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Newsday: Remote Patient Monitoring and Staffing Solutions with Margaret Ptacek

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today on Newsday.

Margaret Ptacek: between hospital at home and utilizing Telehealth in a totally different

format than we're used to, that's the way of the future for happy patients and for providers, not just quitting and saying, I can't do this anymore.

I'm Sarah [00:01:00] Richardson, a former CIO and president of this Week Health's 2 2 9 community development where we are dedicated to transforming healthcare one connection at a time.

Newsday discusses the breaking news in healthcare with industry experts. Now let's jump right in.

Sarah Richardson: Welcome To Newsday, where we break down the top stories in healthcare IT and explore what they mean for leaders in the industry. Today I'm joined by Margaret Pracek, senior Vice President at Experience, A leader in healthcare workforce solutions, clinical operation support and technology enabled care models.

We've chatted a few times before about different aspects of what we both do, and today we get to talk about the news. And the first article we picked was the remote patient monitoring devices, transforming patient monitoring, and showing promise for reshaping cancer care

high level. These advancements in AI powered RPM are making it possible to continuously track patient vitals symptoms and treatment responses, particularly for oncology patients. And these tools are proving [00:02:00] effective not only for proactive interventions, but also for reducing hospital readmissions and improving quality of life outcomes.

Love to hear your thoughts on this article.

Margaret Ptacek: No, absolutely. So really the goal of all of this is when RPM is implemented appropriately, it's truly an extension of the health system out into the community. And that's really an impossible thing to do without a true program model.

And that's what I hear a lot from our organizations is that they're trying to do it in bits and pieces, but. It takes an entire program for it to be effective and to also monetize on it as well. As much as we want to be in the business of doing everything for our patients, there's obviously the business aspect too, and so you have to make sure that everything that you're doing is either reimbursable or there's a way to overcome the financial burden of it.

Sarah Richardson: Well, absolutely. You consider if you're a CXO sitting in the hospital. You need a scalable model for improving outcomes post discharge, [00:03:00] especially in complex high risk populations, but then also looking at that value-based reimbursement opportunity. I think about Medicare Part B and the demand for robust data integration security and clinician workflow alignment, and it's so much more than devices.

This is something that's right in your wheelhouse.

Margaret Ptacek: It is. So there is a program that we have launched this year called Concierge Clinical Solutions. It really models and leverages AI powered RPM protocols that have been built in and in place for over 30 years. We have a wonderful tech partner that has been in the nurse triage space for 29 to 30 years, and so.

We're utilizing all of that great work that's been utilized primarily in the ambulatory space to now shift over to the acute care space. And with this program it not only provides potential admission and discharge offload of the nurses in-house, but then we can follow those patients for 30 days post discharge with remote patient monitoring, [00:04:00] proactive reach outs, and proactively.

Teaching them and training them how to be healthier patients really to prevent that financial burden. And obviously the poor patient outcomes that occur when they just don't know what to do when they get back home. So we're really proud of this clinical concierge solutions and I think it, it's gonna expand greatly over the course of the next several years.

Sarah Richardson: I love how you call it concierge clinical solutions, because that really as template as it may be, you also can meet your clients where they are. So whether that's outcomes, reimbursement wins, even some of the opportunities that's creating for specific clientele and patient populations, that's a win that goes beyond just what someone may have engaged with you to create in the first place.

Margaret Ptacek: A hundred percent, absolutely.

Sarah Richardson: I'd love to ask you though, what have you found is the biggest barrier to RPM adoption? Is it technology, workflow, culture? How do you help your clients overcome that?

Margaret Ptacek: So hands down, I think it's two areas. One. Proving it's worth, which honestly any managed service across the board, that's [00:05:00] always a struggle point.

So, coming in and really getting some good baseline data meaning, you know, what are your 30 day readmission numbers? What are your patient satisfaction scores? What is your nurse turnover rate? What is your provider? Happy standpoint. I should say, and some organizations are great about checking that or not but really proving that what we're doing is working.

And so you've gotta have that baseline data. And then really tracking those KPIs that we are making, the impact that we came into do, and then. Presenting that to the leadership so that when you say, you know, it's working great on med-surg, let's expand it to this unit. There's facts and data to prove that.

So that's one is really proving the worth of it. And then two is the reimbursement piece of it. And that does not sound as complicated as it should be, but it is actually very complicated. And so our offering is really the holistic package. We provide the pre-implementation activity of really.

