral has serious consequences for consumers and health systems, and telling that story effectively is going to take an organized effort. It's time to push the conversation from kind of important to growth. Driver How will you champion the strategic business value of consumer centricity in your organization? It's time to find out and then share our success stories. That's another way that will build the health care of tomorrow. And that's the flavor of the week.

The flow. The flow. The flow.

The flow. The flow. The flow.

All right, everyone, let's get into the flow. Give it up for Denise Warrell, VP of Consumerism at Memorial Hermann Health System. Welcome, Denise, to the Health Care app.

All right, everyone, let's get into the flow. Give it up for Denise Warrell, VP of Consumerism at Memorial Hermann Health System. Welcome, Denise, to the Health Care app.

Thanks. It's nice to be here. I look forward to a fun conversation.

Thanks. It's nice to be here. I look forward to a fun conversation.

Oh, I'm sure we're going to. There's a lot we can get into here. But let's let's start first and foremost, getting to know you a little bit better. There's some really cool things just about where you're at now, but maybe we can give our listeners a brief path to where you are now and then a little bit about your your role at Memorial Hermann.

Oh, I'm sure we're going to. There's a lot we can get into here. But let's let's start first and foremost, getting to know you a little bit better. There's some really cool things just about where you're at now, but maybe we can give our listeners a brief path to where you are now and then a little bit about your your role at Memorial Hermann.

Yeah, absolutely. So I have a background in human, human centered design and strategy and innovation, but I'm also an academically trained futurist. I have a master's in foresight, and currently I'm a VP of consumerism at Memorial Hermann, like you mentioned, which is the largest nonprofit health system in southeast Texas, and that's really in Houston and the surrounding areas. And prior to my current role, I was at MD Anderson Cancer Center, and I actually joined there to start up a human centered design practice as part of the innovation Center. That was also kind of starting up at the same time. And before that, you know, I really began my career in advertising and design. And I have to say, I never expected to be in health care, but I just kind of stumbled into it. And I was actually leading strategy and innovation practice for Long Grand, which is a creative think tank who happens to have really deep expertise and a lot of clients in the payer and provider space. And you know, I just kind of fell in love with with health care because I've never met a challenge that's too complex. Like the more complex, the more I love it. So, gosh, you know, health care doesn't get much more systemically challenging, you know, kind of big, wicked problems. So I really wanted to be part of the solution to help solve that. And, you know, here I am like about ten, 15 years later, still in health care, which I never expected to be. Well, I'll tell.

Yeah, absolutely. So I have a background in human, human centered design and strategy and innovation, but I'm also an academically trained futurist. I have a master's in foresight, and currently I'm a VP of consumerism at Memorial Hermann, like you mentioned, which is the largest nonprofit health system in southeast Texas, and that's really in Houston and the surrounding areas. And prior to my current role, I was at MD Anderson Cancer Center, and I actually joined there to start up a human centered design practice as part of the innovation Center. That was also kind of starting up at the same time. And before that, you know, I really began my career in advertising and design. And I have to say, I never expected to be in health care, but I just kind of stumbled into it. And I was actually leading strategy and innovation practice for Long Grand, which is a creative think tank who happens to have really deep expertise and a lot of clients in the payer and provider space. And you know, I just kind of fell in love with with health care because I've never met a challenge that's too complex. Like the more complex, the more I love it. So, gosh, you know, health care doesn't get much more systemically challenging, you know, kind of big, wicked problems. So I really wanted to be part of the solution to help solve that. And, you know, here I am like about ten, 15 years later, still in health care, which I never expected to be. Well, I'll tell.

You, if you love complexity, you really are in the right place. I mean. No doubt. No doubt. Well, what about, you know, some of the things that have guided you along the way? And a lot of people are just always interested to hear like some of those things we've all feels like gotten some career advice along the way. That's just been helpful. We also always get career advice that isn't as helpful, so maybe we can focus on one of those pieces of career advice that you feel has guided you along. Hey, what's one of those things that comes to mind?

You, if you love complexity, you really are in the right place. I mean. No doubt. No doubt. Well, what about, you know, some of the things that have guided you along the way? And a lot of people are just always interested to hear like some of those things we've all feels like gotten some career advice along the way. That's just been helpful. We also always get career advice that isn't as helpful, so maybe we can focus on one of those pieces of career advice that you feel has guided you along. Hey, what's one of those things that comes to mind?

Something that came to mind? You know, somebody told me not to get an MBA, and I think that was really probably some of the better career advice that I've gotten. And I mean, no offense to people with MBAs, I know a lot of really, really brilliant MBAs, but it was absolutely the right advice for me. It came at a time when I was about to go back to school to start my my foresight masters, and I started to have a moment of self-doubt, like, would anybody take this seriously? Nobody knows what foresight is. And at the time I had just started at MD Anderson, and of course it's an academic medical center. There's just so many amazing, brilliant people there, all these researchers and clinicians. And, you know, one of the things there is that everyone's badge has their name and then it has all of the letters for all of the, you know, things that they have completed, all of their degrees. And, you know, I looked around and my badge said, BS, Bachelor of Science, just a BS. And, you know, it's really kind of how I felt starting up human centered design practice because, you know, nobody knew what that was. And I think most people just kind of assumed it was a bunch of it was a bunch of fluffy stuff and there wasn't really much to add to the conversation. Of course, once they experienced it and got to know it, that really changed, changed people's perception. But I really had that moment of self-doubt and self reflection and thought maybe, maybe I should go for an MBA. Maybe that's more respected. And my boss at the time, I remember kind of expressing that to him and he said, Absolutely not. Do not go get an MBA. You're at a point in your career where there's nothing that they're going to teach you in business school that you haven't already learned. And yeah, he was absolutely right, not only because I think that was really about staying true to myself and my interest and to not worry so much about what other people think, but also because the deeper I've gotten into health care, the more I can see that, gosh, creative thinking and strategic problem solvers and people who think differently are so needed. They need we need like 20 times more people who can think different in health care. So I appreciate I appreciate that advice very much.

