← Becker’s Healthcare Podcast
Becker’s Healthcare Podcast
Malisha Patel, Senior Vice President and Chief Executive Officer of Memorial Hermann Southwest and Sugar Land Hospitals
00:19:57
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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 Dearda with the Beckers Healthcare Podcast. I'm thrilled today to be joined by Malicia Patel, Senior Vice President and Chief Executive Officer at Memorial Herman, Southwest and Sugarland Hospitals. Malicious on the podcast today.
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C
Laura, thank you for having me on.
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B
Absolutely. Now I'm excited for our conversation. I know you always have so much going on in Memorial Herman in such an innovative system, and so I'm looking forward to learning a little bit more about what you've been up to as well as how you're thinking about the future. But before we dive in, can you tell me a little bit more about yourself, your background and the hospitals you oversee?
- [01:22]
C
My pleasure. Again, thank you for having me on and the Beckers team as well. I really enjoy listening to the podcast and to be a part of it is something I'm really excited to be a part of. My name is Malicia Patel and I have the privilege of serving as the CEO and Senior Vice President of two acute care hospitals in the Memorial Herman Health System in Greater Houston. Starting with highlighting our system, you mentioned the system. Memorial Herman is one of the largest nonprofit health systems in Texas with 17 hospitals and over 280 care delivery sites. We have over 7,000 employed and affiliated physicians and providers and over 35,000 employee partners that truly practice the highest standards of care for 2 million patients that we serve annually. I'm proud of our rich history. For over 118 years, Memora Herman has been committed to improving health in the Greater Houston community, contributing nearly millions annually in charity care and our community benefits program. Just one more thing on Memorial Herman at the Health of our all that we do is the health of our communities. Our goal is to deliver high value care for our patients and our populations and I'm fortunate to work alongside teams who show up every day with a deep sense of purpose and commitment to patients and each other. So I have the privilege of leading the system's Sugarland and Southwest Hospitals which have been serving the communities for 20 years and 50 years respectively. Memorial Herman Sugarland is a 179 bed hospital in suburban Sugar Land, which is in Fort Bend county, one of the fastest growing counties in the country. And Memorial Herman Southwest is a 541 bed facility in inner city Houston, which both 15 miles apart serve very different populations but with the same mission and vision improving health in the communities we serve now and for generations to come. And a little bit more About Me I started off my career in health care over 20 years ago after attending Trinity University in San Antonio where I received my Master's in Healthcare Administration. And prior to Memorial Herman I worked with Tennant Healthcare Corporation and I have worked with the VA Healthcare system as well.
- [03:59]
B
I love that. Wow, what a great experience you have and then bringing to your current role in Memorial Herman. I think that's amazing to have that type of background and history and then being able to implement that with your current care teams and make an impact on those 2 million patients that you served per year. Now when you think about the last year or so, could you zero in on an initiative that you led? What did you do and what were the results?
- [04:25]
C
But there are a lot of initiatives. But the one that comes to mind that I would say was the most important and transformative initiative we undertook in the past year was our EPIC implementation and now our ongoing optimization. People often focus on the Go Live, but the real work started long before that. We spent years planning Laura for this transition, aligning leaders, redesigning workflows, spending time with our workforce to just really understand how this change is going to impact care delivery. Go Live at itself was intense. I think that could be an entire different conversation, but what really mattered most was what came after. We're now deep into optimization. We're listening closely to our workforce, to our employees, to our physician partners, just continuing to refine our workflows and make the system work better for our team. The results of this digital transformation initiative have surpassed our expectations. Hospitals across the system have implemented epic. Across the nation have implemented EPIC to digitalize patients health records in which it's been critical to advancement to ensure accuracy and consistency across the continuum of care we have navigated past epic's initial implementation and optimization. As a system, we have been able to significantly stretch the boundaries of what this technology can do to improve care delivery, patient safety, physician and provider information sharing, and the patient's own ability to take ownership of his or her own healthcare journey. And I think that's been the Biggest thing that I really enjoyed watching is just the connection of having this type of information in our patient's fingertips.
