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HEALTH CARE INNOVATION

IMPROVING THE PATIENT EXPERIENCE

While health care innovation accelerated over the last decade, the COVID-19 crisis presented unique opportunities for the U.S. health system to do it in real time. Telehealth, which providers adopted at an unprecedented rate, is just one example. Three health care leaders shared their insights with Crain’s Content Studio on the innovations that will change health care and medicine, helping physicians support patients and families everywhere.

How is your organization involved with health care innovation?

Dr. Steven J. Lester: Mayo Clinic has a long history of innovation and there are more examples of health care innovation than I could begin to outline here. For example, I’m the founder and have the privilege to be the chief medical officer of the Mayo Clinic and ASU MedTech Accelerator, which helps empower medical startups to better navigate challenges while bringing forward life-changing innovations. I’m also honored to be the medical director for our complex care program, which helps employers provide access to high-quality, cost-effective care for individuals with complex medical conditions. These are just a few of the programs in an evolving portfolio of programs and activities designed to enhance the innovation ecosystem at Mayo Clinic.

Rich Fahn: “Innovate or die” has become a reality for most businesses.

As an insurance broker, NFP provides best-in-class vendors to support clients’ goals. Not only do we evaluate hundreds of companies bringing new technology to the market, but our strategic corporate venture

milder issues before clinical care is needed. To support patients, we’ve found that it’s increasingly important to offer short wait times to schedule visits—within seven minutes with trained primary care physicians and within one to seven days with mental health specialists, with same-day appointments available. Finally, we continue to partner with innovative health plans and large employers across the country to implement virtual-first plan designs and offer virtual primary care to support their members, wherever and whenever they need care.

What’s the most exciting health trend or development you’re seeing?

Fahn: The intersection of technology and data has revolutionized digital tools such as apps, telemedicine, artificial intelligence, robotics, transparency and visibility—allowing consumers to make better, more informed health decisions. They no longer have to access care in person; they have information at their fingertips and can take control of their health needs, enabling better outcomes. Historically, consumers found it difficult to find information on the cost and quality of care,

RICH FAHN

VP - Corporate Benefits NFP rich.fahn@nfp.com 224-374-1540

receive a definitive diagnosis in our individualized medicine practice.

And in the world of oncology, 50% of our patients with advanced cancers found a sequencing-based druggable target—or simply stated, based on an understanding of a unique genetic code, we’re able to precisely define the best medication at the most appropriate dose for our patients.

STEVEN J. LESTER, MD

PRENTISS TAYLOR, MD, FACP

Consultant, Professor of Medicine Mayo Clinic mcccpi@mayo.edu 507-422-6102

VP - Medical Affairs Grand Rounds Health Doctor On Demand sales@doctorondemand.com

Taylor: The most exciting trend we’re seeing is an increased focus on diversity, equity and inclusion as it relates to health care. While this has always been a core part of our strategy, we’re seeing an increase in questions from employers and consultants about DEI initiatives.

Currently 43% of our providers are people of color and 20% identify

as LGBTQ+. Being able to provide affirmative, culturally competent care for all of our patients is a priority.

What innovations have you recently implemented?

Taylor: We’ve made monumental strides in bringing integrated care to patients in the comfort of their

“ . . . BASED ON AN UNDERSTANDING OF A UNIQUE GENETIC CODE, WE’RE ABLE TO PRECISELY DEFINE THE BEST MEDICATION AT THE MOST APPROPRIATE DOSE FOR OUR PATIENTS.” — DR. STEVEN J. LESTER, MAYO CLINIC capital arm, NFP Ventures, invests in early-stage benefitech and insurtech companies. The fund’s investment strategy combines a disciplined approach related to the “future of risk” to keep ahead of market trends and provide thought leadership to our industry. We’re at the forefront of innovation because our clients demand it.

Dr. Prentiss Taylor: At Grand Rounds Health and Doctor On Demand, we’ve fully integrated our mental health practice with our national medical practice. This means that providers can easily communicate between the practices, make internal referrals and drill down on improving “whole-person health.” We also added chat-based mental health coaching for addressing

putting individuals and businesses at a disadvantage and frequently resulting in higher costs and dangerous gaps in quality of care.