Something that came to mind? You know, somebody told me not to get an MBA, and I think that was really probably some of the better career advice that I've gotten. And I mean, no offense to people with MBAs, I know a lot of really, really brilliant MBAs, but it was absolutely the right advice for me. It came at a time when I was about to go back to school to start my my foresight masters, and I started to have a moment of self-doubt, like, would anybody take this seriously? Nobody knows what foresight is. And at the time I had just started at MD Anderson, and of course it's an academic medical center. There's just so many amazing, brilliant people there, all these researchers and clinicians. And, you know, one of the things there is that everyone's badge has their name and then it has all of the letters for all of the, you know, things that they have completed, all of their degrees. And, you know, I looked around and my badge said, BS, Bachelor of Science, just a BS. And, you know, it's really kind of how I felt starting up human centered design practice because, you know, nobody knew what that was. And I think most people just kind of assumed it was a bunch of it was a bunch of fluffy stuff and there wasn't really much to add to the conversation. Of course, once they experienced it and got to know it, that really changed, changed people's perception. But I really had that moment of self-doubt and self reflection and thought maybe, maybe I should go for an MBA. Maybe that's more respected. And my boss at the time, I remember kind of expressing that to him and he said, Absolutely not. Do not go get an MBA. You're at a point in your career where there's nothing that they're going to teach you in business school that you haven't already learned. And yeah, he was absolutely right, not only because I think that was really about staying true to myself and my interest and to not worry so much about what other people think, but also because the deeper I've gotten into health care, the more I can see that, gosh, creative thinking and strategic problem solvers and people who think differently are so needed. They need we need like 20 times more people who can think different in health care. So I appreciate I appreciate that advice very much.

That's great. And you outlined several skills and competencies that I'd love to dive deeper here in a little bit. I think a lot of them, I imagine, relate a lot with your current role. So your role at Memorial Hermann right now is VP of consumerism. You and I were just speaking right before we hopped on the air that it is a role that isn't necessarily as common as a lot of other things out there. Maybe we can dive into that a little bit. Can you give us a little deeper dive on the role itself, your responsibilities, and where does that fit within your organization?

That's great. And you outlined several skills and competencies that I'd love to dive deeper here in a little bit. I think a lot of them, I imagine, relate a lot with your current role. So your role at Memorial Hermann right now is VP of consumerism. You and I were just speaking right before we hopped on the air that it is a role that isn't necessarily as common as a lot of other things out there. Maybe we can dive into that a little bit. Can you give us a little deeper dive on the role itself, your responsibilities, and where does that fit within your organization?

Yeah, so I lead a team of experienced designers and then also implementation experts, you know, and we're really working to create more effortless, personalized, contextual experiences. And we do that, of course, by doing things like making it easier to access care, making it easier. For patients and families to navigate through the health care system. Or maybe more simply put, you know, we're really working to make health care easier by removing those barriers across the health care journey. And that really starts with very deeply understanding and balancing the needs of patients with those of providers and operations and business needs. So a lot of times people hear consumerism and the immediate assumption is like, Oh man, they're here to only talk about the patient, what the patient needs. But really what we find is that most of the things, the interventions that we need to to make are helping our our staff and our our clinicians really remove the pain points for them so that they can provide better service to our patients. So that takes a lot of collaboration. We're a small team. We report up through through operations kind of under that umbrella, but we partner really, really close with our digital team. They're like very close partners with us. You know, our IT function, our legal team, our marketing team, physician and nursing leadership. And on and on. It's really a collaborative, collaborative space that we're that we play in. And I think the other thing to mention here is that we are two thirds of a full team. So the full consumer experience team also includes an analytics function and we partner with them really closely as well to marry kind of the qualitative design research with the more quantitative health care survey and NPS measurements type of thing.

Yeah, so I lead a team of experienced designers and then also implementation experts, you know, and we're really working to create more effortless, personalized, contextual experiences. And we do that, of course, by doing things like making it easier to access care, making it easier. For patients and families to navigate through the health care system. Or maybe more simply put, you know, we're really working to make health care easier by removing those barriers across the health care journey. And that really starts with very deeply understanding and balancing the needs of patients with those of providers and operations and business needs. So a lot of times people hear consumerism and the immediate assumption is like, Oh man, they're here to only talk about the patient, what the patient needs. But really what we find is that most of the things, the interventions that we need to to make are helping our our staff and our our clinicians really remove the pain points for them so that they can provide better service to our patients. So that takes a lot of collaboration. We're a small team. We report up through through operations kind of under that umbrella, but we partner really, really close with our digital team. They're like very close partners with us. You know, our IT function, our legal team, our marketing team, physician and nursing leadership. And on and on. It's really a collaborative, collaborative space that we're that we play in. And I think the other thing to mention here is that we are two thirds of a full team. So the full consumer experience team also includes an analytics function and we partner with them really closely as well to marry kind of the qualitative design research with the more quantitative health care survey and NPS measurements type of thing.

So you mentioned the digital team is one of those stakeholders involved in a lot of this. Is that one of the more common areas that you're spending time with, are you looking at digital user experience? Like is that part of a role that sometimes lives in other departments? I've heard of things related to that, being in marketing or communications team, for instance. Do you work with them a lot as well?

So you mentioned the digital team is one of those stakeholders involved in a lot of this. Is that one of the more common areas that you're spending time with, are you looking at digital user experience? Like is that part of a role that sometimes lives in other departments? I've heard of things related to that, being in marketing or communications team, for instance. Do you work with them a lot as well?

Yeah, I mean, it's a little bit our function is still fairly new within the organization and kind of the consumer experience team came on board about three years ago at the same time as our digital team. So we're kind of growing up together within the organization and you know, my team does does have some folks with different backgrounds in design. So we have somebody who used to be an industrial designer. We've got somebody who used to be a designer and just kind of different pieces of design we're really focused on online and offline, so we're not super heavy on the UX UI side. We do have there are some design resources within our digital team, but we absolutely work really closely and inform each other and kind of fill in gaps when they need to be filled in on the digital side.

Yeah, I mean, it's a little bit our function is still fairly new within the organization and kind of the consumer experience team came on board about three years ago at the same time as our digital team. So we're kind of growing up together within the organization and you know, my team does does have some folks with different backgrounds in design. So we have somebody who used to be an industrial designer. We've got somebody who used to be a designer and just kind of different pieces of design we're really focused on online and offline, so we're not super heavy on the UX UI side. We do have there are some design resources within our digital team, but we absolutely work really closely and inform each other and kind of fill in gaps when they need to be filled in on the digital side.

