Robb Wetmore, MHR, Director of Digital Health at Variety Care

Summary

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Podcast Summary

Podcast: Becker’s Healthcare Podcast
Episode: Robb Wetmore, MHR, Director of Digital Health at Variety Care
Date: September 19, 2025
Host: Chris Sosa
Guest: Rob Wetmore

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Episode Theme

Transforming Healthcare Through Digital Innovation at Variety Care

This episode highlights Rob Wetmore’s unique career path, his leadership in digital health at a large, federally qualified health center (FQHC), and the current imperatives and strategies around digital transformation—particularly as they relate to improving patient access, harnessing partnerships, and adopting cutting-edge AI technology.

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Key Discussion Points & Insights

Rob Wetmore’s Career Journey and Values

• Background and Path to Healthcare
  • Rob’s journey began with an initial foray into business studies which he quickly found uninspiring.
    • Quote: “Those classes put me to sleep.” (02:02, Rob Wetmore)
  • Earned a double major in psychology and sociology, followed by a master’s and work toward LPC licensure.
  • Significant background in inpatient mental health, clinical management, and care transformation roles, leading to expertise at the intersection of clinical vision and operational execution.
    • Quote: “That’s really where I got a huge exposure into the transition between a clinical vision and operational reality and how those things worked for and against each other.” (00:58, Rob Wetmore)
  • Emphasizes being a “helper” and maintaining a patient-first mentality, even in the digital health arena.

Purpose and Priorities of Digital Health at Variety Care

• Patient-Centric Mission
  • Focuses on serving 100,000+ patients across 20+ clinics, especially underserved populations.
  • Sees technology as the central tool to reduce disparities and enhance access.
    • Quote: “My top priorities are really serving the patients, reducing those disparities, and providing access to the underserved communities.” (05:04, Rob Wetmore)
  • Telemedicine, remote patient monitoring, and similar tools are emphasized for expanding reach.

Rapid Change, Limited Resources, and Collaborative Work

• Adapting to Change with Limited Funding
  • Balancing federal performance pressures with fewer resources is an ongoing challenge.
  • Digital health viewed not as a side project, but as a core strategic initiative.
    • Quote: “Digital healthcare isn’t just like this side project now. It’s really looked at as a key strategic initiative.” (09:59, Rob Wetmore)
• Collaboration Philosophy
  • Works cross-functionally with internal leaders: Dr. Lydia Nightingale (VP of Medical Affairs), Chief Medical Officer, and Chief of Population Health.
  • Externally, collaborates with digital health vendors like:
    • Evisit (Telemedicine partner for the past 2.5 years)
      • Praised for deep, hands-on collaboration.
      • Quote: “They’ve really been a partner just in digital health and innovating and expanding what that looks like and how people get involved in.” (07:27, Rob Wetmore)
    • Naveena AI (AI-driven clinical record review)
      • Integrates with Epic, pulls data from Health Information Exchanges, and makes diagnostic suggestions.
      • Goal: more robust provider insights, well-rounded patient data.
      • Quote: “The AI will then make suggestions towards what diagnosis the provider may want to look at... So it’s a really cool technology. I’m very excited to get it going.” (08:48, Rob Wetmore)
  • Rob operates solo in his department but considers himself part of a broader, synergistic internal and external team.

Building Sustainable Digital Health

• Scalability and Culture Shift
  • The goal is to move beyond pilots to true, sustainable digital transformation—woven into organizational culture and practice.
    • Quote: “I’m hoping to be able to take this from just like piloting tools and bringing some stuff on to really making this something that's sustainable and culture shift...” (10:13, Rob Wetmore)
  • Driven by intrinsic motivation and excitement around digital innovation.

