Crystal Broj, Chief Digital Transformation Officer at MUSC

Summary

Becker’s Healthcare Podcast – Episode Summary

Episode Title:
Crystal Broj, Chief Digital Transformation Officer at MUSC
Release Date: November 5, 2025
Host: Chanel Bunger (Becker's Healthcare)
Guest: Crystal Broj, Chief Digital Transformation Officer, Medical University of South Carolina (MUSC)
Event: Recorded live at the 10th annual Health IT Digital Health and RCM Meeting, Chicago

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Episode Overview

This episode features Crystal Broj discussing her team’s use of AI and automation at MUSC to transform patient access, improve workflows, and balance innovation with operational demands. She shares practical examples of deploying digital tools, managing change, responding to regulatory shifts, and shaping the future of digital healthcare.

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Key Discussion Points & Insights

1. Crystal Broj's Role and Achievements

[00:59]

• Leading transformation across patient access, revenue cycle, population health, and clinical trials at MUSC for three years.
• Focus areas: AI, automation, and digital tools to improve access, reduce burdens, enhance patient/staff experience.
• Recognitions: Global CDO100 award, Stevie Female Exec of the Year, and HIMSS Change Maker finalist.

“On a personal note, I'm a national speaker and an award-winning recipient for both the global CDO100 award as well as this new Stevie Female Exec of the Year and a HIMSS Change Maker finalist.” — Crystal Broj, [01:26]

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2. AI Use Cases Making a Difference at MUSC

[01:53 - 03:22]

• AI-Driven Pre-registration:
  • Patients receive a text three days before appointments for insurance and demographic updates, appointment confirmation, cancellations, and copay collection.
  • Reduces friction for both patients and staff.
• AI Voice Bot in Patient Access Center:
  • Now handles 42 lines, available 24/7 in English and Spanish (previously 8-5, weekdays).
  • Capable of confirming/canceling calls, providing parking info, answering FAQs.
• Natural Language Appointment Scheduling:
  • Patients can say symptoms (“I have knee pain”) to find providers with available slots for easy scheduling.
• Results:
  • Notable improvement in Press Ganey scores for patient contact (now top quartile).
  • Reductions in call wait and abandonment times.
  • Expansion of these tools to other areas like revenue cycle and pharmacy.

“All of those things have made a big difference. We've actually increased our press ganey score for how to contact our patients. We're now in the top quartile and we keep moving up. We reduce call wait times, we reduce call abandonment times...” — Crystal Broj, [03:11]

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3. Advice for Leaders: Balancing Innovation and Operations

[03:49 - 04:43]

• Early Governance & Workflow Selection:
  • Establish governance that includes input from clinicians, IT, and operations.
  • Begin small: choose a promising workflow, pilot in limited settings, and gradually scale.
  • Incrementally add features—start with appointment confirmations/cancellations, then demographics, then copay, etc.
  • This approach enables “tweaking” and effective change management.
• Patient Feedback Loop:
  • Use simple “thumbs up/down” ratings at the end of interactions.
  • High patient satisfaction: 98% approval.
  • Adjust workflows based on specific patient suggestions.

“We start small, we pick a workflow that we think will succeed... Not everything all at once, not big bang across the entire state so that we could tweak it and add on slowly and also change our change management.” — Crystal Broj, [04:06]

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4. Navigating Government Policy and Legislation

[04:43 - 05:56]

• Regulatory environment is rapidly evolving at both state and federal levels.
• Key issues: interoperability and data transparency.
• Anticipating more AI guidance—FDA frameworks, executive orders.
• Internal safeguards: MUSC has an AI governance committee to review new software solutions annually, treating AI like a high-performing intern (subject to reviews and monitoring).
• Emphasis on transparency, monitoring, and training.