Setting up the structure of the [00:06:00] program with those baseline data and KPI points. We then provide the nursing staff, the technology the automated tools whenever possible. And then we actually do the code drops at the end of it so that these facilities aren't having to figure out what.

Individual codes based off of Medicare, Medicaid are actually, you know, coordinated with the right patient. And again, like I mentioned earlier, without the reimbursement piece of it, it's very difficult to continue to expand and find that funding and that approval for it.

Sarah Richardson: Well, and that extra layer of that coding element that you know is already backed by the algorithms you have in place is huge because.

So many cuts are coming everywhere margins keep getting compressed, and if you have those revenue capabilities brought into an organization to do something that's about closing the loop between the hospital, the home, and the care team, and about personalized care plans and even capacity management.

When you can bring all those things together in a way that's pretty seamless for the health system, they need that now more than ever and so do the [00:07:00] patients. Absolutely. Let's go to Article two. Hackensack Meridian expands hospital at home to improve patient care statewide, so they're scaling their hospital at home model across New Jersey, allowing more patients to receive acute level care in their homes with remote monitoring, on demand nurse visits and virtual physician oversight.

Tell me your thoughts on this one.

Margaret Ptacek: We definitely support this transition and I personally been tracking it for over five years, I kept thinking maybe it would move quicker than it is, but this is healthcare. But we can really provide that by the monitoring piece, the nurse triage component the operational framework that's needed to really do that shift safely.

And then our goal really is to make sure patients are not. Just discharge, but they're truly supported in a way that prevents that bounce back, that readmission and really enhances their recovery experience. I mean, the ultimate goal is obviously happy, healthy patients, and I think this really fits into that pathway [00:08:00] well.

Sarah Richardson: Absolutely., If you can alleviate the pressure on the ED and the inpatient capacity challenges that most systems experience, you have a competitive advantage with both the satisfaction and the experience of the patient, but then that high reliability that's required from the system itself and the operational coordination that is not lost on all the elements that it takes, and now you're looking at it plus clinical, plus operational elements.

I'm wondering though, when you consider how scalable and how safe it can be, especially with a strain on EDS and inpatient, how does Experis help an organization make that kind of a leap?

Margaret Ptacek: great question. So the first step is really understanding, ensuring you have the right patients that are even opted in to this option.

And so we can come in and really help with that initial framework to assess who's a good candidate and who is really better off staying in a traditional hospital setting. We can help build out that assessment you know, internally into their EHR system. So it's a nice, [00:09:00] you know. Nice workflow that's integrated already into their typical workflow.

And then the second piece is utilizing our nurse triage framework. That, again, has been around for many years just to ensure that we're utilizing those well-known workflows and protocols that have worked for a long time so that there's really great oversight and a positive experience. And then lastly, again, it boils down to reimbursement.

So it's going to be important for healthcare orgs. And companies like Experius to really establish a strong working relationship with the payer partners ' at the end of the day, we're all in for the same reasons, reduce costs and have better patient outcomes. But the level of reimbursement is not obviously going to be the same in the hospital setting as it is at home care.

And so we've gotta come together and figure out what does that reimbursement model look like and move forward with that. And

Sarah Richardson: So much of this is predicated on the patient experience. Yes. From the work that you do, how does [00:10:00] at home acute care change the patient's perception of quality, care and trust with their health system?

Margaret Ptacek: I think they finally feel heard in those settings. And I do think that is an ongoing issue in healthcare in general. I mean, our providers and our care staff are so tapped out right now. And they have to prioritize not just their hour, but by minute, by second. And so when that happens, the patient often feels like they can just be lost in the mix.

And so, in this setting. We all know sleep better, we have less stress. We're happier in our own environment. So to be able to offer all of those comforts with the comfort of knowing that there's a highly trained team proactively monitoring you is just a perfect pairing and in addition.

The other cool piece of that is with video calls, providers can actually visually see where the patient. Is staying and their environment factors of that. And that's something that's usually [00:11:00] just verbally told, you know, during initial visits or the intake process. But to actually visually see where they're, you know, where they're set up in their home, and the factors that can potentially cause poor outcomes, that can just add an additional layer of education and po and potentially preventative measures that we didn't have prior without having eyes on their environment.

Sarah Richardson: And with the aging population. I wanna take the lens of a future Outlook. Do you believe that the hospital at home dynamic will become a standard offering for certain conditions? I say in the next five years, let's be honest, this next 20 year window, 11,000 people per day, and I'll be one of them within that 20 year window.