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Memorable Quotes & Timestamps

• Career Pivot:
  • “Those classes put me to sleep.” (02:02, Rob Wetmore)
• On Living Between Worlds:
  • “There’s such a divide between technology and the human experience...I live on that divide, that gray line between those two realms.” (03:48, Rob Wetmore)
• Patient-First Mentality:
  • “It’s all about the patient and patient first, patient engagement, patient care.” (03:17, Rob Wetmore)
• Strategic Digital Health:
  • “Digital healthcare isn’t just...a side project now. It’s really looked at as a key strategic initiative.” (09:59, Rob Wetmore)
• Future of Digital Health:
  • “I’m hoping to...make sure that we can scale it across the organization and then it sticks.” (10:26, Rob Wetmore)

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Notable Segments with Timestamps

• Rob’s Introduction and Background: 00:13–04:25
• Digital Health Priorities & Patient Focus: 05:04–05:58
• Collaboration & Partnerships: 06:46–09:40
• Excitement for the Future of Digital Health: 09:59–10:46

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Tone and Takeaways

The conversation is candid, energetic, and optimistic—Rob Wetmore’s enthusiasm for “living in the gray line” between human care and digital innovation is palpable. The episode offers a window into the evolving, sometimes solitary, but interconnected world of FQHC digital health work, highlighting the power of purposeful partnerships and a relentless focus on equitable patient access.

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Transcript

[A]

Welcome to the Becker's Healthcare Podcast. I'm Chris Sosa, your host, and I'm thrilled to be joined today by Rob Wetmore. He is the director of Digital health for Variety Care in Oklahoma City. Rob, thank you for joining us today.

[B]

Thanks, Chris. Thank you for having me.

[A]

Yeah, we're so glad you could be here. Rob, if you could please introduce yourself and tell our audience a bit about your background.

[B]

Sure thing. As Chris mentioned, my name is Rob Wetmore. I am the director of digital healthcare at Variety Care. We are a federally qualified health center out of Oklahoma City. We have around 20 clinics within the Oklahoma City area and a couple into rural Oklahoma. And we currently serve responsible for a little over 100,000 patients. So, fairly large system. My path kind of coming here into this realm is a bit different than what is the usual. So I spent 16 years working in inpatient mental health, everything from utilization review and prior authorization into clinical program management. And then I even was working under supervision for my LPC licensure before my career kind of went off on a tangent and ended up being on an epic implementation build as an instructional designer. And then that transitioned again into what we called care transformation, where I was able to work with some physician leads to develop best practices for that healthcare system, to standardize care and processes throughout the whole entire thing. And so that's really where I got a huge exposure into the transition between a clinical vision and operational reality and how those things worked for and against each other.

[A]

That does seem a little bit like a meandering path through health, but by and large, it just sounds like you've had a, a breath of experience in, in the industry. What got you, what made you go into healthcare? What made you pursue that in the first place?

[B]

So kind of going back even further, I entered undergraduate with this whole idea of like, I'm going to be a business major, I'm going to be a CEO, and you know, do all this and make all this money. And then those classes put me to sleep.

[A]

And.

[B]

So I realized that probably wasn't the direction I wanted to go. And I took an intro to Psychology class and realized that it was very interesting to me. It's very intriguing. The psychology, the social sciences. And I ended up getting a double major in psychology and sociology, ended up in Oklahoma after undergrad and quickly realized that a bachelor's degree in psychology and sociology was going to get me nowhere. And eventually got into a master's program at the University of Oklahoma and focused on my LPC licensure. At the time, I was Working for the inpatient mental health facility. So I was able to translate that real world experience into the classroom and vice versa. So it was a really cool way of getting that accomplished. So that's how I got into healthcare. It just fell in my lap kind of a thing. And it's something that definitely is a part of who I am. It's in my, it's in my DNA really. I enjoy it. No one's in my family has been in healthcare, but it's definitely something that's just ingrained into me. It's really just I'm a helper and I can't help but be an helper even on this side in digital health and looking at the systems of things, it's in that helper role of like, how can I better the system, not just for the system. I mean, sure, that's great, they, they sign my paychecks, but to me it's all about the patient and patient first, patient engagement, patient care. And that was driven in on the behavioral health side way before was on to the medical side. So I, I got a head start on that patient first mentality before it really got into the medical side of healthcare. And now in digital health, that's what it has to be about. There's such a divide between technology and the human experience that with me, I live on that divide, that, that gray line between those two realms of basically anywhere in life, I live in that gray line. And so for me to be able to take digital technology and use it to transform the human experience in healthcare is just like a win win for me.

[A]

I guess certainly if there's any indication, sure indication that you're in the wrong place, it's if it's not inspiring you and putting you to sleep. But fortunately you found your way into wr. Now I love the way you put it that it's a gray line. I hadn't heard that before, but it certainly, I think, speaks to a lot of leadership in healthcare that you, as you said, you have to live between these two worlds of what digital and other technologies can provide and how you actually translate that to the patient. So along those lines, could you let us know what exactly are your top priorities today?