- [06:37]
B
I love that. And, you know, I really appreciate what a big change that is because having that information can make that difference, can help them think differently about how they're caring for patients, deliver the care plans and, you know, really make sure that you are aligned and moving forward in a strong way. But I'm curious, can you talk a little bit more about that period as you were doing the planning and the go live and making adjustments, investments over time? What did you learn over that process? What are, I guess, advice would you have for other systems that are preparing to go through the same thing as they're trying to implement a whole new or unified version of their EHR and get it up and running as quickly as possible and have the same type of success that you've had?
- [07:20]
C
Well, I want to make sure that I give credit to where credit's due. And we had an instrumental number of leaders and frontline employee partners, physician leaders, you name it. We had folks that touch our patients, touch different components of the electronic medical record that were involved in this space. So we had work groups with patient access, we had work groups with perioperative services, perinatal with med surg. So we had multiple councils and structures leading up to this work. And we did exactly what you're asking. We learned from other organizations. We had site visits with other large organizations that had a significant transition, such as us. We sent our teams to UGM for, with EPIC to, to learn from our friends in Wisconsin. But really we were, we're doing the same thing, really gaining insights from other organizations that went through this, created structures that were beneficial that we created here as well. And I think the thing I'd like to stress the most is ongoing communication and the willingness to be agile and be able to make changes where we could help optimize the flow. And I think that was instrumental, first and foremost is getting the stakeholders that are going to be impacted the most to be a part of the change process. There was a lot of change management that went here and having all the key stakeholders was really important.
- [09:21]
B
That's helpful to know and understand. Thank you for sharing that with us. And, you know, really digging a little bit deeper now. Looking ahead for 2026. What are some of the big priorities as well as headwinds that you're focused on?
- [09:34]
C
Looking ahead to 2026, our priorities center on sustainable growth, workforce stability, operational excellence. Very similar to healthcare organizations across the country. For me, Including a major expansion at the Sugar Land campus that will significantly increase our ability to serve the community. The expansion is exciting, but it's going to require discipline to ensure reskill scale responsibility while protecting quality and culture at the same time. The headwinds we're facing are real rising cost, policy changes, reimbursement pressure, increasing patient acuity and workforce challenges. But recognizing that there's a lot of work that our system is doing. One that I'm really proud of when it comes to our workforce challenges is we recognize that our greatest asset and most indispensable asset is our workforce. And so we have developed a comprehensive and focused human capital strategy. The principles aim of our human capital strategy include being the employer of choice for the best talent in healthcare and equipping and empowering and enabling them to deliver high value care to create healthier communities now and for generations to come. We're also investing in internal growth opportunities to advance the career pathways of our existing talent within the system. These investments include personal career coaching, tuition support, reimbursement for continuing education opportunities and efforts to promote from within our existing talent pool when openings arise. I also want to highlight we're also actively engaged in proactive workforce development strategies. How are we building our pipeline? We have partnerships with local high schools, community colleges, universities. Just a lot of great work in this space.
- [11:46]
B
That's amazing to hear and I really appreciate that work towards building a great pipeline of talent and leadership as well as, you know, employee growth in retention and satisfaction. I think that's something that so many health systems are trying to accomplish today and really figuring out where that sweet spot is for their own teams to continue to retain a great workforce and staff. And when you talk about some of the different advancement opportunities, the career coaching, tuition support and more, is there anything that you are hearing from your team members or things you've planning to try new this year that you're excited to roll out to the team?
- [12:27]
C
We're continuously assessing our our benefits that we provide to the team. And so the continued improvements in the offerings that we offer to our employee partners is something that I'm really excited about. Whether it's their continued professional growth or personal needs that they may have at home, how we could help connect them to, you know, helping find a daycare that best meets the need for what they need. But there's our partnership with Bright Horizons and the tools that we could offer for tutoring for our employees and their families. So there's just a lot of great offerings that we're continuing to evaluate to make sure we could help meet the needs of our employee partners.