Lester: Imagine a new dawn for medicine where cancer is commonly intercepted, treatment of diseases is more precise and less toxic, prescribing medication is safer and the burden of inherited genetic disease is reduced. While once only imagined, this new dawn of medicine is becoming a reality and part of the promise of individualized medicine.

Our ability to decode the DNA that constitutes the human genome is accelerating our understanding of the causation of disease and helping to tailor patient-specific treatment plans.

For example, approximately 30% of patients on a diagnostic odyssey can

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HEALTH CARE INNOVATION

IMPROVING THE PATIENT EXPERIENCE own homes. Coordinated medical and mental health video visits, home delivery of prescriptions and delivery of remote patient monitoring device kits are examples of solutions that give patients access to convenient care. We’re also committed to providing a continuous care experience—one that balances direct clinical support with tools to enable patients to effectively self-manage conditions.

Fahn: NFP Connect is a newly launched integrated, clientcentric digital platform to support and accelerate our digital transformation. It makes it easier for us to share best practices, enhance our efficiencies, aggregate data and streamline our systems across our entire enterprise.

One component is a proprietary COVID-19 cost-impact model tool that helps clients better prepare for the effects of the pandemic and make informed fiscal decisions.

It uses demographics, regional infection rates and cost of care data to estimate the financial impact of the pandemic across employers’ workforces. Another exciting component is the ability to host an interactive open enrollment where

employees are virtually educated, engaged and enabled through the process. It provides a personal experience with access to deeper insights, empowering clients to improve employee education.

Lester: During the pandemic, while cases were surging, we were able to use electronic intensive care unit remote monitoring technology to support staff and patients at a New York City hospital. This allowed our physicians to participate in virtual rounds, manage patient medications and ventilators—and it provided physicians on the ground with more time to care for more patients. Additionally, our work with technology company Medically Home powered a new advanced home care model so patients can receive hospital-level care at home—an important innovation during the pandemic.

What other innovations are on the horizon for your organization?

Lester: We’re currently engaging with the digital revolution and working to make care nonlinear and patient directed. By developing

automated provider and digital diagnostic platforms, we aim to streamline care for patients and provide high-quality care more conveniently, and at a lower price. Additionally, by harnessing the vast potential of data from wearable devices, we can use remote diagnostics to predict adverse events before they happen and respond more quickly to public health crises.

Fahn: We plan to continue aggregating data from all areas of our business, pulling in third-party data in real time, and using that data to interact with employees through mobile in a personalized way. For us, innovation is about ideation that connects problems with solutions, positively impacts people and helps clients be even more well-covered.

Our approach is collaborative,

of health care innovation is the translation of research into bedside care for patients. When you can help a patient in a way that didn’t exist yesterday, it’s incredibly rewarding.

Taylor: We lean on our clients and market feedback to drive innovations in care delivery. Given the increased demand for mental health care

“BEING ABLE TO PROVIDE AFFIRMATIVE, CULTURALLY COMPETENT CARE FOR ALL OF OUR PATIENTS IS A PRIORITY.” — DR. PRENTISS TAYLOR, GRAND ROUNDS HEALTH AND DOCTOR ON DEMAND

Taylor: Doctor On Demand recently merged with Grand Rounds Health.

Together we’re delivering a first-ofits-kind virtual entry point for Total Virtual CareTM. Integrating medical and mental health care with clinical navigation means we’re innovating the ways that patients find the right care at the right time. We’ll continue to create an experience that’s seamless, personalized and connected—ensuring a better care experience, better integration and better outcomes.

Are your employees facing complex health issues?

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Learn more at mayoclinic.org/complex-care-program Phone: 507-422-6102 | Email: MCCCPI@mayo.edu

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inclusive and purpose-driven. While many people equate innovation solely to technology, true innovation is about creating value in our everyday lives—by solving problems, enhancing convenience and reducing costs.