Very exciting. Very exciting. Can you give us an idea of some of the successes and challenges of being in this role, especially from the leadership standpoint?

Very exciting. Very exciting. Can you give us an idea of some of the successes and challenges of being in this role, especially from the leadership standpoint?

Oh yeah. I will say that of course, starting any new function in an organization or even in an industry, right? Because this whole idea of consumerism is still new and the whole industry is just getting established and getting woven into the fabric of the system. And probably like the biggest challenge that seems so obvious. But you know, the biggest thing is really just getting people to get comfortable with the concept that patients are actually consumers. I can't tell you how many times I've, you know, been in a meeting and I use the consumer word, the C word right in front of providers and particularly and I can just see how uncomfortable I make people feel, you know, they're just not used to that terminology. I do see that starting to change. I think younger generations of providers are entering the workforce and they're much more open to, you know, thinking of consumers as people with choice. You know, patients have choice. It's not just one path anymore. So I do see that shift starting to happen, which which is good. So that's one positive and also challenge at the same time, you know, and why we're why we're talking about making people uncomfortable. Apparently. I'm really good at that, you know, because I think the other the other challenge that I face really regularly is that when I go into a meeting and introduce myself and I say I lead a team of health care designers, I get a lot of blank stares. I get a lot of confused faces staring at me because, you know, service design, experience, design, they're still really new concepts in healthcare. And the assumption is either, Oh, this is a fancy new word for process improvement, or oh, you must be interior designers or Oh, you must do marketing, graphic design. And of course, we're none of those things. You know, we're designing better health care journeys, better health care experiences. And people still don't really know what that means. So, you know, I have to walk a line between explaining and helping people understand, but also not boring them with design methodology that they probably don't want to hear about. As much as I don't necessarily want to hear about accounting methodology, I just trust that the accountants know what they're doing. So that's definitely, definitely a challenge. But, you know, it's not all not all bad. There's definitely some wins. I think being here and having this conversation and having people like you starting to really try to give a voice to this idea of consumer centricity. And design in health care is a huge win. And I think having organizations, even though it's not by any means the vast number of health care organizations there are, you know, getting to be more and more kind of forward thinking organizations like Memorial Hermann who are willing to invest in bringing in these types of capabilities and trying to to think differently. You know, and I think the other piece of that is I'm starting to see that it's still a challenge to attract really creative, talented designers to, you know, come over to health care. It's fun. It's still a challenge, but it's getting a little easier. I think people are getting more open to that idea. We're able to attract really talented, passionate people to come kind of join the fight in helping us solve these complex challenges. That's definitely when I know personally I'm really, really proud of the talented team that we've built at Memorial Hermann. So a big win there.

Oh yeah. I will say that of course, starting any new function in an organization or even in an industry, right? Because this whole idea of consumerism is still new and the whole industry is just getting established and getting woven into the fabric of the system. And probably like the biggest challenge that seems so obvious. But you know, the biggest thing is really just getting people to get comfortable with the concept that patients are actually consumers. I can't tell you how many times I've, you know, been in a meeting and I use the consumer word, the C word right in front of providers and particularly and I can just see how uncomfortable I make people feel, you know, they're just not used to that terminology. I do see that starting to change. I think younger generations of providers are entering the workforce and they're much more open to, you know, thinking of consumers as people with choice. You know, patients have choice. It's not just one path anymore. So I do see that shift starting to happen, which which is good. So that's one positive and also challenge at the same time, you know, and why we're why we're talking about making people uncomfortable. Apparently. I'm really good at that, you know, because I think the other the other challenge that I face really regularly is that when I go into a meeting and introduce myself and I say I lead a team of health care designers, I get a lot of blank stares. I get a lot of confused faces staring at me because, you know, service design, experience, design, they're still really new concepts in healthcare. And the assumption is either, Oh, this is a fancy new word for process improvement, or oh, you must be interior designers or Oh, you must do marketing, graphic design. And of course, we're none of those things. You know, we're designing better health care journeys, better health care experiences. And people still don't really know what that means. So, you know, I have to walk a line between explaining and helping people understand, but also not boring them with design methodology that they probably don't want to hear about. As much as I don't necessarily want to hear about accounting methodology, I just trust that the accountants know what they're doing. So that's definitely, definitely a challenge. But, you know, it's not all not all bad. There's definitely some wins. I think being here and having this conversation and having people like you starting to really try to give a voice to this idea of consumer centricity. And design in health care is a huge win. And I think having organizations, even though it's not by any means the vast number of health care organizations there are, you know, getting to be more and more kind of forward thinking organizations like Memorial Hermann who are willing to invest in bringing in these types of capabilities and trying to to think differently. You know, and I think the other piece of that is I'm starting to see that it's still a challenge to attract really creative, talented designers to, you know, come over to health care. It's fun. It's still a challenge, but it's getting a little easier. I think people are getting more open to that idea. We're able to attract really talented, passionate people to come kind of join the fight in helping us solve these complex challenges. That's definitely when I know personally I'm really, really proud of the talented team that we've built at Memorial Hermann. So a big win there.

Yeah, it really is. I love the balance here. And there's there's reality here, right? Like, I've been a practitioner on the digital marketing side growing up in the hopefully this is encouraging, but the I see a lot of parallels to ten, 12, 15 years ago when we were just starting to talk about digital transformation, getting a lot of the same blank stares, sometimes the eye rolls, sometimes the wait, what? What are you doing? And we already have a way to do that and we're able to look back now. Not sure there were transformations at scale before that, but that's, you know, the one that I was involved in to a point where I can put a finger on it and say, Hey, look, remember when we were facing a lot of the same reactions, but we understood at the base the value that this could be to the organization and to the consumers we serve. So there's reason to to pursue this and to grow these capabilities within an organization. So, you know, I'm looking forward to that and I'm keeping an eye on how how it mirrors the rise of digital capabilities within healthcare systems, especially because, yeah, there are a lot of things in common.