- [13:25]
B
Fantastic. That's helpful to understand and, you know, really seems like it meets a lot of the trends of the time in terms of how, you know, different folks want to be personalized and have different options and opportunities with those benefits. What do you think the hardest thing you'll have to do in the next year will be?
- [13:44]
C
In the coming year, the manner in which we provide healthcare services will will continue to change just due to recent federal legislation and ongoing conversations shaping the legislative and regulatory landscape across a multitude of issues impacting the delivery of care. As a nonprofit hospital system, we're monitoring those policy changes closely and determining the best way to continue to provide high quality care to the communities that we serve while complying with federal and state policy. We can't predict what those changes will be, but we're absolutely living in a transformative time for healthcare policy and its impacts on how hospitals, healthcare systems and providers will deliver care. So I think the hardest part will be continuing to make tough prioritization decisions. Where to invest, where to slow down, and how to balance financial realities with our responsibility to people. And then those decisions affect real lives. And they're going to require transparency and empathy and courage. But as I shared earlier at Memorial Herman, the health of our communities is at the center of what we do. And so with the headwinds, the quintuple aim will remain our guiding principle for our value based journey. This includes how we're going to continue to deliver the greatest outcomes at optimal cost, create exceptional experiences for our patients and a fulfilling work environment for our workforce, and improve health care access in the communities that we serve,
- [15:33]
B
that makes a lot of sense. And you know, that word access is such a huge talking point right now. And thinking about how healthcare needs to change, whether it's driven by policy or demographics or a convergence of many different factors, as communities still need to have care and need to be able to have the means to access it as well. And so when you're looking at that idea of transparency and empathy and trying to continue to grow those access points within the hospitals, the community you serve, you know, what does that look like for you? Is there a digital component? Are you looking at building additional ambulatory locations? How does that idea come into the strategy for what you're looking at in the next few years?
- [16:21]
C
Paul shared earlier that we have a large footprint across the greater Houston area. You know, I think when it comes to access, it's not something we could do alone. And we're very fortunate with the different partnerships that we have in the community. And as we think about access, those community partnerships are going to be really important. How we partner with our FQHCs, how we partner with our YMCAs, how we partner with different medical homes, how we partner with our Community Benefit Corporation and identify where our community health needs assessment tells us we need to spend some more time in. I know this past year we launched our first maternal van where we're able to bring health care services for women in their communities. They're in vulnerable communities. And so that's really neat for us to be delivering care by meeting people where they are.
- [17:37]
B
Absolutely. I love that. And you know, really it's helpful to understand some of those partnerships and places where you're finding it most valuable in spaces in the community too, where you're able to connect and expand services in your network. Now, before we wrap up here, how else are you thinking about going growth? What are some of the big opportunities that you're excited about and looking forward to?
- [17:59]
C
I see the greatest opportunities for growth at the intersection of people, innovation and technology. Developing leaders at every level, strengthening our physician and community partnerships, and thoughtfully integrating AI into how we deliver and support care, I think is going to be really important now and in the years to come. AI isn't about replacing people. It's about freeing up time, improving decision making, and allowing teams to focus more on what matters most. I mean, strong leadership and smart technology are aligned with purpose. Sustainable growth will follow. And so with that being said, Memoria Herman has established an AI Governance Council. And with guidance from the council, AI technology is helping to accelerate our digital transformation in support of our organization's transition to value based care. So I'm really excited about the work that we're doing in this space.
- [19:04]
B
I love that. Alicia, thank you so much for joining us on the podcast today. This has been a really fun conversation, very informative and inspiring to think about all you've gone through over the last couple of years and then, you know, continue opportunities. You know, the future too is just really an exciting time to be in healthcare. So thank you for your time today and, you know, looking forward to seeing you as well at our annual meeting. I know you'll be speaking on a panel and sharing additional perspective and thoughts along these lines. And so I look forward to continuing the conversation there.
- [19:36]
C
I appreciate it. Thank you, Laura. It.