“We're going to start seeing more AI legislation and guidance from the FDA, frameworks, executive orders that are going to help shape governance and minimize risk management. And our strategy, we have an AI governance committee that does reviews of every new software that we have.” — Crystal Broj, [05:31]

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5. Top Advice for Healthcare Leaders Facing Tech Change

[06:10 - 07:00]

• Ground technology initiatives in clearly defined problems.
• Prioritize provider and patient needs in design and implementation.
• Decide on upfront metrics of success, track over time, and iterate as needed.
• Invest heavily in change management: explain “how, why, and what’s in it for them.”
• Stay adaptable—tech is evolving rapidly, and even trusted vendors are constantly shifting.

“The best thing you can do when you put technology into place is really anchor it in what the problem is. So make sure you're thinking about your providers and your patients and then measure success. Know what you want to change before you start and then keep measuring it..." — Crystal Broj, [06:10]

“Invest in the change management, actually spend time teaching people the how, why and what's in it for them so that they know and they can help you become change champions…” — Crystal Broj, [06:27]

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Memorable Quotes & Moments

• “An AI agent is kind of like your best intern on the best day, we give it a review once a year, just like you give an employee a review.” — Crystal Broj, [05:40]
• “Be adaptable, be willing to change, be willing to look at that and think about what the future holds for us.” — Crystal Broj, [06:53]

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Key Timestamps

| Timestamp | Segment | |-----------|---------| | 00:59 | Crystal's introduction, background, and role at MUSC | | 01:53 | AI and automation’s real use cases at MUSC | | 03:49 | Advice for rolling out digital solutions, governance | | 04:43 | Adapting to state/federal legislation, governance committee | | 06:10 | Crystal’s top advice for healthcare technology leadership |

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Summary: Actionable Takeaways

• Start Small, Scale Carefully: Pilot technology within limited workflows, expanding as you learn and refine.
• Integrate Feedback: Solicit patient input and adapt accordingly.
• Emphasize Governance & Transparency: Establish cross-disciplinary review and ongoing monitoring for AI tools.
• Invest in Change Management: Equip people with the knowledge and motivation to champion new tech initiatives.
• Stay Adaptable: Remain open to innovation and regulatory changes to ensure continued advancement and compliance.

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Crystal Broj’s strategic and deliberate approach to digital health at MUSC offers a clear pathway for healthcare organizations looking to leverage technology for real improvements in access, efficiency, and patient/staff satisfaction.

Transcript

[A]

Philips is a health tech leader focused on innovation that improves the health and well being of people. Our healthcare technology and informatics solutions help care teams diagnose, treat and manage more patients with greater precision, speed and confidence. Across the care journey with Philips, clinicians are empowered with streamlined insights in the moments that matter for every patient. Better care for more people. Philips.

[B]

Hello and welcome to the Becker's Healthcare Podcast. My name is Chanel Bunger and today I'm recording live at the 10th annual Health IT Digital Health and RCM Meeting in Chicago and currently sitting down with Crystal Roy, the Chief Digital Transformation Officer at the Medical University of South Carolina, or musc. Crystal, thank you so much for joining me today.

[C]

Thank you so much for having me. What a great conference this is. There's so much energy this morning.

[B]

Love to hear it. Well, to get us started out, can you please introduce yourself, talk a little bit about your background and your work in healthcare?

[C]

Yeah, so I'm super excited to be here. I joined MUSC three years ago. I lead transformation across patient access, revenue cycle, population health and now clinical trials. We're mostly focused on AI, automation and digital tools to improve access, reduce burden and enhance our patient staff experience. On a personal note, I'm a national speaker and an award winning recipient for Both the global CDO100 award as well as this new Stevie Female Exec of the Year and a Hymns Change Maker finalist.

[B]

Love to hear it. I'm glad you're here and getting into the meat of the podcast a bit. So we all know that AI is a huge buzzword and everyone's talking about it in healthcare and actually nearly half of all medical practices reported using AI in some capacity in the last year. I'm curious to hear from your perspective, what are some use cases that are making a big difference at your organization at the moment and how are you leveraging them?