Yeah, it really is. I love the balance here. And there's there's reality here, right? Like, I've been a practitioner on the digital marketing side growing up in the hopefully this is encouraging, but the I see a lot of parallels to ten, 12, 15 years ago when we were just starting to talk about digital transformation, getting a lot of the same blank stares, sometimes the eye rolls, sometimes the wait, what? What are you doing? And we already have a way to do that and we're able to look back now. Not sure there were transformations at scale before that, but that's, you know, the one that I was involved in to a point where I can put a finger on it and say, Hey, look, remember when we were facing a lot of the same reactions, but we understood at the base the value that this could be to the organization and to the consumers we serve. So there's reason to to pursue this and to grow these capabilities within an organization. So, you know, I'm looking forward to that and I'm keeping an eye on how how it mirrors the rise of digital capabilities within healthcare systems, especially because, yeah, there are a lot of things in common.

They're one of the things there is that, you know, with digital, people are able to see a tangible product. They're able to see at the end of the day, there's a website, there's an app, there's a tool that's been created. And still with design, we have that extra layer of challenge. That's so much of what we do is abstract. It's thinking, it's the strategy, it's the planning that goes into designing the final product of that digital piece or the, you know, the service. And people have a hard time wrapping their head around that. So I'm hoping we can figure out as a as an industry or as a, you know, practitioners how to help people really understand what appears to be pretty abstract.

They're one of the things there is that, you know, with digital, people are able to see a tangible product. They're able to see at the end of the day, there's a website, there's an app, there's a tool that's been created. And still with design, we have that extra layer of challenge. That's so much of what we do is abstract. It's thinking, it's the strategy, it's the planning that goes into designing the final product of that digital piece or the, you know, the service. And people have a hard time wrapping their head around that. So I'm hoping we can figure out as a as an industry or as a, you know, practitioners how to help people really understand what appears to be pretty abstract.

That's very true. It was easy in the early days of digital advancement and transformation to put your finger on something and say, Yeah, here's a tangible thing, you're very right there. I mean, there are a couple of areas that I see worth spending time in to help grow these capabilities. I mean, one is just within our own organizations is just learning how to build up these consumer muscles, if you will. That's going to take some new skills and core competencies. You mentioned a few earlier, but if we start making a list, if we're literally whiteboarding a list of some of those skills, they're like, you know, hey, these things are useful. These are things I'm looking for on my team and these are helping us grow the the successes that we're participating in. And then the the influence of that within the organization. What do you think some of those skills might be? What does that look like? Yeah.

That's very true. It was easy in the early days of digital advancement and transformation to put your finger on something and say, Yeah, here's a tangible thing, you're very right there. I mean, there are a couple of areas that I see worth spending time in to help grow these capabilities. I mean, one is just within our own organizations is just learning how to build up these consumer muscles, if you will. That's going to take some new skills and core competencies. You mentioned a few earlier, but if we start making a list, if we're literally whiteboarding a list of some of those skills, they're like, you know, hey, these things are useful. These are things I'm looking for on my team and these are helping us grow the the successes that we're participating in. And then the the influence of that within the organization. What do you think some of those skills might be? What does that look like? Yeah.

So I think one of the skills that and maybe this is more of a mindset shift within healthcare, but if we're talking about, you know, what is that consumer muscle inside of the organization is kind of learning to think beyond process improvement. So, you know, process improvement is so important. Everyone wants efficiency, including our patients. They absolutely want it. But I think in many ways, health care has been so, by necessity, forced to really get lean as much as they can over the years that we've engineered the humanity out of health care. And we have to figure out now how to get that muscle back. You know, we have to kind of the pendulum has swung too far and we have to bring in teams who are trying to bring that human component back into health care, which is is a pretty big challenge, you know, So instead of always coming in and saying, how do we improve this process that already exists and make it even more efficient, you know, health care organizations really need to learn when it's better to step back and instead ask, well, why do we have this process at all? Who is it serving? You know, maybe at one point in time it had a really great purpose. But as the world has evolved, you know, maybe it doesn't really fit in today's environment. It's not really in line with what consumers need or what our workforce needs, you know, now and into the future. So really getting a getting a handle on on flexing that muscle to think a little bit different beyond just improving what exists and maybe questioning why it exists and looking for alternative paths forward. That's a role that, you know, design. Kind of design thinking, design, research, behavior change, collaboration and facilitation skills can really help pull that thinking forward across all disciplines inside of health care. And, you know, this probably goes hand in hand with the first. But I think health care also has to get better at sort of storytelling and selling a vision. I know over the years and probably even even more so in my time on the innovation team at MD Anderson, you know, we would sit through so many pitches and ideas and people from the outside, people from the inside coming in with, you know, what could be really interesting, solid ideas. But they haven't ever really learned how to tell a story and not just present data, but present the insights, help show and make a connection of like the human emotions that are actually going to make people compelled to act and get on board with your idea. And again, I think that's something that designers and creative folks being brought into healthcare organizations can help with. We can literally help paint a picture of what could be that, you know, maybe people who are more traditionally analytical don't necessarily naturally have the skills to do so. I think that's that's an opportunity, again, to grow more consumer muscle and then think last, you know, as a futurist, I'm biased on this, of course. But, you know, I think if health care really wants to build its consumer chops, it has to learn to look beyond the fires of today and really take a longer view to get ahead of what people want and need and like the years and the decades ahead. And again, not just consumers, but the workforce that we have to attract and retain. You know, it takes a long time for legacy kind of traditional health care systems to make those changes. And it takes dedicated attention and time and planning. And so, you know, when I talk about foresight, a lot of people tend to assume I'm talking about forecasting and and making financial projections, you know, what are we projecting for the next quarter and the next year in volumes and that sort of thing? And that's really not what foresight is. It's, you know, and it's also not having a crystal ball and trying to predict the future. But it's really the real goal is to make sense of the future so that we can confidently make informed decisions in the present that put us on a trajectory to achieving our preferred long term future and also help us at the same time move away from futures that we wish to avoid. And that's a tool that foresight can really bring to healthcare. You know, it's there's a lot of teams, foresight, teams that exist in like the Fortune 500 and in other industries. But but health care has really been slow on the uptake on this one. Am starting to see a glimmer here, a little bit of noise from some of the more forward thinking organizations that there's some interest in starting to grow this capability. So that that gives me some hope.

