← Becker’s Healthcare Podcast
Becker’s Healthcare Podcast
Jason Glover, CEO of Memorial Hermann–Texas Medical Center Adult Services
00:20:06
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- [00:02]
A
The most important healthcare decisions don't happen in isolation. They happen when leaders come together. Becker's 16th annual meeting brings together more than 3,500 hospital and health system executives this April in Chicago. With 800 speakers from Ascension, Cleveland Clinic, Common Spirit and more, the conversations get real. Leaders will share how their scenario planning for policy shifts brief breaking through value based care barriers and building clinical teams that translate new ideas into real world care. Join top decision makers in the room April 13th through the 16th. For the agenda and event details, visit BeckersHospitalReview.com and click on the Events tab in the upper right.
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B
This is Laura Deardo with the Becker's Healthcare Podcast. I'm thrilled today to be joined by Jason Glover, CEO of Memorial Herman Texas Medical Center Adult Services. Jason, it's a pleasure to have you on the podcast today.
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C
Thanks for having me, Laura.
- [00:59]
B
Absolutely. Now I'm excited for our conversation because we're going to dig a little bit deeper into some of the cool things that you're doing at Memorial Herman as well as your perspective on the future, how you're seeing growth and more. But before we dive in, can you tell me a little bit more about yourself and Memorial Herman?
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C
Yeah, absolutely. So been very blessed, been at memorial Herman for 13 years. Actually started a career in construction management and made a switch over to healthcare when I had the opportunity to build a hospital and I just, I haven't looked back. It's been just a wonderful career. But Benwood Memorial Herman, it's the market share leader in Houston. It's one of the largest not for profit systems in Texas. Throughout the area we have 260 sites of care and 17 hospitals. So I'm over our Texas Medical center adult population. So it's a 1200 bed flagship academic medical center. Were the primary teaching school for UT Health Houston McGovern Medical School and a cool fact, we're actually celebrating our 100 year anniversary. So we were the first hospital to open in what has now become the Texas Medical center, which is known as the largest healthcare district in the world. We have one of the busiest and most notable Level 1 trauma programs in the country with our Red Duke Trauma Institute. So many may know Red Duke's name and how he pioneered care and trauma. We're also the home of Life Flight which is the largest and oldest air ambulance fleet and we own and we run that and that's supported by our community and the philanthropic support. So we don't get any government funds to run that. And then we also have several other notable programs and Service lines from our Mission Neuroscience Institute or Larry D. Johnson Heart and Vascular Institute. We have a really cool relationship with the Houston Rockets and we have a specialty Memorial Herman Rockets Orthopedic Hospital. And then we have a Children's Memorial Herman on our campus. So I oversee everything but children's. We're going on our fourth round of being magnet designated. So really use that in our professional governance structure to power our frontline. And then we're consistently a top 10 Vizient hospital. And so I love Vizient because it's a very objective database and it compares our quality and our efficiency, experience and equity measures against all other hospitals that participate. So we're compared against other academic medical centers. And to consistently be in the top 10 in performance is really just a testament to the incredible team and medical staff we have here at the tmc.
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B
That's really cool to hear and definitely great to have that opportunity to have so much of that care spectrum on the campus there and really, truly some unique partnerships and ability to continue to improve quality and equity across the board. Now, when you think back to the last year or so, what was the most important initiative that you led? What did you do and what were the results?
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C
Yeah, so last year was a, it was really a great year. So at the end of 2024, as a system, we converted our entire EHR from Cerner over to Epic. So as we entered into 2025, we had just completed the monumental task of cutting over, but there were really just intensive efforts to optimize switching our EHR over. And so that took a large focus of our team to really dig in and tweak and adjust things so that they could optimize how we use it. So you can imagine that's a large change management initiative. And what I'm really proud of is how we were able to stay laser focused on our mission. So on top of this monumental EHR change, you'll see a lot of organizations, they'll drop 20 to 30 spots in their Vizient ranking. We stayed very focused on our processes, we stayed very focused on delivering high reliability care and remained in the top 10. And then also along with that, being in a large metropolitan area, we are often at high occupancy, but we were able to grow and take care of more patients than we had in any other years. We set records and volumes for our, our discharges, our inpatient surgeries and our deliveries last year. So I think really just engaging with the team, making sure that we had the appropriate structure in place, that we had the mechanisms to focus and to consistently be looking at how we were performing and not be distracted by what could be a very large distraction. Staying disciplined in our efforts to grow and to deliver great care to those that trusted us with that care.
