Dive Brief:
- "We're going to get disrupted by technology," NewYork-Presbyterian President & CEO Steven Corwin stated Tuesday at a Washington D.C. event hosted by Axios on the "New Era in Healthcare."
- Corwin said telemedicine and telehealth will be more important going forward, adding that the system has performed about 10,000 telemedicine visits this year.
- NYP can set up telepsychiatry consults within an hour with an on-call psychiatrist. "I thought that was going to be something patients wouldn't accept," Corwin said. "Quite the contrary. The Net Promoter Score of the telepsychiatry consult is 95. The Net Promoter Score of Netflix is 75. We are talking about a sea change in the way that we're delivering care. I think the virtual and the physical will come together."
Dive Insight:
Corwin added that the system is engaging with telestroke consults. "I hope we can demonstrate telemedicine can lower the cost of healthcare," he told Axios Executive Editor Mike Allen.
His talk with Allen touched on many issues facing the hospital sector.
On the CVS-Aetna deal: The talk of the town and in the industry has been the CVS-Aetna merger announcement. But many questions loom over the deal. The first big one: Will it actually happen?
Corwin was unsure how the $69 billion deal could affect consumer costs or pharmacy benefit managers, (PBMs) but he did share that it could put pricing pressure on hospitals. "I think it's going to make us charge less. We're going to have to get more efficient," he said. In addition, he wasn't convinced the deal would lower pharmaceutical costs because PBMs, in his view, are a contributor to rising drug prices.
On PBMs overall: "That's a middle man we can get rid of."
On the "homespital": Patient care moving to lower cost settings was a big trend for 2017 in the industry, but as far as recreating the hospital in the home: "I'm not a believer that's going to happen," Corwin said. He does believe the industry will merge the virtual and physical settings and more intensive services — such as surgery or intensive care — will continue to be performed in hospitals while some care could be performed in the home, such as diabetic or heart failure patient management. "Hospitals will become places where very intense care is being delivered," he said.
On diversity: Corwin shared that 60% of NYP's workforce is a member of a minority group. "We are entering a period of great uncertainty in terms of race, in terms of religion," he said. "This affects my employees every day."
Corwin promoted a culture of tolerance and respect. "If you have that, then you can put patients first. The culture of care is very important for NewYork-Presbyterian."
He also championed diversity in leadership positions, adding that half of NYP's senior leadership members are women. A diverse workforce in race, age and gender is not just important for aesthetics — results are better with different points of view, he said.
NYP is highlighting a trend in workforce management where new perspectives and individuals are needed to fill the void as leaders retire. There's a large push on team-based care delivery, but panel members at a summit on the future of the healthcare workforce worried that leadership and clinical workflows that reflect the new normal of the industry are not being taught.
Ann Greiner, president and CEO of the Patient-Centered Primary Care Collaborative, said by and large health professionals are trained in silos and then asked to work in a team-based environment. Teamwork and an understanding of collaboration will be necessary for providers as the landscape changes, both in providers' four walls and in policies coming out of Washington.