Workplace in Focus Podcast Episode 2 Transcript

Banner Health’s response to the COVID-19 pandemic, helping Arizonians get tested and preparing for a potential 2nd wave with Chuck Lehn, President of Banner Health Network.

[ANNOUNCER] You have COVID-19 related workplace questions. Banner|Aetna has the answers. Welcome to Banner|Aetna: Workplace in Focus.  Now here’s your host, Banner|Aetna market head of sales, John Dingledine.

[DINGLEDINE] Welcome back everyone, I’m your host, John Dingledine. This week's guest is the President of Banner Health Network, Chuck Lehn. Chuck has been with Banner for three decades, and is a founding member of our Banner|Aetna joint venture. We’re really excited to have him here today. Welcome Chuck, thanks for joining us.

[LEHN] Thanks John. Glad to be here.

[DINGLEDINE] You know three decades, thirty years, is a long time to be in a business. Certainly we have a lot of challenges with COVID. How does this rank, and how does this stack up with the challenges you have faced over that time?

[LEHN] You know John, I think the word we keep hearing is unprecedented. And I think that’s really the right word. You know this has had such a dramatic effect on people’s lives, those that have been afflicted with the disease, family members, its affected the employers, people being able to make a living. Certainly affected the healthcare system, and all of the financial challenges it's created over the spectrum. So I think it's unprecedented, and I don’t think any of us in our healthcare careers have seen anything like it. So we’ve gotta take it seriously, and we’ve gotta work hard to overcome this. And I think we're confident we can do that, but it's unprecedented.

[DINGLEDINE] Certainly it will take all of us working together. Can you tell us a little bit about Banner Health’s top priorities in responding to the COVID-19 Pandemic?

[LEHN] We initially focused on creating capacity for treatment. We were really worried about having specific availability for emergency room capability and ICU capability, and just making sure our health system was prepared for a really worse case scenario. So we started shutting down elective procedures and anything that we could really transfer out of the hospital, so that the hospital had maximum capacity incase we had a surge of COVID-19 patients.

So in addition to managing our capacity, we also wanted to move into prevention mode. So we wanted to make sure that the public understood that there really isn’t any immediate prevention or care for this, so we need to really focus on things we can do to minimize it. So handwashing, social distancing, all of the kinds of things that the CDC recommended. So we really went aggressively on the prevention mode. Then we also followed that with, we had to immediately convert most of our care delivery capabilities to virtual healthcare. So we went making sure medical groups, physicians in our independent medical practices all had those capabilities to see those patients virtually. For a couple of reasons, one obviously we wanted to reduce the transmission of the disease in-person visits, and two just people’s reluctance to travel to go to appointments and those kinds of things. We wanted to make sure that we had that capability, that virtual capability, and then we also prioritized patients that we knew were at high risk. Not only for the COVID treatments but for other ailments like lung disease, those kinds of things. We did a lot of outreach to those kinds of folks that had high risk factors to make sure that they were getting their medications and care that they needed.

And then kind of our fourth, or final priority, and the startup mode was keeping everybody informed. Throughout our network, throughout our organization, the public just communicate, communicate, communicate. We had daily huddles multiple times just so we could get people as informed as possible. So we did lots of different things to make sure we were prepared for responding to it as best as we could.

[DINGLEDINE] Yeah, there is certainly a lot of things to think about. Do you think we're at the point now where we can pick up where we left off, or at least start thinking about that?

[LEHN] We are, so we’ve been starting to slowly restart the healthcare system. Doing things carefully and cautiously. Starting to do the medically necessary procedures that were delayed. We’re starting to do those. We’re probably at maybe 50% capacity able to do those right now. We’re also making sure people are safe while we're doing those.

[DINGLEDINE] So what kind of precautions is Banner Health taking to limit COVID-19 exposure for their nurses, doctors, staff, even their patients?

[LEHN] So first we’re screening everyone, and making sure that people that are coming into our facilities, clinics, or care settings are appropriate doing basic screenings so we believe they are safe to enter. We are also limiting access to patients, and access to family members so forth, so we're trying to limit (it) to just treating the patient. That’s been a challenge. It’s hard, people really want to be with their loved ones. But we have really tried to limit that, so we limit anybody that’s potentially exposed. And we’re also doing contact tracing where it's necessary. So if we do find out later that somebody was diagnosed then we start the contact tracing process. Making sure our team members have Personal Protective Equipment. That’s been a big challenge, and I think we have met that challenge, and I’m sure that we have adequate protection for everybody. And then also having caregiver work virtually wherever we can. Even within the walls of a hospital for example, where we’re not having the caregiver enter the room. We can have a caregiver stand outside the room virtually even 5 or 10 feet away. They don’t have to use PPE, limits exposure, that kind of thing. And then just I will probably say this multiple times but the basics: handwashing, social distancing, being careful.

[DINGLEDINE] Okay thanks Chuck. I know I have heard a lot about a potential second wave of COVID-19. There is certainly ways Banner Health is preparing for that, and how do you think telemedicine will play a role?

[LEHN] Sure, so they’re are a number of things we are doing to prepare for that. I had mentioned earlier the lack of Personal Protection Equipment, and Banner is a member of Premier, which is a healthcare purchasing consortium, with a number of other health systems across the U.S.. And of the things that we just completed was the purchase of a domestic supplier of Personal Protective Equipment to a manufacturer. So we don’t have to worry about, or worry less about supply limitations because we have direct access to a manufacturer. So that’s really important, so we’re prepared for that. A second thing is really the widespread adoption of telemedicine. I think we’re just kinda scratching the surface on the things we can do with telemedicine. We did it quickly out of necessity, but now I think we can keep refining it and find more and more ways to make sure we can use telemedicine effectively. So in really almost any kind of a setting. And then you’ve probably seen some of the public information that our Chief Medical Services Officer, Dr. Marjorie Bessel, has been promoting like on television and so forth. It’s just about common sense measures, so again the social distancing, hand washing, just being careful and being smart about how we interact with each other.

[DINGLEDINE] Yeah. I certainly understand. How about advice for C suite leaders in Arizona, about how best to bring the workforce back in this situation, as these SeeSweet Leaders think about that?

[LEHN] Sure, there’s a number of things to consider. So one is creating physical barriers, the information is that much of the disease is transmitted physically so creating some kind of physical barrier between workers. You see that in grocery stores where they put plexiglass screens up and so forth to keep that physical distancing. Second is masking, making sure that folks are wearing masks when appropriate. And then having just those common check ins, for example when you log into your computer asking basic screening, have you had a fever, those kinds of things to make sure people are staying home if they suspect that they have anything. And then enhance cleaning. So I think everybody is focused on that of trying to make sure they’re cleaning up workspaces after meeting rooms, all of those kinds of things to keep things as clean as possible. So I think all of us have a responsibility to make sure that we keep people safe, and communicate well to keep people informed of what’s going on. But using those common sense things I think will help us all stay safe.

[DINGLEDINE] Ok. Perfect Chuck. Hey, we greatly appreciate your time today for coming on with us. Thank you everyone for joining us on this episode as we explore how to get back to the workplace. Join us next week as we get the point of view from our innovative telehealth partner, 98Point6.

[ANNOUNCER] You’ve been listening to Banner|Aetna: Workplace in Focus. Learn more at BannerAetna.com.