HJNO Jul/Aug 2019

Q&A 22 JUL / AUG 2019 I  Healthcare Journal of NEW ORLEANS   What is an innovation company within a hospital? innovationOchsner, or iO as we call it, is an innovation lab founded by Ochsner Health System. It functions like a startup that is embedded within one of the largest health systems in the Gulf South. We are focused on solving some of healthcare’s most pressing problems and creating new value by using technology and data to create personalized, patient-centered solutions to empower people to live their healthiest, best lives, while also reducing costs and making the experience of health and healthcare bet- ter for everyone. We have an incredible cross-functional, entrepreneurial team that has developed a diverse portfolio of initiatives, includ- ing extensive work in digital health and machine learning/artificial intelligence. We are relentless about finding new ways to solve age-old challenges and bringing them to life to make an impact in the com- munities we serve. That’s what is so special about being a startup in a health system. As a startup, we have immediate access to a real-world environment to test, validate, and grow our solutions, and at the same time the health system has access to an in- house team to work with to solve real-world problems. What is the methodology of attracting and analyzing these ideas? We keep up with trends and break- throughs in medicine, science, and technol- ogy, and because we are fortunate enough to be part of a great health system, we also get to see first-hand some of the challenges our patients, physicians, and clinicians experi- ence every day. These internal and exter- nal sources help give us a broad funnel of ideas that we vet for desirability, feasibility, and viability. People are always at the center of what we do, and we are very intentional about designing programs and tools that create a tangible impact in the real world, on the ground. We focus on ideas that we think will meet the needs of people, while leveraging available technology and science, and setting them up for scale so they can benefit a lot of people. From there, we use a process of experimentation and ideation, where we are building and learning at the same time. One area that we have been focused on for several years now is how we can use digital health tools to solve chronic dis- ease, which affects so many people we know and love. Chronic disease is respon- sible for 75 percent of deaths and 86 per- cent of healthcare costs in this country, and it is a problem that is projected to get worse over time. It is a big problem, and when you consider that the healthcare delivery model is still principally designed around provid- ing episodic care for acute conditions, not for chronic conditions that are longstanding and dynamic, our team recognized that we needed to reengineer and completely rede- sign the delivery model to try and move the needle on chronic disease. Nearly five years ago, we saw an opportu- nity to try and solve that problem by using what was then new connected technology to create a more continuous, proactive, and effective model of care. The idea is, rather than just going into a doctor’s office three or four times a year, patients can send infor- mation to us about their health using an app on their smartphone, and then get regular “…patients can send information to us about their health using an app on their smartphone, and then get regular virtual check-ups from a dedicated care team from the comfort of their own home.”