[B]

Well, I mean, I kind of hit on it. My top priorities are really serving the patients, reducing those disparities and providing access to the underserved communities. That is always been true for federally qualified health centers and it's really, it's always been true for what I've been trying to do, but now it's even more so the pressures that are being put on us at the federal level to perform, to do what we're doing with less funding, we have to figure out a way around this. And it comes down to access, and to me, in my worldview and fortunately my leaders as well, it comes down to things like telemedicine and remote patient monitoring. Any sort of tool that improves access, increases access, gets us in front of our patients and help them have healthier lives.

[A]

Along those lines as well. Rob, so to say that things change quickly would be maybe the understatement of the year. Technology and health care in particular. And you covered some of the challenges that you're facing with respect to changes in the federal government and the like. So could you take this moment to just say, describe to audience how you anticipate your role is going to change and how the role of your team is going to change, and lastly, how you work through. You said you're really not alone in this. Not at all. So who are the people and other systems organizations that you're looking for to kind of collaborate with? That's a lot. So breaking as you wish?

[B]

No, that's a great question. So to start things off with Digital health is the department of Rob. So I don't have a team to wrap around me, but that doesn't stop me. I talk to myself probably as much as I talk to anybody, and we have good conversations, but I have a good relationship with my leadership. Dr. Lydia Nightingale, she's our VP of Medical Affairs.

[A]

And.

[B]

And we have a good relationship and a good understanding of where we want this organization to go on that medical, clinical, operational front and really shift how we're doing things within the system. And she and our CMO and our like, chief of Population Health and all those aspects, they're really working together with the synergy to kind of bring this together. So internally, that's my team that I work with is. Is Dr. Nightingale and her chiefs that are underneath her to just transform the way that variety care is doing care. Externally, I have a great partner with Evisit. Evisit Telemedicine. They have been an amazing partner from the first conversation I had with them. Gosh, it's been two and a half years now probably that I've been working with them. They've been amazing. Telemedicine partner, more than a telemedicine partner. They've really been a partner just in digital health and innovating and expanding what that looks like and how people get involved in. So it's been a great partnership There working with other vendors to try to bring in cleaner, better, faster, more efficient ways of doing things. Naveena AI is a company that I've been trying to work well, I've been working with a lot. I'm trying to get them into our ecosystem. They're going to allow us to look at the medical record from a whole new level. Naveena uses its AI to not only comb through our record and we're an EPIC shop, we go through o instance of Epic. And so not only to come through Epic and Nexus or whatever you want to call their care everywhere platform, all that stuff, but it also looks out to the health information exchange and pulls in information from that on that patient. And so our providers right there in front of them are going to have all of this information on, on these patients that they treat and know a much more robust history than they've ever been able to look at before because it's pulling in information that we probably don't have in our health system from records going way back. And the AI will then make suggestions towards what diagnosis the provider may want to look at, to look at and, and run through and just kind of dive deeper into. So it's a really cool technology. I'm very excited to get it going. We have some internal barriers that we're looking into to make sure that once we decide to go forward with it that it's going to be clean implementation process. But it's something that I'm very excited about.

[A]

I'm glad you mentioned that, the excitement aspect because you know, that's really what's going to keep all of us going in all of our jobs really, especially when things can be a little difficult as they are right now. Beyond what you just mentioned and thank you for sharing all of that, is there anything else that you think, hey, this is really exciting and I really want to share this as far as.

[B]

Your job is concerned, just me personally, the fact that digital healthcare is isn't just like this side project now. It's really looked at as a key strategic initiative. It is one of our strategic initiatives here at Variety Care is innovation within that being the digital health innovation. So the fact that that is my realm and the fact that it's at that high of level of engagement is pretty rewarding and exciting in itself. And I'm hoping to be able to take this from just like piloting tools and bringing some stuff on to really making this something that's sustainable and culture shift and just being able to make sure that we can scale it across the organization and then it sticks.

[A]

Rob, thank you so much for joining us on the podcast today. We're going to see you at a conference coming up this fall, and we can't wait to share these insights until next time.

[B]

All right. Thanks, Chris. Been good talking to you.