How is your organization staying current, given that new solutions are becoming available on an almost daily basis?

Fahn: As an insurance/employee benefits consultant, we’re continually evaluating new solutions to ensure that we’re providing the best available plans, programs and services to solve our clients’ most significant challenges. Our innovation lab and venture capital arms have helped us not only analyze data, evaluate new solutions and address challenges but better position our organization to support our clients moving forward.

Our innovation lab consists of a team supported by associates who interact with new technology vendors to solve problems and reduce costs. We initiate and advance conversations to identify the most significant challenges, create connections to facilitate collaborative ideation and partner with companies that provide forward-thinking solutions.

Lester: With more than 71,000 people on staff, including more than 7,000 physicians and scientists, we’re driving innovation through programs such as the Mayo Clinic Platform, Center for Digital Health, business accelerators and government and industry collaborations. Plus, we encourage our staff to go out and learn from others within health care and other industries, because some of the best ideas come from other sectors.

Also, we’re an academic medical institution and play a significant role in sharing knowledge through our five medical schools that educated 135,000 learners in 2020.

One of the most satisfying results

access, we developed a chat-based coaching solution to address issues like burnout, stress, emotion management, career challenges, motivation and goal setting. The convenient, 24/7 access to providers via chat empowers patients to develop self-coping skills, thus mitigating the risk of subclinical issues before they become costly clinical conditions. It also enables early identification of health issues so that patients can be referred to higher levels of care when necessary.

What effect has the pandemic had on health care innovation?

Taylor: Within the virtual health care space, COVID-19 has drastically increased the demand for and use of telehealth services.

Patients are becoming more and more comfortable with virtual-first solutions like ours to address health care concerns. It’s worth noting that the increased use of telehealth isn’t just for urgent care or COVID19-related concerns. We examined our data from April 2020 and saw a meaningful increase in visits for chronic conditions and behavioral health needs compared to the same time period in 2019.

Fahn: The pandemic accelerated the need for our company and our clients to innovate and adapt— virtual care and enhanced mental health programs are two examples.

Before the pandemic, many providers weren’t fully equipped to provide virtual care, nor did all patients feel comfortable with receiving care virtually. Although some may have been initially apprehensive about this “new” way of care, they’ve accepted this necessary solution. Virtual care and other changes fueled by both necessity and innovation will continue to be essential to provide patients with the best care possible.

SPONSORED CONTENT How is health care innovation impacting health equity?

Taylor: Virtual care can be strategically leveraged to address health equity and social determinants of health for underserved populations. We’ve improved access to primary and mental health care in geographic areas that experience provider shortages, especially for rural populations. We’ve also found that it’s important to focus on the diversity of a practice, and to train providers on delivering culturally affirmative care. Studies have shown that patients of color fare better when they’re seen by a provider from a similar background. Another way that technology is positively impacting health equity is the use of video for providers to see inside patients’ homes. Video visits allow providers to glean key information about their patients’ living environment—like food, housing insecurity or other social contexts—that may affect health outcomes.

Lester: Health disparities in our communities have been magnified during the pandemic. Everyone deserves the ability to live their best life, and health and wellness is a key component of that. We’re investing $100 million over the next 10 years to address health disparities, eliminate racism and advance equity and inclusion on our campuses.

From recruitment and training to diversifying clinical studies and deploying digital and telehealth technologies, we’re innovating to meet those goals.

What are some other challenges to innovating in today’s environment?

Fahn: There’s an immense amount of data available to all health care stakeholders, including insurance companies, health care providers, IT companies and more. One challenge is using that information to solve for competing goals such as keeping costs down, curing diseases and extending lifespans while improving the quality of life. Innovators must act strategically and create solutions that benefit and further progress the health care industry as a whole so we can keep moving forward together.

