B-Time with Beth Bierbower

How do you help a company pivot and emerge stronger?  How do you chose what to prioritize versus not?  How do you engage your employees in the company’s future vision?  We discuss these issues and more with Matt Levin, CEO of Benefitfocus as he talks about leading his company through a time of change.

Show Notes: Podcasts: Smartless; The Rewatchables with Bill Simmons; Hacks on Tap with David Axelrod & Mike Murphy; Hell & Highwater with John Heilemann.  Books:  Team of Rivals by Doris Kearns Goodwin; Books by Michael Lewis or James B. Stewart; Biographies of Michael Jordan or Walter Peyton.

We are talking today with Patrick Quigley, the Founder and CEO of Sidecar Health, a company that is offering personalized, simplified coverage to individuals and equipping these consumers with cost information to help them make good decisions about their healthcare.  I am excited to learn more about what Sidecar Health is doing to simplify and create affordable coverage and provide price transparency that’s meaningful by removing the intermediary as we know it today.  Patrick is no stranger to healthcare as he was formerly the CEO of HealthPlans.com.

Show notes:  The Price We Pay by Marty Makary, MD.  Podcasts:  The Cleveland Browns Daily Podcast.

Today we are going to discuss the impact of cellular carriers sunsetting their 3G networks this year.  You may wonder why the sunsetting of 3G is an appropriate topic for a podcast focused predominantly on healthcare, so here’s the answer.  The sunsetting of 3G networks has a significant impact on the elderly and low-income populations.  Many devices such as older phones, personal emergency response systems and home alarm systems including carbon dioxide alarm systems will cease to work.

Many individuals cannot afford to replace these devices.  In addition, COVID has significantly slowed the ability for service workers to upgrade systems in the home.  As healthcare leaders, is this issue on our radar screen?  Will we find it more difficult to contact chronically ill members whose phones no longer work?  Will we see increased costs due to the failure of a PERS device to signal for help? 

With us today to educate us on the 3G sunset issue and what is being done to help people upgrade is Janet Dillione, CEO of Connect America which brings digital health connected solutions into the home to improve the safety, care and quality of life for the elderly who want to remain living independently as long as possible.

Janet has a long history in digital health serving in the past as President & CEO of Siemens Medical Solutions, EVP & GM of Nuance Communications Healthcare Division and President and CEO of  Action Management Technologies and Bernoulli. 

Show Notes:  Books The Leadership Moment by Michael Useem.  Podcast: The Spycast Podcast.

:  Approximately 800,000 people in the US have a heart attack every year?  1 in 4 people have had previously had a heart attack.  When an individual is recovering from a heart attack or has a serious heart problem, Cardiac rehabilitation can be an instrumental part of not only the individual’s recovery, but also in preventing future heart attacks.

Today we are going to hear from Ade Adesanya, Co-founder and President of Moving Analytics, a company that offers Cardiac Rehabilitation in the comfort of the patient’s home.  We’ll learn exactly what Cardiac Rehabilitation entails, and why many people fail to participate despite the demonstrated success of these programs. 

Show notes: Favorite Book:  Crossing The Chasm by Geoffrey Moore.  Podcasts: Tim Ferris Podcast; Access & Opportunity with Carla Harris.

The Price We Pay: What Broke American Health Care And How To Fix It by Marty Makary, MD is a book that takes a hard look at aspects of the US healthcare system that drive up the costs of premiums and other patient out-of-pocket costs.  Makary looks at PBMs, broker payments, hospital billing and financial recovery practices and inappropriate procedures to name a few.  Regardless of where you work in the healthcare system, you may find yourself getting defensive one moment and nodding your head in agreement in another.

What Makary is after at the end of the day is price transparency which he believes will help bring healthcare costs down.  The author makes many good points in the book about hidden costs that drive significant profitability for one party while the other party is in the dark.  Typically, price transparency levels the playing field between seller and buyer and enables new market entrants to redefine a business model that offers service at a lower cost. 

Price transparency isn’t exactly a thrilling topic but Makary is a brilliant writer whose writing and storytelling is on par with exceptionally good journalists.  I couldn’t put the book down.  The reader will not agree with every point that Makary makes.  However, many would agree that we are at the tipping point for price transparency, some of which will come about due to regulation and other aspects will be driven by market competitiveness.  Health care leaders must rethink their business models due to transparency changes and it’s prudent to take a close look at major areas in need of an overhaul.  The Price We Pay by Makary is an informative book to read to level set on how we operate today and to remind us how costly, continuing many of these practices can be in the future.

With me is Sara Potecha who is a leadership consultant, executive coach and speaker.  Sara was not only in one of the first groups of women that were admitted to the United States Military Academy at West Point, she also graduated after four tough and life-changing years.

