I Don't Care

Today on 'I Don't Care', Kevin gives an update on how COVID-19 has affected Central Texas. He talks about how his hospital has dealt with the pandemic, what the County has done and how the community has embraced and supported healthcare workers. Kevin offers a heartfelt message of hope and talks about how our lives have been positively changed in surprising ways.

Join Kevin as he discusses the impact of COVID-19 on higher education with Dr. David Toledo, Director of Worship Studies and Associate Professor of Music at California Baptist University. Dr. Toledo discusses how Cal Baptist has implemented online learning through an existing platform and the challenges of teaching vocalists, instrumentalists and conducting students online.

Dr. Toledo also talked a great deal about how student engagement and involvement has changed, with professors taking on broader roles as counselor and advocate. He also discusses how the Christian foundation of Cal Baptist has undergirded all of their decisions and actions, making their COVID-19 response a true mission.

Join Kevin and his guest, Allye Crosby, as they discuss how COVID-19 has affected the labor and delivery process. We'll talk about moms and babies and how their special time has drastically changed during the pandemic. Allye also fills us in on how her hospital is dealing with COVID-19 and about life in New Orleans during this unique time.

Kevin is joined by Reverend Stephen T. Carrell, Pastor of Worship and Music at Park Cities Baptist Church in Dallas, TX, who shares how his church and other churches have been impacted and have responded to the COVID-19 pandemic. Stephen speaks to new avenues of worship, working with their mission partners to serve the underserved in Dallas and his hope of revival across the world.

Join Kevin as he talks with his wife Michelle, a flight attendant for a major airline. They discuss enhanced cleaning protocols, crew safety and changes in air travel in light of COVID-19.

This week on I Don’t Care, Kevin Stevenson takes a look at the impact the COVID-19 crisis is having on long term care facilities. Many patients in these facilities are the most susceptible to the most severe effects of the virus as they are older or have weakened immune systems.

The healthcare professionals running these facilities have had to quickly adapt to this threat to keep their community safe which means restricting family access, restricting social activities, and additional monitoring of at risk patients. Today’s guest, Cody Savell, gives his personal perspective of how this has affected his immediate family and the changes he has seen.

The virus has not only affected the hospital and care facilities but has brought most businesses to a grinding halt. As a small business owner, Cody shares how he is navigating the new COVID-19 world and trying to protect his business as well as his employees.

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Catch upon previous episodes of I Don’t Care with Kevin Stevenson!

The global COVID-19 pandemic has initiated ripple effects across every global industry, and education is no exception.

Universities and public school districts around the U.S. are being proactive in addressing the impact of this viral outbreak, working to mitigate the impact of COVID-19 on students, faculty and surrounding communities.

On this episode of I Don’t Care with Kevin Stevenson, Stevenson was joined by Keller ISD attorney Amanda Bigbee, who detailed how her district is handling everything from online learning, meal provision for students who rely on it and more.

To begin, Keller ISD shuttered for two weeks at the recommendation of Tarrant County health officials, leveraging the benefit of already being effectively closed for spring break to attempt to mitigate the potential spread of the virus.

In particular, Bigbee said communication is critical for public school systems like Keller ISD.

“We did not panic. … We started the emergency management plan, which we have in place,” Bigbee said. “We began the communication process to our families so they knew they wouldn’t be returning on Monday and started trying to move the wheels to figure out how we educate 36,000 kids with varying levels of needs online. It's been nonstop since the morning of Friday, March 13.”

On this episode of I Don’t Care, host Kevin Stevenson was joined by Christian Torres for a discussion about the ins and outs of revenue cycle management, or medical billing, in the healthcare industry.

Torres has more than two decades of experience helping healthcare professionals manage this complex aspect of the business.

“We help doctor’s offices and other healthcare providers, whether they’re therapy, counselors, you name it, with their billing,” Torres said. “We help them get paid by the insurance, and, really, we help them navigate the ever-changing of insurance claim filing.”

Today, coding has also become critically important – essentially, with the advent and adoption of electronic healthcare management systems, there has arisen a necessity to correctly provide diagnosis codes in these systems to ensure the process of making claims and getting paid runs as smoothly as possible.

Barriers have risen in the face of this process as a result of much more detailed and specific diagnosis codes – as Torres put it, instead of a few codes for types of broken legs, there could now be a code for breaking a specific leg, in a specific place, because of a fall off of a skateboard.

Stevenson and Torres also dove into more issues surrounding complications and challenges associated with electronic health record systems, the pressures put on medical staff assigned with managing these processes, and more.

Host Kevin Stevenson cares; he just doesn’t do care. On this episode of I Don't Care, Stevenson spoke with someone who does do care: Colea Owens, Professional Development Nursing Educator. Owens’ passion is quality healthcare, and she knows the best way for nurses to provide the best care for patients is first to take care of their own well-being. Owens advocates for nursing self-care and diversity in the healthcare industry.

“Empathy is why nurses are so trusted,” Owens said. “But being in such an empathetic profession, sometimes nurses care so much for their patients, they forget to care for themselves.”

Owens pointed out the need for teaching nurses coping skills to deal with some of the more high-stress situations that come with patient care.

Owens saw opportunities to set nurses on a path for success from the first year in nursing school. Residency programs are one way to help nurses understand the real-life challenges they’ll face on the job and determine what area of nursing they’ll pursue.

“I think the hospitals, the schools, and the industry as a whole, need to do a better job at the outset of setting the expectation of the reality of what nurses will face in the real world,” said Owens. "Nurses learn everything they need to know from a textbook standpoint in school, but once they get out in the field, how do they deal with patient experience and hospitality? I don’t believe institutions provide enough emphasis on these issues in nursing school.”

Owens said nurses should be better advocates for themselves at their healthcare facilities; show up to meetings where their opinions could make a difference. If there is a weekly clinician meeting taking place and a nurse advocate is not there to share what is working and what is not, the problem will inevitably continue.

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On this episode of I Don't Care, host Kevin Stevenson is joined by Eastland Memorial Hospital’s Ron Hunt, who brings to the table a lengthy career of experience in rehab and post-acute care, to discuss the ins and outs of rural healthcare.

Rural facilities can differ from those in larger metropolitan areas in a variety of ways, including the very nature of their staffs of medical professionals – rural facilities sometimes have to rely on episodic doctors willing to travel and work on location.

“We’re pretty fortunate here (at Eastland),” Hunt said. “We’ve got, I believe, five physicians that are still in town. … We’ve got a general surgeon, which you don’t see happen very much, anymore.”
Still, Hunt and Eastland also contract with an outside company through a hospitalist program, which allows for outside physicians to come into the hospital and stay with patients from the time they are admitted until discharge. Eastland’s ER operates in a similar manner.

Hunt and Stevenson also discussed the challenges that Eastland and rural facilities face, including aging populations, challenges in treating patients who are unemployed, and more

“There are a number of things that are going on in rural America that make it difficult for us to maintain the hospital,” Hunt said. “We have an older population. … The other thing that we see out here is we see a lot of people who are either unemployed or underemployed.”