So I think one of the skills that and maybe this is more of a mindset shift within healthcare, but if we're talking about, you know, what is that consumer muscle inside of the organization is kind of learning to think beyond process improvement. So, you know, process improvement is so important. Everyone wants efficiency, including our patients. They absolutely want it. But I think in many ways, health care has been so, by necessity, forced to really get lean as much as they can over the years that we've engineered the humanity out of health care. And we have to figure out now how to get that muscle back. You know, we have to kind of the pendulum has swung too far and we have to bring in teams who are trying to bring that human component back into health care, which is is a pretty big challenge, you know, So instead of always coming in and saying, how do we improve this process that already exists and make it even more efficient, you know, health care organizations really need to learn when it's better to step back and instead ask, well, why do we have this process at all? Who is it serving? You know, maybe at one point in time it had a really great purpose. But as the world has evolved, you know, maybe it doesn't really fit in today's environment. It's not really in line with what consumers need or what our workforce needs, you know, now and into the future. So really getting a getting a handle on on flexing that muscle to think a little bit different beyond just improving what exists and maybe questioning why it exists and looking for alternative paths forward. That's a role that, you know, design. Kind of design thinking, design, research, behavior change, collaboration and facilitation skills can really help pull that thinking forward across all disciplines inside of health care. And, you know, this probably goes hand in hand with the first. But I think health care also has to get better at sort of storytelling and selling a vision. I know over the years and probably even even more so in my time on the innovation team at MD Anderson, you know, we would sit through so many pitches and ideas and people from the outside, people from the inside coming in with, you know, what could be really interesting, solid ideas. But they haven't ever really learned how to tell a story and not just present data, but present the insights, help show and make a connection of like the human emotions that are actually going to make people compelled to act and get on board with your idea. And again, I think that's something that designers and creative folks being brought into healthcare organizations can help with. We can literally help paint a picture of what could be that, you know, maybe people who are more traditionally analytical don't necessarily naturally have the skills to do so. I think that's that's an opportunity, again, to grow more consumer muscle and then think last, you know, as a futurist, I'm biased on this, of course. But, you know, I think if health care really wants to build its consumer chops, it has to learn to look beyond the fires of today and really take a longer view to get ahead of what people want and need and like the years and the decades ahead. And again, not just consumers, but the workforce that we have to attract and retain. You know, it takes a long time for legacy kind of traditional health care systems to make those changes. And it takes dedicated attention and time and planning. And so, you know, when I talk about foresight, a lot of people tend to assume I'm talking about forecasting and and making financial projections, you know, what are we projecting for the next quarter and the next year in volumes and that sort of thing? And that's really not what foresight is. It's, you know, and it's also not having a crystal ball and trying to predict the future. But it's really the real goal is to make sense of the future so that we can confidently make informed decisions in the present that put us on a trajectory to achieving our preferred long term future and also help us at the same time move away from futures that we wish to avoid. And that's a tool that foresight can really bring to healthcare. You know, it's there's a lot of teams, foresight, teams that exist in like the Fortune 500 and in other industries. But but health care has really been slow on the uptake on this one. Am starting to see a glimmer here, a little bit of noise from some of the more forward thinking organizations that there's some interest in starting to grow this capability. So that that gives me some hope.

That gives me a lot of hope. I love hearing that, that there's a growing interest there. And you're right, it's the the daily challenge of putting out the fires, but then not losing sight of where we want to go as a result and being able to to grow some of these things within it. I love that. Stay tuned for more provocative thinking after the break.

That gives me a lot of hope. I love hearing that, that there's a growing interest there. And you're right, it's the the daily challenge of putting out the fires, but then not losing sight of where we want to go as a result and being able to to grow some of these things within it. I love that. Stay tuned for more provocative thinking after the break.

Consumer demands, disruptive technologies and I are shaping health care for years to come. On the Hello Healthcare podcast, we dive deep on these issues with leaders who are driving change. These stories will inspire you to create and demand a better future in health care. Learn more at Hello Healthcare. And now back to the show.

Consumer demands, disruptive technologies and I are shaping health care for years to come. On the Hello Healthcare podcast, we dive deep on these issues with leaders who are driving change. These stories will inspire you to create and demand a better future in health care. Learn more at Hello Healthcare. And now back to the show.

Let me ask about a couple of departments or teams and how they might play a role here. You mentioned that your team works up through the operations team. And then I'd like to I'm curious how that intersects with with marketing as one of the teams you mentioned that you might partner with. Do you feel like operations and marketing can both play roles here in building up the consumer muscles? And if so, what might that look like?

Let me ask about a couple of departments or teams and how they might play a role here. You mentioned that your team works up through the operations team. And then I'd like to I'm curious how that intersects with with marketing as one of the teams you mentioned that you might partner with. Do you feel like operations and marketing can both play roles here in building up the consumer muscles? And if so, what might that look like?

Absolutely. I mean, I think there's a direct straight line, right, between brand and consumer perception and the experience. Right? So, you know, when marketing builds a really strong brand, the consumer is coming in with high expectations that the organization is going to deliver the brand that's been kind of portrayed. And that's where the experience piece and experience design service design comes in because we want to bring to fruition the the vision, the brand that marketing has has put out for the world to see. And, you know, I actually think this is one of those things where it helps that a lot of times marketing tends to be a little on the aspirational side because I think that can start to push the organization to live up to its potential. It can start to push people to to think a little bit differently within the organization itself, kind of that power of positive thinking and, you know, really getting people to change and think differently. Of course, you can't overshoot over promise because nobody wants to put out marketing that's impossible to deliver on. And I don't think that's happening. But yeah, when consumers come in with the confidence that they're in good hands because they're coming to an organization that has a really strong, credible, you know, reputable brand, then we're already starting from a place of trust. We're starting from a net positive. And that's ultimately what we want from our consumers. We want them to trust that when they're in our care that we're going to consistently deliver the highest quality care that's personalized to our needs and also think it plays out in brand and consumer experience metrics like NPS. I think that's something that measures both brand and experience kind of in one one measure. So think it's all absolutely connected. It all works in concert.