- [05:57]
B
I love it. And you know, that is really impressive to hear. You were able to make that EHR switch and able to do all you need on the change management side and still maintain the right level of quality care that, you know, you'd been serving to the community, which is so, so critical. And I'm curious, you know, going through all of that change. Technology is one thing and a huge thing to overcome. But I think, you know, when you look at the human side of it too, there's a lot that goes into it. So when you're working with your teams and people and across the board, how do you make sure everybody is understanding the change and then able to integrate it within their workflows and really embrace that type of change as quickly as possible?
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C
Yeah, I think it's staying close to people and that's the one thing I love about healthcare. No matter how technology changes or continues to increase, at the core of healthcare, we're a people business. We have amazing people who have these massive hearts and this great intellect that are, that are really healing people and taking care of them. And so, you know, as we go through these changes, we look to listen to them, we look to hear what is working well, what is, where are the opportunities or where the friction points that are being found. And often we found just sitting down and talking there were solutions. Those solutions may not be readily apparent. And so as we took that feedback back to our technical teams and to our service line teams, we're able to make adjustments and be able to rework things or we over to show individuals, hey, here's tools that weren't accessible to you in our old platform, but these tools are now accessible to you. With that came some change in workflows and so involving the frontline staff, involving the medical staff in those different workflow changes, not trying to apply old workflows to a new technology, but adapting our workflows and the technology so that they can match, they can maximize the care that our teams are able to spend and give to the patients. But I think frequent communications, being visible, being vocal, being vibrant in champion that change and having opportunities for bidirectional feedback.
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B
I love that. That's so helpful to know and thank you for getting a little bit deeper there. Now, looking ahead to 2026, what are some of your big priorities and Headwinds that you're focusing on on today?
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C
Yeah. So in 2026, I, I think of it in three kind of buckets. So the first one I would say is access. We are the tertiary care flagship facility for Memorial Herman and because of the acuity that we can take care of, we have to stay disciplined in making sure that our, our beds are available, that we're able to take patients from our community, whether that be coming as walk ins from our EMS partners, from our sister facilities or from outside facilities. And so we spend a lot of time on maintaining our length of stay, maintaining our ability to say yes to transfers coming in. So first is people getting in the door. Second, I call outcomes. But this is really continuing our high reliability journey, making sure that we're delivering high quality care. I use the 0 and 1000 harm to 100% of our patients and making sure that, that we're delivering care with evidence based practices. And I love that we're an academic medical center and so there's a real appetite to follow those evidence based practices. But there's also the passion to create evidence based practices and to ask the questions of why do we do things and continue to pioneer and advance medicine. And then lastly, I would label as creating world class experiences. And I think about this for two populations. So first, our people, our team members that, you know, they choose to be here. Many of our team members pass eight to 10 hospitals before they get to the Texas Medical Center. And so we spend a lot of time focusing on making sure that they come to a place that's physically and psychologically safe, that they have the tools and training to do their job, that they're rewarded and recognized for the work that they do, and that we help them with their career growth. We understand what their personal and professional goals are and we put them in pathways and we put them in situations and we pair them with mentors that can help them achieve them achieve their goals. And then I think second for our patients, they also have the opportunity to choose where they go. And so when I think about what's a world class experience as I talk to our Pat, we look for ways that we can communicate simply. Healthcare is full of jargon and acronyms and so how do we simplify that so it's understandable and relatable? How do we coordinate seamlessly? I joke and someone shared this, maybe when we're boring, we should all be given a lawyer and a healthcare navigator. But I think we can play a huge role in coordinating care between the specialties and from the inpatient to the outpatient side, and that when they come here, they come to a crisp, clean, and welcoming environment. And I think that's important to providing an experience that is meaningful and really creates a moment that matters for each of those patients that choose to come to us. So those are a number of priorities. I think, from a headwind perspective, you know, the public funding pressures I think are real and those are things that concern us. You know, we're just getting into the early days of the subsidy expirations and, you know, there's continued pressure on cost as those continue to inflate with reimbursement. Going the opposite direction, I think, uniquely to the Houston community. Right. We have, I think 1 in 4 Houstonians is either uninsured or underinsured, and we get paid around 52 to 58 cents on the dollar for Medicaid. And so the private sector is having take on more and more of the safety net costs. And as a level one trauma center, that puts just incredible pressure for us to find other sources of revenue that allow us to continue to fund our mission and to make sure that we have the appropriate infrastructure to take care of those we have the privilege to take care of. I think another headwind or area that we're focused on, and this impacts our partner at UT Health Houston a little bit more, is just the national adjustment that have been made to research and research funding. You know, we have a partnership there where we're looking to do trials, we're looking to do research that advances medicine, which is important, and we don't want to see that shifted away from us locally or even nationally to other locations. But I think it's also important the impact that has on how dollars are allocated and how projects are sustained without that funding to keep those projects sustainable, there have to be other funding sources. And when you're using that, that funding for clinical care, but you're also trying to support the academic mission of our partners. You know, you get put in situations where you. You have to make decisions, and I think that'll be important to us, continuing to advance care, how those issues get resolved on a national level.
