In this episode, Dr. Cawley sits down for an in-depth conversation with Dr. Muthu Alagappan, CMO at Notable. In addition to digital transformation the two discuss the role of technology in improving patient safety and quality, on-going healthcare labor shortages, burnout, the challenge of seeking to fundamentally change the way things are done, the keys to finding the right partners, and more.

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Dr. Patrick J. Cawley is the Chief Executive Officer of MUSC Health and Executive Vice President for Health Affairs of the Medical University of South Carolina. In this role, he oversees all clinical matters as they relate to MUSC. During his leadership, MUSC has significantly expanded its clinical enterprise with a new Children's Hospital, a regional health network, multiple ambulatory sites, development of additional clinical affiliates, and numerous novel joint ventures. Additionally, MUSC has become a national leader in telehealth and has continued as South Carolina's #1 hospital/health system per US News and World Report.

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0:09:12: The role of technology in improving patient safety and quality.

0:09:53: How do you use technology to change the business?

0:10:10: Digital transformation.

0:11:04: Dr. Cawley: “There have been phenomenal technology advances in the past 10 years in healthcare, we use a lot of them, but I still have this feeling we're not using enough of them, mainly because we're trying to fix problems in the same old way through the same old checklist rather than using AI or some advanced sensor that we might be able to put somewhere in order to answer some of these really basic but recurring problems.”

0:19:04: Labor shortages on the clinician and administrative staff side of things.

0:19:51: Burnout is a real issue and it was an issue pre-pandemic. When the pandemic hit, the industry doubled down on doing things the way they had always been done. That compounded the issue and now we’re seeing the result.

0:20:22: Dr. Cawley: “We must change the way we deliver care.”

0:22:24: Dr. Cawley: “...we have to figure out how we optimize the things that only our physicians, nurses, and other providers can do and take the other stuff away from them, use technology to replace a lot of it, but we have got to be purposeful about it.”

0:22:41: Burnout and the labor shortages are the challenge of the next 10 years.

0:22:50: Dr. Cawley: “What we see today is just going to be nothing compared to what happens in 10 years as the population ages, as there are more people needing healthcare, and burnout has continued, people leave early, and now, you got a severe problem. It’s a real problem today. This could get worse if we don’t approach it right.”

0:23:13: Dr. Muthu Alagappan asks ‘Is automation inevitable in that case?’ He says, “Is that how you see this playing out in the next five or 10 years, that a lot of the work at health systems that is currently manual becomes automated?”

0:23:43: Dr. Cawley: “Absolutely, we have to keep people working at the very, very top of their license.”

0:24:06: Dr. Cawley: “I think there’s a lot of technology out there today, we just don't use enough of it, and we don't use enough of it because leaders get caught in this paradigm of delivering care the way they see it today…”

0:24:35 Dr. Cawley: “When you begin to really, really understand that [the technology] and seek to change the way you do things today, that's when the magic happens. And you can bring technology experts to the physician, but until the physician, the physician leader, the clinical leader begins to say, ‘Hey, wecan do this differently’, that's when it's going to change faster.”

0:28:05: Dr. Muthu Alagappan asks how you sift through the noise and determine when to partner and with whom from a technology POV.

0:28:45: Dr. Cawley: “Every leader should be involved in their own search for that digital transformation.”

0:30:10: The key to finding the right partners, per Dr. Cawley, is finding those who are aligned, even somewhat broadly, around mission, vision and values.

0:31:49: Lessons learned for other health systems as they may be about to embark on a partnership journey around technology.

0:32:04: Dr. Cawley: “Very, very, very first tip I would give is, get over yourself. Partnership is better than doing it by yourself.”

0:34:55: END

Relevant Links

• How MUSC and Notable are partnering to drive better patient retention and empower staff to use their higher purpose.