Absolutely. I mean, I think there's a direct straight line, right, between brand and consumer perception and the experience. Right? So, you know, when marketing builds a really strong brand, the consumer is coming in with high expectations that the organization is going to deliver the brand that's been kind of portrayed. And that's where the experience piece and experience design service design comes in because we want to bring to fruition the the vision, the brand that marketing has has put out for the world to see. And, you know, I actually think this is one of those things where it helps that a lot of times marketing tends to be a little on the aspirational side because I think that can start to push the organization to live up to its potential. It can start to push people to to think a little bit differently within the organization itself, kind of that power of positive thinking and, you know, really getting people to change and think differently. Of course, you can't overshoot over promise because nobody wants to put out marketing that's impossible to deliver on. And I don't think that's happening. But yeah, when consumers come in with the confidence that they're in good hands because they're coming to an organization that has a really strong, credible, you know, reputable brand, then we're already starting from a place of trust. We're starting from a net positive. And that's ultimately what we want from our consumers. We want them to trust that when they're in our care that we're going to consistently deliver the highest quality care that's personalized to our needs and also think it plays out in brand and consumer experience metrics like NPS. I think that's something that measures both brand and experience kind of in one one measure. So think it's all absolutely connected. It all works in concert.

Absolutely. Yeah. Thanks for diving in there. I think that's useful to get that granular on it because I know other organizations are asking that question How do we even structure this? Like what's the interplay between some of the teams? So that's fantastic. When we kind of back this out to how does this impact a consumer of health care, I think it's pretty fair to say that a majority of consumers don't understand the complexity and they don't care that much. They just they just want a better experience. I think that's the point where I'd love more acknowledgment, you know, among other leaders in health care organizations. Some recognize that and some are like, well, let's help them navigate the complexity while others are saying, let's reduce the complexity. Yes. What about your team there at Memorial Hermann? Like, how are y'all designing that better experience? What things are you working on?

Absolutely. Yeah. Thanks for diving in there. I think that's useful to get that granular on it because I know other organizations are asking that question How do we even structure this? Like what's the interplay between some of the teams? So that's fantastic. When we kind of back this out to how does this impact a consumer of health care, I think it's pretty fair to say that a majority of consumers don't understand the complexity and they don't care that much. They just they just want a better experience. I think that's the point where I'd love more acknowledgment, you know, among other leaders in health care organizations. Some recognize that and some are like, well, let's help them navigate the complexity while others are saying, let's reduce the complexity. Yes. What about your team there at Memorial Hermann? Like, how are y'all designing that better experience? What things are you working on?

Yeah, absolutely. So we're working from a moments that matter strategy that really understands and prioritizes our efforts around improving the most impactful parts of the consumer journey. One thing that's really important to note is that when we look at data, when we talk to patients, you know, overwhelmingly they tend to be very happy with their providers. They love their nurses, they love their doctors. And where they have issues is all of the stuff surrounding that interaction with their doctors and nurses. So it's scheduling, it's billing wayfinding. Where the heck do I park? Why are the wait times so long? All of those things. So those are the types of things that my my team is working on and kind of has developed seven unique moments that matter around these different areas to kind of organize ourselves in. And, you know, I think the other thing that, you know, we really realized early on is, you know, ideally we would design a perfect end to end journey like design, the perfect journey for having a baby design, the perfect journey for having cancer. And reality is there's not one journey, right? Like even every every mom has their own birthing plan. They have their own vision of what the ideal experience is to have a baby. And we can't design that for them. What we realized is we don't have to design that perfect end in journey. We need to find those common pain points that it doesn't matter if you broke your leg or you've got allergies or you're having a baby, every patient is going to experience these same kind of moments that matter. They all need to find and access the right level of care, find the right physician provider for them. They all have to share their health history and concerns with us and feel like they're being heard. We all have to pay bills. They all have to navigate a parking garage and find wayfinding. So that's really how we're choosing to organize ourselves. And I think that we're finding that taking that kind of, for lack of better word, vertical approach, instead of trying to move horizontally across a never ending sea of possible. Patient journeys is really allowing us to move much more quickly and scale our efforts on the things that are most important that we really need to get right.

Yeah, absolutely. So we're working from a moments that matter strategy that really understands and prioritizes our efforts around improving the most impactful parts of the consumer journey. One thing that's really important to note is that when we look at data, when we talk to patients, you know, overwhelmingly they tend to be very happy with their providers. They love their nurses, they love their doctors. And where they have issues is all of the stuff surrounding that interaction with their doctors and nurses. So it's scheduling, it's billing wayfinding. Where the heck do I park? Why are the wait times so long? All of those things. So those are the types of things that my my team is working on and kind of has developed seven unique moments that matter around these different areas to kind of organize ourselves in. And, you know, I think the other thing that, you know, we really realized early on is, you know, ideally we would design a perfect end to end journey like design, the perfect journey for having a baby design, the perfect journey for having cancer. And reality is there's not one journey, right? Like even every every mom has their own birthing plan. They have their own vision of what the ideal experience is to have a baby. And we can't design that for them. What we realized is we don't have to design that perfect end in journey. We need to find those common pain points that it doesn't matter if you broke your leg or you've got allergies or you're having a baby, every patient is going to experience these same kind of moments that matter. They all need to find and access the right level of care, find the right physician provider for them. They all have to share their health history and concerns with us and feel like they're being heard. We all have to pay bills. They all have to navigate a parking garage and find wayfinding. So that's really how we're choosing to organize ourselves. And I think that we're finding that taking that kind of, for lack of better word, vertical approach, instead of trying to move horizontally across a never ending sea of possible. Patient journeys is really allowing us to move much more quickly and scale our efforts on the things that are most important that we really need to get right.

I'm really intrigued by this. Moments the matter philosophy. I'll have to circle back with you at some point on that. Not today, but at some point. I see a lot of value there. That kind of brings me to this thought of of a lot of professionals. We were kind of speaking to it earlier that a lot of professionals involved in consumer centered design or any type of human centered design, but particularly with just this is a big lift. So it feels like it hasn't quite coalesced in terms of a discipline, a title, a department that it lives in a lot of different places. And thankfully, thankfully, it's there. It's better than not having it at all. I mean, we have made a lot of progress. But I'm just wondering, like as a community out there, what would you like to see? Like, how would you like us to see a community created and built up so that this community becomes involved in our work? What types of things do you think we can do to help speed that up?