Aging into Medicare. Like what do you expect from the hospital at home Opportunity?

Margaret Ptacek: I think it's the only way that we're gonna keep up with the demands of the aging population, coupled with not enough skilled caregivers going into that field. You think of the specialists and the physicians, [00:12:00] there's just not that many

choosing that option in school anymore. You think of, you know, your own kids or your nieces, nephews, they do not wanna end their career with several hundred thousand dollars in debt. They don't wanna be in school that long. And so. Getting them to sign up for this career, we're gonna have to offload some of kind of the terror factor that they hear about when they decide to become a caregiver.

So my ultimate hope is that we use hospital at home and nurse triage to really create a total health plan for patients and their providers. So for example. A, let's just say a patient has diabetes, they have high blood pressure, they have depression, so they easily could have a primary care provider, they could have an endocrinologist and they could have a psychologist all on their care team.

Traditionally, they'd have to have three separate visits. Medications could be changed without any of the other providers knowing about it. And if we could coordinate that one telehealth call with all the providers, you know, every six months we could see a [00:13:00] drastic improvement on just the patient's outcomes and less confusion, less frustration on both parties.

You know, documentation is great. But there's nothing like a coordinated call where everyone's hearing the same things at the same time and coming up with an approach together. So I think between hospital at home and utilizing Telehealth in a totally different format than we're used to, that's the way of the future for happy patients and for providers, not just quitting and saying, I can't do this anymore.

Sarah Richardson: I love that perspective because I'm also hopeful that with the concern about rural closures and other things coming up, that it allows a lifeline to patients who wouldn't otherwise be able to even access some of that care. Assuming, of course their broadband could keep up with the demand, but imagine those things will come together faster than they have in the past for obvious reasons, which takes us to our third article, and that's at a new hospital that is open, is struggling with staffing shortages.

It's affecting their clinical care and the operational efficiency. Leaders are citing national labor, market [00:14:00] constraints and high turnover as some of the ongoing challenges. When I put my CIO hat back on, I realize that workforce challenges remain one of the top threats to care quality ability to staff people in those facilities.

But then that's gonna slow technology adoption and limit service expansion. And the adoption is the whole point of making a lot of those investments so we can continue to offer the services that are so needed. But then these creative staffing models, like what you just mentioned and virtual augmentation to help us fill the gaps, tell me your thoughts on this one.

Margaret Ptacek: absolutely. So at experience we really help organizations supplement and stabilize their workforce with virtual staffing, nurse triage, clinical support solutions. And this really allows our clients to maintain that care quality, keep their services running and protect their teams from burnout even in those high demand periods, which is critical.

It's the ebb and flow. I mean, we all have ebb and flow in every industry, but healthcare. Specifically is that way, and with that ebb and flow, I think [00:15:00] specifically to healthcare, there's more risk involved if you don't have enough of the right staff at the right time.

Sarah Richardson: Can you share in a little more depth about how your solutions are helping clients maintain quality and avoid some service disruptions from staffing shortage?

Margaret Ptacek: Sure. So really our ultimate goal is to offload time consuming tasks that don't have to be done in person. Not everything has to be done in the traditional way that healthcare is used to. So when it's. A time consuming task like admission and discharge and you already have an understaffed provider population, I guarantee there's things being missed and rushed to the detriment of the patient.

I personally, as a nurse practitioner know that if it's finishing this med reconciliation or you know, running to the crash cart because a patient's. Crashing. You're gonna go that pathway and you don't always get to come back and finish that really important documentation that's gonna lead to better care and better outcomes for that patient.

[00:16:00] So if we can come in with a team that's not being pulled away with the 5 million other activities that happen in an acute care setting and are dedicated to that patient. Their charts are gonna be updated perfectly and that patient is gonna feel like they have a voice to talk about their issues, their concerns, and actually get some really great teaching.

So we're really trying to help reimagine what patient workflow can look like for an organization and really what has to be done by an onsite provider versus what can be offloaded with our team of virtual nurses.

Sarah Richardson: And if you had to give advice to a health system in terms of workforce resilience, what would you share with them when it comes to facing chronic staffing gaps and why they would wanna partner with you for that?

Margaret Ptacek: I think the biggest advice is you don't have to figure it out all on your own. You know, we are your partner and our jobs are not to try to sell you something you don't need. I mean, personally, just from my heart, I'm constantly trying to figure out [00:17:00] where are the gaps in healthcare and how can we make it not only not cost the organization, but actually increase their revenue.