Lester: One of the biggest areas of opportunity is in creating a culture and environment where innovation can thrive, and it empowers us to bring new products and services to the market. We’re fortunate to have a strong culture of innovation. We empower our staff to create, and we provide resources to facilitate their creativity. Then, we connect these ideas with investors, entrepreneurs and business collaborators to bring them to life. This connection to others

is critical because it gives us insight into the ever-changing needs of individuals and organizations.

How can employers help their employees engage with their overall health?

Taylor: Employers should provide benefits such as virtual services that make it easy for employees to focus on things like primary care with care team support, along with mental health. Employers can also encourage employee participation in their health benefits by lowering the copay for key services that have a meaningful impact on overall health and wellbeing. Lastly, employers should evaluate their corporate culture to prioritize employee health, from management training and resources around mental health to looking at how employees are using—or not using—available paid time off.

Fahn: Employees are demanding bestin-class, personalized, accessible health care that’s delivered in a way that’s convenient and easy to understand.

Therefore, employers need to provide targeted, multi-faceted solutions to manage their diverse employee populations. They need to embrace innovative tools and technologies to keep employees engaged.

Lester: Employers are starting to partner with organizations like us to create innovative solutions that remove barriers found in the health care industry. For example, we work with employers and their trusted payer partners to design programs that enhance health benefits for employees’ serious and complex needs. The programs can be designed with a variety of optional benefits, and many barriers to care—like travel, lodging costs and coordination—can be covered by the employer. By providing these solutions, employees receive highquality care in a timely manner and employers see cost savings from accurate diagnoses and treatments for their employees.

RICH FAHN is vice president – corporate benefits for NFP, an insurance broker and consulting firm that provides employee benefits, property and casualty, retirement and individual private client solutions. He has more than 25 years of experience in the health and welfare benefits industry, including prior roles at various insurance companies and Excell Benefit Group, an independent insurance brokerage that he founded. He has been featured on national TV broadcasts, quoted in numerous publications and frequently presents at industry events. He is a chartered benefit consultant (CBC) and a member of the National Association of Health Underwriters.

STEVEN J. LESTER, MD, is a consultant and professor of medicine at Mayo Clinic, a nonprofit worldwide leader in medical care, research and education. He joined Mayo in 1999, serving as the inaugural associate chair of medicine for innovation and as associate chair of medicine for research within the department of internal medicine.

He currently serves as associate medical director for the departments of business development and contracting and payer relations where he helps form collaborations between employers, trusted payer partners and Mayo Clinic through the Mayo Clinic Complex Care Program.

PRENTISS TAYLOR, MD, FACP, is vice president of medical affairs at Grand Rounds Health and Doctor On Demand, a virtual care provider.

Previously, he was medical director at Advocate Aurora Health Care, launching its patient-centered medical homes sites. He is a graduate of Harvard Medical School and Northwestern University’s Kellogg School of Management, and is a fellow of the American College of Physicians and the American College of Preventive Medicine. His peers have named him, multiple times, as a “top doctor” in Chicago Magazine and US News & World Report.

Fahn: In the last few years, there’s been a tremendous amount of money invested by private equity firms, venture capitalists and companies not historically involved in the health care space, such as Google, Amazon and

Tesla. We’re still in the early stages of investments, but there have been significant enhancements in health care delivery and disease management. While this will result in improved quality of life and extended lives, health care

costs will rise in direct relation to more complex care and the investments required. I believe these costs will eventually level out in the long term as research and technology improves efficiency and effectiveness of care.

What’s your short- and longterm outlook for health care innovation?

Lester: We’re bullish on the shortand long-term outlook for health care innovation. We invest in the brightest talent, give them state-ofthe-art facilities and support them with the infrastructure to make their ideas a reality. Our driving focus at the center of it all is that the needs of the patient come first. Whether we’re helping employers give their staff access to our care through our complex care program or developing the next medical breakthrough, everything we do is centered on doing what’s right for the patient.

“ . . . TRUE INNOVATION IS ABOUT CREATING VALUE IN OUR EVERYDAY LIVES—BY SOLVING PROBLEMS, ENHANCING CONVENIENCE AND REDUCING COSTS.” — RICH FAHN, NFP

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