I'm really intrigued by this. Moments the matter philosophy. I'll have to circle back with you at some point on that. Not today, but at some point. I see a lot of value there. That kind of brings me to this thought of of a lot of professionals. We were kind of speaking to it earlier that a lot of professionals involved in consumer centered design or any type of human centered design, but particularly with just this is a big lift. So it feels like it hasn't quite coalesced in terms of a discipline, a title, a department that it lives in a lot of different places. And thankfully, thankfully, it's there. It's better than not having it at all. I mean, we have made a lot of progress. But I'm just wondering, like as a community out there, what would you like to see? Like, how would you like us to see a community created and built up so that this community becomes involved in our work? What types of things do you think we can do to help speed that up?

To me, there's kind of like this big elephant in the room that has to be addressed maybe before we can even accelerate our efforts. There's kind of two schools of thought. There's patient experience and the types of people that are working on on traditional, more traditional patient experience groups that exist inside of healthcare organizations. And then there's this group that we're talking about here, which are people who have maybe very different skill sets that are coming in from the outside, thinking about transformation and design and just totally different ways of thinking from kind of traditional skill sets within a healthcare organization. And I think in order for us to really move ahead on this sort of consumer centric side is we need to get the health care industry to even know that there's a difference, that we're talking kind of apples and oranges. And in my experience, what I've found is that people working on patient experience teams are generally more focused on those day to day interactions between the care team and the patient. You know, they're focused on training and reminding staff, you know, say their name when they walk in the room, doing rounding, doing service recovery. And that's super important. That's like at the end of the day, that's the core service of health care. And so we need to have a focus on that. For most health care systems, they don't even know that there's this other thing that they could be looking at that there's like this broader experience that needs to be designed. And so, like, to me, the first thing we need to do is figure out how to get that message out, that great, continue your efforts with patient experience, but also consider all of the consumer things and consider bringing in resources that think differently, that are here to solve different problems for a different reason. And so to that end, I think we need to start going to more of those types of conferences and having a voice there mean personally, I think for a while I avoided them because I was like, Yeah, it's not really what I do. It's not it's connected. It's absolutely vital, but it's not quite what I do. I'd rather go to a conference with designers, so I think we have to figure out how to kind of bring our voice and help introduce this concept to, you know, probably the vast majority of health care systems that don't know that there's something else to think about there. So I think this podcast is a great way to start doing that. Any ways that we can get more more conversations going about leveraging design thinking and you know, this consumer centric mindset in health care is going to go a really long way to make it less like, who's that weird, scary person in the room talking about feelings and emotions and what patients want and need and instead be like, That's a really cool asset. We need to be thinking different. Let's invite them to the table.

To me, there's kind of like this big elephant in the room that has to be addressed maybe before we can even accelerate our efforts. There's kind of two schools of thought. There's patient experience and the types of people that are working on on traditional, more traditional patient experience groups that exist inside of healthcare organizations. And then there's this group that we're talking about here, which are people who have maybe very different skill sets that are coming in from the outside, thinking about transformation and design and just totally different ways of thinking from kind of traditional skill sets within a healthcare organization. And I think in order for us to really move ahead on this sort of consumer centric side is we need to get the health care industry to even know that there's a difference, that we're talking kind of apples and oranges. And in my experience, what I've found is that people working on patient experience teams are generally more focused on those day to day interactions between the care team and the patient. You know, they're focused on training and reminding staff, you know, say their name when they walk in the room, doing rounding, doing service recovery. And that's super important. That's like at the end of the day, that's the core service of health care. And so we need to have a focus on that. For most health care systems, they don't even know that there's this other thing that they could be looking at that there's like this broader experience that needs to be designed. And so, like, to me, the first thing we need to do is figure out how to get that message out, that great, continue your efforts with patient experience, but also consider all of the consumer things and consider bringing in resources that think differently, that are here to solve different problems for a different reason. And so to that end, I think we need to start going to more of those types of conferences and having a voice there mean personally, I think for a while I avoided them because I was like, Yeah, it's not really what I do. It's not it's connected. It's absolutely vital, but it's not quite what I do. I'd rather go to a conference with designers, so I think we have to figure out how to kind of bring our voice and help introduce this concept to, you know, probably the vast majority of health care systems that don't know that there's something else to think about there. So I think this podcast is a great way to start doing that. Any ways that we can get more more conversations going about leveraging design thinking and you know, this consumer centric mindset in health care is going to go a really long way to make it less like, who's that weird, scary person in the room talking about feelings and emotions and what patients want and need and instead be like, That's a really cool asset. We need to be thinking different. Let's invite them to the table.

Oh, you're seriously speaking my language here. These are things so we've that we'd love to just shout out there to, to the whole world to help them understand the value of of all of this. Which brings me to my last question for you, Denise, which is kind of our destination here. You've been sharing a vision of of where these efforts could take us. I wonder if we could think about what that destination might be like, What kind of progress could we see in the industry, either in the in the state of consumer experience or elsewhere? This is kind of a reality check, but where do you think that destination is? And maybe we even look like short term in the next year or two, What types of places could we get to if, like if things go right, if we make progress here, where do we hope this gets us?

Oh, you're seriously speaking my language here. These are things so we've that we'd love to just shout out there to, to the whole world to help them understand the value of of all of this. Which brings me to my last question for you, Denise, which is kind of our destination here. You've been sharing a vision of of where these efforts could take us. I wonder if we could think about what that destination might be like, What kind of progress could we see in the industry, either in the in the state of consumer experience or elsewhere? This is kind of a reality check, but where do you think that destination is? And maybe we even look like short term in the next year or two, What types of places could we get to if, like if things go right, if we make progress here, where do we hope this gets us?

