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FATHERS of Invention
How one medical company finds its inspiration from within Written by Hazel Davis Produced by Tom Venturo
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nnovation is very important to medical reference laboratory PAML; so much so that it created a division dedicated to its pursuit. Dr Francisco R. VelĂĄzquez, President
and CEO, says, “Their job is to go around the organization and look for opportunities to improve our quality, our service, and our costs, with the caveat that everything they do must w w w. p a m l . c o m
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have, at the end of the day, some lead each of these ventures, as financial impact.” They call this team well as the primary PAML brand the Performance Solutions Group. and two PAML product lines. The Washington company, With the responsibility of 11 which was founded in 1957, serves entities, no two days look the same physicians, hospitals, members of for Dr Velázquez. He says, “I do the community, employers, move around a lot and I like and other allied health to go spend time in our professionals. It is various facilities and ranked among with our various the top clinical partners.” The reference company’s laboratories partners in the country are varied and is and range considered an from testing industry leader partnerships in joint venture – Dr Francisco Velázquez, (such as a partnerships President & CEO health system in with communityMontana) to high-level, based hospitals. Its nationwide joint ventures. laboratory outreach program These ventures have been partners with hospitals allowing them to significantly grow their developed and continue to develop, laboratory outreach businesses. Dr Velázquez says, “On the basis of PAML has eight joint ventures, our philosophy; that healthcare is local each a freestanding LLC based on and our goal should be to enhance the a community partnership model. Dr ability of local providers to provide the Velázquez and his team of executives broadest possible service level they
We always know how we’re doing with pretty much anything at any given time with the appropriate report or report structure
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can.” Partnerships have to be mutually beneficial and involve providing better services to the communities they are in, he adds, or they will find other avenues to do business. PAML’s strategic partnerships include one with the molecular technology company, Axela, a spin-out of the University of Toronto. “They have a very unique technology that we see as beneficial for our partners, so we partner with them and help develop assays that can be used in the American market,” says Dr Velázquez. Partnerships account for many advances, though PAML also prides itself on its ability to produce innovative resources in-house. One of these resources is a new, progressive cost-accounting system. “We’re going to see more bundle payments, more population health management, more regionally integrated networks and more valuebased care,” says Dr Velázquez. “So, the common denominator to all those is not revenue. The common denominator is that you must understand your cost structure,
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Francisco Velázquez President & CEO
Francisco R. Velázquez, M.D., S.M. is the President and Chief Executive Officer for PAML, LLC and PAML Ventures. Prior to joining PAML, Dr. Velázquez was Managing Director for the Quest Diagnostics Nichols Institute, and Vice President for Focus Diagnostics, in San Juan Capistrano and Cypress, California respectively. Dr. Velázquez trained at the Mallory Institute of Pathology in Boston, the Boston University Medical Center and is Board Certified by the American Board of Pathology. Subsequent to his training, Dr. Velázquez obtained a Masters in Health Care Management and Policy at Harvard University School of Public Health, Boston, Massachusetts.
Partnering to empower lab optimization As the global leader in in vitro diagnostics, Roche is proud to be a valued strategic partner of PAML. Roche is committed to providing laboratories like PAML with innovative workflow solutions to drive productivity, quality and the consistent, cost-effective delivery of critical diagnostic insights to clinicians and the patients they serve.
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very, very, very, very well so you can make informed decisions as to which one of these market models you can participate in and what the advantages and disadvantages are, from a financial perspective. In order to do that you have to have real-time access to the ways your costs are changing throughout the day. “What most laboratory companies do is they react on a monthly or weekly or quarterly basis to what happened. To what already happened. We believe it’s more important to react while it’s happening so we can correct it or change course,” says Dr Velázquez. So, the business performance division at PAML has engineered a system that keeps track
of metrics, on a real-time basis, “So we always know how we’re doing, with pretty much anything, at any given time, with the appropriate report or report structure.” PAML’s role in the economic development of the region, specifically in the area of life sciences, is something very important to the company. To that end, Dr Velázquez is in a number of leadership groups looking at medical education, healthcare, and healthcare-related technology. One of the projects he’s currently working on is the new medical school in the area. This, along with other projects, generates dialogue and development throughout the
PAML’s General Administration Offices, located in Spokane, WA
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“WE ALWAYS KNOW how we’re
doing with pretty much anything at any given time with the appropriate report or report structure” – Francisco Velázquez, President & CEO
community and company. Opening lines of communication is critical to Dr Velázquez and he makes a point of regularly spending time with the company’s clients, partners, and employees. “I tend to walk around whenever possible and just ask people how are they doing and what’s going on and what can we be doing better or different,” he says, though he agrees this isn’t the norm in a lot of organizations. “My theory, without any analytics behind it, is that employees have about 65 percent of the answers to all the questions we are asking, if we just take the time to ask.” He meets his partners in their offices because, it’s “more productive to do it that way and it allows them to
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be in their own environment.” He also says he enjoys knocking on doors for a quick chat, as you can learn quite a lot about the person and the business, “as long as they are free to talk, that is.” PAML spends a lot of time asking employees what they think could be improved. According to Dr Velázquez, “We’re always looking at our operation with the question of how can we do better. Once we are 100 percent confident that it is replicable, then we’ll go more public with it.” He talks of a man who “started at PAML in logistics, a fireman paramedic by training. But he is someone who had this inquisitive mind and a very well-defined analytical skill. He helped us develop
PAML
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Lab Equipment
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5 1. PAML uses state of the art equipment to process millions of specimens every year 2. Cutting edge laboratory technology allows PAML to remain a leader in the industry. 3. Specimens from across the country make their way to PAML for processing. 4. One of many pieces of equipment used to process client samples. 5. Significant patient diagnosis’ come from blood tests, like those processed at PAML’s National Reference Laboratory in Spokane, WA. w w w. p a m l . c o m
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a superb logistical system. I was impressed with the fact he was very serious so we decided to let him loose and see what happened… He’s now the Chief Performance Improvement Officer,” leading the business performance division. The general philosophy at PAML is that everyone has something to offer. Says Dr. Velázquez, “Sometimes little changes can have positive impacts.”
PAML, YEAR FOUNDED
1957
1,753
Number of employees at PAML
PAML YEARLY REVENUE
$250+ MILLION
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National Corporate Headquarters 629 N. Iron Court Spokane, Washington, USA , 99202
mbachilla@paml.com www.website.com