And have happier patients and providers that's what they need from us. So partners like us can get creative to really ensure that what's working well stays that way, and that what areas can be more efficient and with better outcomes through outsourcing. Can be shifted to that model. And it's really that program level that I've talked about earlier that we can provide.

That's key. Trying to launch RPM, chronic Care Management Hospital at home Outsourcing, admissions and discharges can seem completely overwhelming for most organizations and oftentimes it's hit and miss. They're doing pieces and components of it, but it's not a holistic program. And so we can come in, set that up and be monitoring it 24 by seven, and it's our job to make sure that it's going well and really offload that, that that struggle point and that risk factor by trying to fix it all on your [00:18:00] own.

Sarah Richardson: When I was a CIO, I always appreciated partners that could come in and do program management with me. Like, here's the four or five things we need to tackle. It is one bucket to work. You've got your team, I've got mine, and they work seamlessly together to deliver all kinds of amazing opportunities inside the system.

And often you'd find things that neither of you had expected that make things even better because of that. What's unique about all three of these stories is that. Technology and people are absolutely intertwined. How do you see experience blending these two elements to deliver a sustainable solution?

And I'll do like what I call the Sarah math, which is always kind of fascinating. 80% of all of this is people related that process and the technology might be 20% of the equation. So if 80% is the human factor, how do you bring that forward so that it lasts beyond the implementation phase?

[Mic bleed]

Margaret Ptacek: love that question.

So there's always gonna. You know, be that high people touch area [00:19:00] and that's honestly the core of healthcare. There's always gotta be the people component of it, but there's multiple areas that AI and automation are actually going to provide better care by removing the people error. And that's really what we're starting to build out.

We don't have all the answers yet. I don't think anyone has all the answers yet from AI and automation and how do you intertwine that perfectly. But I personally and then just experience and Manpower group as a whole. We're collaborating as a company. Very strongly to figure out what's working well in certain industries that might be, you know, several years ahead of where healthcare is at and how can we incorporate some of those best practices that can be infiltrated into healthcare.

And that's really my job and experience's job is to come up with those newer solutions. But with proven track records of workflows that we can incorporate in and make this just an easier transition as we're all trying to figure out what really can be done by AI [00:20:00] without the risk of losing that people touch.

Sarah Richardson: And as a partner and a clinician, if you had to pick one capability that you believe is going to be mission critical for health systems over the next 12 months, what would it be?

Margaret Ptacek: So I think the key to that is offload what you can to keep the critical talent within your organization happy, because it is very difficult to find and retain great talent, keep them happy, and then, you know, that, that's just a financial burden that, that you don't even need to figure out, as well as ensure you're capturing all potential revenue through reimbursement.

Right now every dollar matters and what I hear over and over as I'm talking to organizations is. There's just still a lot of mishaps on billing appropriately so that the reimbursement is coming in. And so we can come in, really assess that between ERP, supply chain, clinical concierge solutions, chronic care management, remote patient monitoring.

We can look at it from a very holistic global picture and [00:21:00] say. You know, you're not able to capture all of the revenue 'cause you're just not dropping all of the codes that you need to. Let's offload that piece so that we can keep you financially strong so that you can do all of these big initiatives that are important to your patients and the population that you're serving.

Sarah Richardson: And as a, literally a CIO who spent probably 30 years. Arm wrestling with my CFOs over, are you an expense? Are you revenue producing, et cetera. How poignant it is at this point to be able to truly streamline operations and technology to bring the right revenue reimbursement opportunities into your health system.

I am so grateful that you shared that capability. People listening or wanna know where they can go to learn more about this, how do you want people to reach out to you?

Margaret Ptacek: Absolutely. Well, I would love for them to connect on LinkedIn and then they can just reach out to me personally through my email that I'm sure will be posted with this.

Sarah Richardson: Absolutely. And today's stories from AI powered RPM to Hospital at home and Workforce Resilience, they show a common theme. Healthcare leaders need integrated solutions that combine technology, operational expertise, [00:22:00] and workforce stability Expiris is helping organizations make these shifts safely, efficiently, and with measurable results.

Margaret, thank you for joining me today and for sharing how Experius is addressing some of healthcare's biggest challenges. Head on.

Margaret Ptacek: It

Sarah Richardson: was my pleasure, Sarah. Thank you for having me.

Thanks for listening to Newsday. A lot's happening in our industry. And while Newsday covers interesting stuff, another way to stay informed is by subscribing to our Daily Insights email, which delivers expertly curated health IT news straight to your inbox.