[C]

We're seeing some really good success. We've really transformed patient access by layering tools together. So we started out with AI agents that actually do pre registration. So if you have appointment, you get a nudge from us three days before a text, they'll actually take your insurance card, take your driver's license, change your demographic information, let you confirm your appointment, cancel your appointment, collect your copay. That's one way of removing friction from a patient experience as well as from the back office. With that, then we layered on an AI voice bot that answers calls in our patient access center. So 42 lines now on that in Charleston we're extending across the state that she answers in English and Spanish. She answers 24 hours a day, seven days a week, where before it was only 8 to 5, Monday through Friday. And she can confirm calls, cancel calls, she can tell you where to park, answer frequently asked questions. And then on the front end in our digital front door, we have an natural language way to actually look for appointments and look for your doctors. You can just say I have knee pain and we'll pull up the doctors, they have the next available appointment, you'll be able to actually see the slots and schedule that. So all of those things have made a big difference. We've actually increased our press ganey score for how to contact our patients. We're now in the top quartile and we keep moving up. We reduce call wait times, we reduce call abandonment times and so, and we're continuing to roll this out to other areas, revenue cycle, pharmacy and so on.

[B]

That's amazing to hear. And now moving forward as virtual care expands from AI enabled tools such as remote monitoring to broader digital health platforms, introducing technology always comes with its challenges. And with that, what advice would you give to other healthcare leaders? Navigating everything from governments to patient engagement. And can you share an example of how your organization has balanced innovation with operational constraints?

[C]

Yeah, we, we build governance early. We want to ensure that clinicians, IT operations all have a voice. We start small, we pick a workflow that we think will succeed. We'll do it for a couple of offices or a couple of areas. And then we grow it slowly across the organization, adding more and more parts of the tools all the way across the thing. For example, we confirmed and canceled appointments first. Then we added on collecting demographics, then we added on copay and so on. Not everything all at once, not big bang across the entire state so that we could tweak it and add on slowly and also change our change management. How do we train people on it? How do we let people know that it's working and validate and also get patient feedback on that as well. We got a lot of, we do thumbs up, thumbs down at the end of everything and you know, 98% of the patients say that they like it. But then a lot of them were very happy to give us some words of wisdom about what they did or did not like and that actually made us change the workflows.

[B]

Absolutely. And moving forward. So right now, obviously with everything going, we're recording right now, October 1st, the government just shut down. So this is very pertinent to right now. How are you seeing recent legislation, both state and federal, affect health Care organizations and health care IT specifically. And have you adjusted strategies and response?

[C]

I think, you know, the, the federal and state things, as they continue to look at it work, is working on interoperability and data transparency is going to be key for people like me that really want to make these things succeed. And the integrations become very hard. And so we're really looking forward to some advice from government on that. We're going to start seeing more AI legislation and guidance from the fda, frameworks, executive orders that are going to help shape governance and minimize risk management. And our strategy, we have an AI governance committee that does reviews of every new software that we have. And because an AI agent is kind of like your best intern on the best day, we give it a review once a year, just like you give an employee a review. How is it doing? Should it be improved? Should we do something with it? Make sure it's still doing what we expected. But the transparency in all of that and the training and monitoring is super important.

[B]

Absolutely. And now, Crystal, I want to thank you for your time today, but before I let you go, I'm curious to hear from your perspective, what's your top piece of advice that you would share to other healthcare leaders as they prepare for further advancements in technology and seeing demands for care?

[C]

That's a good question. I think the best thing you can do when you put technology into place is really anchor it in what the problem is. So make sure you're thinking about your providers and your patients and then measure success. Know what you want to change before you start and then keep measuring it to make sure it's still meeting the needs and if it isn't. Because when you first put in a technology, you might see a big jump in the change, but then you might see it wane over time and you might need to change the way it's rolling out or additions to it. Invest in the change management, actually spend time teaching people the how, why and what's in it for them so that they know and they can help you become change champions when they adopt it. And then stay adaptable because as we've seen at this show, there's so many new things coming out and even our good friends that we worked with for a long time are coming out with new things. So be adaptable, be willing to change, be willing to look at that and think about what the future holds for us.

[B]

Yeah, you definitely don't want to get left behind.

[C]

Yeah.

[B]

Well, Krystal, I want to thank you once again for your time today and for sharing your insights on the Becker's Healthcare podcast. Thank you.

[C]

Thank you so much.