Issue link: https://beckershealthcare.uberflip.com/i/1444560
34 INNOVATION Can hospitals go too digital? 8 executives weigh in By Katie Adams H ospitals have been investing millions in digitization efforts to improve workflows and care outcomes over the past decade, but research from October 2021 shows nearly half of employees say too much digitalization hurts productivity. Here, eight executives from hospitals and health systems across the U.S. answer the questions: "How do you know when you've gone too dig- ital? How do you strike the balance of making things more efficient without confusing staff?" Note: Responses were edited lightly for clarity and style. Karen Murphy, PhD, RN. Chief Innovation Officer at Geisinger (Danville, Pa.): Suc- cessful digital transformation always begins with the end user. At Geisinger, we heavily invest in the design process, which includes engaging staff and patients as we develop technology solutions. We also identify key performance metrics as well as an evaluation strategy prior to launching. We have found that the greater the complexity in using the technology, the more frustrating it is for the end user. Low engagement rates are a signal that you've either gone too far digital or de- veloped an ineffective tool, resulting in the need to go back to the design process. Our rule regarding staff engagement is that the digital tool cannot add to the staff bur- den. Digital solutions have to take away the complexity of work. Again, engaging staff in the design process enhances the probability of success. Also, we do not want to "digitalize" current processes. e idea is to transform using digital tools as an enabling strategy. e goal is to improve staff experience. Greg Till. Chief People Officer at Provi- dence (Renton, Wash.): For the last several years, healthcare has been racing to catch up with the rapid acceleration of digital tools that consumers use in their everyday lives. at urgency has led to the proliferation of ad- ministrative applications, sites and other dig- ital solutions that solve for discrete business needs but largely ignore the holistic employ- ee experience. Caregivers from Providence and its family of organizations have made it clear that merely adding to the growing list of workplace tools without considering the entire digital footprint is a losing proposition. Instead, we must consider caregivers' full ex- perience and design digital support that pro- vides fast, simple ways to get work done. At Providence, we are investing more in up- front design that contemplates the full eco- system of work tools from our caregivers' experience. is means ensuring all of our functional teams are collaborating on a us- er-centered design experience, taking into account how caregivers access our adminis- trative tools on a daily basis. A success using user-centered design is the launch of OnboardMe, an app that helps newly hired caregivers and their leaders get real-time support from hire through the full onboarding experience. From access to providing updates all along the onboarding journey, OnboardMe is integrated into the workday, so it feels like a natural, value-add use of technology. We are looking forward to continuing our digital jour- ney and offering even more integrated, digital- ly-enabled work experiences for caregivers, so they can focus on the important high touch work of caring for our patients. Richard Zane, MD. Chief Innovation Offi- cer at UCHealth (Aurora, Colo.): I lament the term "digital" or "virtual" health because there is nothing virtual about it; it's really technology-enabled "actual" care. At the end of the day, healthcare boils down to people, process and tools. We must keep in mind that digital is just a tool for people to take care of other people and "digital" is not a destina- tion in and of itself. Like any tool, it requires training and human adjudication on when and how to best use it. Our guiding principles are simple: digital health must be easier and not harder, fewer clicks and not more, the path of least resis- tance, bulletproof, and must enhance human connectivity and not decrease it. e bottom line is that if a tool does not make providers' jobs better and easier and does not improve our patients' experience and lives, then it needs to stay on a shelf. Kolaleh Eskandanian, PhD. Chief Innova- tion Officer at Children's National Hospital (Washington, D.C.): e root cause of be- ing too digital is oen the absence of a well- integrated digital transformation strategy, one that would take into consideration all as- pects of a hospital's value chain. And, I always wonder: What happened to the notion of the good-old ERP (enterprise resource plan- ning) introduced in the 1990s? Why are some health systems so consumed with enhancing and babysitting their EHRs that they put the equally important back-office digital trans- formation on the back burner? is hurts the productivity and efficiency of the health system as a whole, contributing to staff burnout and confusion. So, I would say we can never go too digital in the presence of a well-integrated digital transformation agenda that takes into consideration integration and in- teroperability for all actors of the hospital's eco- system: 1) patients and their families, 2) clini- cians, 3) scientists and 4) back-office operators. Daniel Durand, MD. Chief Clinical Officer at LifeBridge Health (Baltimore): Many of us truly believe that digital health and virtual care can help us be both more efficient and more effective at delivering a wide range of healthcare services. But digital and virtual medicine must always remain a means to the end of helping people care for people. Trou- ble arises when digital transformation simply becomes about putting more contemporary tools in place or staying at the front of indus- try trends. We need to look for sustainable adoption rates, avoid overly abrupt transi- tions to digital, and protect against the "dig- ital confusion" of having too many separate solutions in place simultaneously. So, how can we balance our sense of urgen- cy to improve care rapidly while protecting against "digital for digital's sake"? We need to keep ourselves honest by relentlessly focus- ing on measuring each innovation across the full "quintuple aim" of improved population health outcomes, decreased total cost of care, enhanced patient and provider experience, and equity in all of these measures between populations. If, aer a reasonable imple- mentation period, a specific digital or virtual innovation fails to sustainably create more healthcare value than it consumes, then it's likely an example of digital gone too far, or at least too far ahead of its time. omas Graham, MD. Chief Innovation and Transformation Officer at Kettering Health (Dayton, Ohio): Few sophisticated healthcare delivery systems are experienc- ing a paucity of data. e relationship we "We must keep in mind that digital is just a tool for people to take care of other people and 'digital' is not a destination in and of itself." Dr. Richard Zane, UCHealth