Sara shares the leadership characteristics she learned and explains how they are relatable to life and leadership outside the military in her book, West Point Woman.  I’ll be asking Sara to share some of these life lessons with us along with several stories of how she succeeded at such an historic institution that was less than welcoming to the women it was forced to let into its hallowed halls.

Show Notes:  Sara enjoyed the following books:  Atomic Habits by James Clear; she enjoys books by Steven Covey, Malcolm Gladwell (including David and Goliath), and books by Simon Sinek including Leaders Eat Last.  Sara enjoys listening to leadership podcasts by Carey Nieuwhof, John Maxwell & Simon Sinek.

The Book Healthcare Without Walls: A Roadmap For Reinventing U.S. Healthcare does what its title states – provides a roadmap for executives to use as they are rethinking healthcare delivery now.  The book’s contributors include many of the nation’s brightest healthcare leaders and practitioners.  The book consists of five chapters covering technology, reimbursement, regulatory approaches, workforce and human factors and states what can be done using many of the resources we have today or that are quickly emerging.  These are not pie-in-the-sky scenarios, they are practical, useful and within reach.

In addition to covering the key issues that must be addressed to achieve healthcare without walls, the book includes eight realistic patient/family scenarios including one on what should happen if there were a pandemic which is uncanny foresight for a book published in 2019.

While some will read the book from cover to cover, its power lies in serving as a reference guide.  Executives should use the information to challenge their business strategies and their leadership team’s thinking.  It’s like having an expert you can call upon in your back pocket. 

Books like this can become outdated quickly.  I don’t think this is the case for Healthcare Without Walls.  The book is relevant today and will be for the next decade – at least. 

:   In October of this year, The Kaiser Family Foundation released a study that showed 7 in 10 Medicare Beneficiaries did not shop for new plans during the 2018 open enrollment period.  If this is the case, then why all the focus on plan design enhancements each year?

To help us understand what Medicare Advantage plans are currently doing to attract and retain members and what they might do better is Betsy Seals.  Betsy is the CEO and Co-founder of Rebellis Group, a consulting firm with deep expertise in health plans, PBM and government regulations.  The Rebellis Group helps organization with strategy and operational processes to help optimize their business models.  Betsy has 20-years’ experience in the healthcare industry and has worked for notable companies such as Scan Health Plan, Anthem,  and Gorman Health Group.

Show notes:  Betsy listens to podcasts that are related to healthcare matters.  As a busy working mother, the last book she read was Where the Crawdads Sing by Delia Owens.

Our guest today has created a simple, integrated platform that uniquely leverages the one piece of technology that is ubiquitous with the elderly – and that is the television.  Kian Saneii is the Founder and CEO of Independa, a company that provides everything from video chat to reminders through the television.  Kian is going to explain how Independa is helping reduce the angst of caregivers and the elderly and creating a foundation for bi-directional communication.   

Show notes:  You can reach Kian at [email protected].  Book Recommendations: The Innovator’s Prescription & The Innovator’s Dilemma by Clay Christenson; Jonathan Livingston Seagull by Richard Bach; The Little Prince by Antoine de Saint Exupery; Childhood’s End by Arthur C. Clark; The Creative Destruction of Medicine: How The Digital Revolution Will Create Better Healthcare by Eric Topol; The Art of War by Sun Tzu.  Podcasts: The Catch and Kill Podcast with Ronan Farrow

Advances in creating a more effective and efficient healthcare system will be tied to digital transformation which requires changes in the way we use technology and data, the way we manage our workflows and reimagining the system from a consumer perspective.  Our guest today, Dr. Maia Hightower spends a great deal of time thinking through these issues.  Dr. Hightower is a physician is the former Chief Medical Information Officer for the University of Utah Health.

During her career, Dr. Hightower has led or collaborated on initiatives ranging from EMR optimization and usability, introduction of new technology and population health initiatives, quality reporting and process improvement. She strives to “leave no one behind” with a team-based approach to supporting all members of the healthcare community to achieve professional fulfillment in our rapidly changing digital healthcare environment.

Dr. Hightower’s drive is to advance the work of clinicians, care teams, researchers, educators and learners by providing health information technology tools, processes, and systems needed to adapt to change and provide value to our patients, families and communities in the digital era of healthcare.  Dr. Hightower was recently recognized by Health Data Management as one of the “Most Powerful Women in Healthcare IT” and “25 leading CMIOs at healthcare organizations

Show notes:  Books: HBR’s 10 Must Reads On Entrepreneurship & Startups; The Practice by Seth Godin; Upstream: The Quest To Solve Problems Before They Happen by Dan Health