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B
That's fascinating to hear and I think truly helpful to understand some of the pressures that you're under and things that are top of mind for you as you're navigating changes within the healthcare space and then, you know, working with your teams in order to figure out how to continue to evolve and grow and develop within this space. I really appreciate you talking through some of those successes that you've had and the goals that you're looking for in this next year, whether it's patient care or the experience and caregiver experience as well. You know, really can't underestimate how much that means to the teams that are coming and providing care every single day. Now I'm curious, you know, in thinking through everything that we just talked about, what do you think the hardest thing you'll have to do in the coming year will be?
- [14:34]
C
So first, the year is really exciting for us. We'll be moving into the remaining floors of our newest building, our Seraphim Tower. So that'll be the new home for our neuroscience, oncology and transplant programs. We're also going to be implementing technology like virtual nursing and ambient listening. And as I've mentioned, we continue to explore ways to partner with our academic affiliate, UT Health Houston. And so there are a lot of exciting things, but I think the hardest part will just be keeping the team engaged and supported while we're continuing to ask them to change constantly, staying close to our people, making sure that they feel invested in, making sure that they understand why we're doing things and making sure that we're listening to them. In terms of how is that implementation going and where do we need to make adjustments and using really some of those lessons we learned from EPIC and applying them through our change management initiatives this year, I think the other thing that we'll just have to balance this year and will really be balancing our tripartite mission while recognizing sustainable financial outcomes. Academic centers is just becoming increasingly more challenging. So we have to stay true to our mission. I think we have to stay disciplined in the blocking of tackling, of delivering a world class experience to those we serve. And then I think continuing to look for ways that we can grow and diversify so that we can support the tripartite mission that we're committed to.
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B
That makes a lot of sense. And you know, speaking of that growth, what does that look like in the next year or two? You know, how are you diversifying? What does it mean to be an academic health system, especially coming into this new era of healthcare where you have to balance so many different headwinds and challenges, whether it's on the research side or the care delivery side and looking at the broader healthcare ecosystem in your community.
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C
Yeah, so I think about healthcare, right. We've shifted models, right. So I think there used to be a lot of individual and maybe physician centric models and those have moved to more team based models within our system. I believe, you know, our Future growth will be extending those team concepts beyond our own walls, whether that be payer and provider relationships that change or provider payer employer relationships or some mix of those. As we find new payment mechanisms and really as we sh what is still largely a fee for service model to avoid a more value based model, I think our ability to partner together to make healthcare more affordable and more attractive to employers, to employees and to payers will all be important for that team based concept to flow over. I can't underestimate just kind of being disciplined in our operational efficiency and productivity improvements. You know, as capital gets reallocated, you know, we're focused on more consumerism, we're focused on more enabling technologies. How do we use those to augment? Not replace, but augment and also to have flow kind of come back. And can those efficiencies free up time to allow for more brain power in any part of our academic mission or clinical mission? I think also at an academic facility we take care of some of the sickest of the sick. How do we balance that highly intensive care with creating more ambulatory settings and think about how do we leverage the ambulatory footprint, how do we scale it, how do we use telehealth to allow the expertise that sometimes lives at academic medical center to extend past our walls and into other communities, even rural communities, I think is a big opportunity for growth. And then I think lastly going back to our people, just continuing to invest in their growth and giving them the space to bring their ideas forward, to harness their energy and creativity. We have a platform I generate that any one of our employees or contract employees can go in and they can submit ideas and we vet those and we look to implement those. But getting close to the workforce and listening to their ideas and doing whatever we can to make those ideas realities I think are as an opportunity to create organic growth and to sustain our mission.
- [19:15]
B
I love that. Jason, thank you so much for joining us on the podcast today. This has been a really fascinating conversation. I think you touched on so many different trends and topics that are critical in health care today. And then your strategy behind the growth engine of the future will be really fun to see that play out. And you know, I'm looking forward to seeing you as well at our annual meeting. I know you'll be speaking on a panel with us in April and so it'll be great to dig a little bit deeper into some of these themes there and then continue the conversation.
- [19:43]
C
Absolutely. Thank you Laura, for the time. This was, this is great and definitely look forward to seeing you in April.