I would love, love, love nothing more than to see like massive changes and everything switch overnight. But I know that's just really not realistic, right? So if we're being really realistic and pragmatic about what what can happen in the next year or two in traditional health care, I think that what we can really hope and hope to see and can help Shepherd through is really creating more culture change, you know, mindset shifts and more awareness about the fact that this is real. There's a real need to change now and think more consumer centric because. As consumers are already there. They're already demanding it. They already have been for years. You know, and I think by and large, executive leaders in health care, they're very well aware. They see what's happening. They see that there's an urgency. But in my experience, that hasn't really trickled down yet to the front lines. So kind of that middle management layer of health care is still really actively kind of pushing against the need to change, the need to think more consumer centric. They see that kind of as a challenge to their own organization. And I totally get it because literally their job is to maintain the status quo. They are measured. They incentivized to, you know, throughput, bringing the volumes in, decreasing length of stay. Their job is to make sure that things stay the same along that track. So, you know, right now, bringing in teams like ours, it's kind of scary to them. So even though executive leadership's bought in, hoping in the next year or two that we can start to really bring that down to another level, to the folks doing the work that need to embrace the change and I think there's a couple of things that will happen in the next couple of years that may help to accelerate that that mindset shift. You know, one of them, of course, being we're going to continue to see the Walmarts and the CVS's and the one medical that are prioritizing convenience over physician relationships continue to grow. And I don't I don't think anyone would necessarily disagree with that trend. But when you look at what those entities are doing and how they approach scheduling, it's based on time and location. The provider piece is secondary. It's either buried behind for links to, you know, we have to click through a bunch of things to find who would the provider I would be seeing Tuesday at 11:00 B or it's not listed at all. Or maybe it's just a name and a picture, but there's no profile. And that's very, very, very different from how traditional health care approaches sort of that everything is driven by this relationship with a physician. So I think the other piece that's going to start helping that mindset shift is that, you know, we have all of these new don't even know that they're new. They've been around for seven, several years. But growth in these sort of online, asynchronous access to providers focused on very specific problems. Right. So like the hims and hers, hair loss, birth control, dermatology, you know, as a patient, I can just go to a to a website, I can fill out a form and say exactly what I need. And like the next day it's magically called into my pharmacy or they're delivering it directly to my house. I think those things are going to start really pushing on and chipping away at primary care, the kind of that traditional primary care to a point where the front lines are feeling that shift and seeing it. It's going to be tangible. And I'm hopeful that in the next year or two that that's going to start kind of being the catalyst that helps sort of the frontline stuff, see the urgency and maybe be a little more open and willing to try new things and change. At least that's my hope.

I would love, love, love nothing more than to see like massive changes and everything switch overnight. But I know that's just really not realistic, right? So if we're being really realistic and pragmatic about what what can happen in the next year or two in traditional health care, I think that what we can really hope and hope to see and can help Shepherd through is really creating more culture change, you know, mindset shifts and more awareness about the fact that this is real. There's a real need to change now and think more consumer centric because. As consumers are already there. They're already demanding it. They already have been for years. You know, and I think by and large, executive leaders in health care, they're very well aware. They see what's happening. They see that there's an urgency. But in my experience, that hasn't really trickled down yet to the front lines. So kind of that middle management layer of health care is still really actively kind of pushing against the need to change, the need to think more consumer centric. They see that kind of as a challenge to their own organization. And I totally get it because literally their job is to maintain the status quo. They are measured. They incentivized to, you know, throughput, bringing the volumes in, decreasing length of stay. Their job is to make sure that things stay the same along that track. So, you know, right now, bringing in teams like ours, it's kind of scary to them. So even though executive leadership's bought in, hoping in the next year or two that we can start to really bring that down to another level, to the folks doing the work that need to embrace the change and I think there's a couple of things that will happen in the next couple of years that may help to accelerate that that mindset shift. You know, one of them, of course, being we're going to continue to see the Walmarts and the CVS's and the one medical that are prioritizing convenience over physician relationships continue to grow. And I don't I don't think anyone would necessarily disagree with that trend. But when you look at what those entities are doing and how they approach scheduling, it's based on time and location. The provider piece is secondary. It's either buried behind for links to, you know, we have to click through a bunch of things to find who would the provider I would be seeing Tuesday at 11:00 B or it's not listed at all. Or maybe it's just a name and a picture, but there's no profile. And that's very, very, very different from how traditional health care approaches sort of that everything is driven by this relationship with a physician. So I think the other piece that's going to start helping that mindset shift is that, you know, we have all of these new don't even know that they're new. They've been around for seven, several years. But growth in these sort of online, asynchronous access to providers focused on very specific problems. Right. So like the hims and hers, hair loss, birth control, dermatology, you know, as a patient, I can just go to a to a website, I can fill out a form and say exactly what I need. And like the next day it's magically called into my pharmacy or they're delivering it directly to my house. I think those things are going to start really pushing on and chipping away at primary care, the kind of that traditional primary care to a point where the front lines are feeling that shift and seeing it. It's going to be tangible. And I'm hopeful that in the next year or two that that's going to start kind of being the catalyst that helps sort of the frontline stuff, see the urgency and maybe be a little more open and willing to try new things and change. At least that's my hope.

Well, I'm going to second that and we can we should keep our eye on it, you know, just see if we can come back here in a year or two and see, you know, how are we doing compared to that vision? I love it. I love thinking of the destination and what that could yield for all of us. This has been such a pleasure to me and I want to thank you for for joining us. And with that, that's that's a wrap for this episode. I've had the pleasure of speaking with Denise Carroll from Memorial Hermann Health System. Thanks so much for joining us today. Thanks.

Well, I'm going to second that and we can we should keep our eye on it, you know, just see if we can come back here in a year or two and see, you know, how are we doing compared to that vision? I love it. I love thinking of the destination and what that could yield for all of us. This has been such a pleasure to me and I want to thank you for for joining us. And with that, that's that's a wrap for this episode. I've had the pleasure of speaking with Denise Carroll from Memorial Hermann Health System. Thanks so much for joining us today. Thanks.

I really appreciate it.

I really appreciate it.

Thanks for tuning in. If you like what you heard, please spread the word. Tell your colleagues to tune in for all the awesomeness, then leave a review on Apple, Spotify or wherever you listen. This show is produced by Shift Forward Health The Channel for Change Makers. Subscribe to Shift Forward Health on your favorite podcast app and you'll be subscribed to our entire library of shows. See our full lineup at Shift Forward Health one subscription, all the podcasts you need and it's all for free. And remember, we might have a lot of work to do in health care, but we'll get there faster together. Thanks again.

Thanks for tuning in. If you like what you heard, please spread the word. Tell your colleagues to tune in for all the awesomeness, then leave a review on Apple, Spotify or wherever you listen. This show is produced by Shift Forward Health The Channel for Change Makers. Subscribe to Shift Forward Health on your favorite podcast app and you'll be subscribed to our entire library of shows. See our full lineup at Shift Forward Health one subscription, all the podcasts you need and it's all for free. And remember, we might have a lot of work to do in health care, but we'll get there faster together. Thanks again.