Ochsner Health

when we join together in love we can do what once seemed impossible for me that's the heart of rebirth

very well said i think uh you know one of the things that we just saw this week you released a couple of singles on an album that's coming up Massive news with the Neuroscience Center and Ochsner opening up.

I mean, that's, you know, is that opening if things don't happen the way it happened over the last 20 years? And, you know, you sit there and look at it's been pretty remarkable how, to your point, a blocked punt and then your journey and story and fight has inspired and just lasted, you know, left a lasting legacy.

It's pretty cool.

Um, maybe talk, walk us through a little bit of y- what a, an enterprise relationship is like.

You've got some amazing hospitals, Northwestern, Ochsner, Cleveland.

Y- when you implement your system, what happens to a nurse at the Cleveland Clinic in Ohio?

I'll give you an example of, um, a couple of different products, but one, what, what we have found is, so there's two ways you can apply this.

The hamstring is you hyper-extend something, right, as you're running.

I mean, we all know it's Ochsner, so we can just move on.

It's Ochsner.

There you go.

Yeah.

Warner has had a remarkable career in healthcare.

He spent 24 years at Ochsner Health in New Orleans, leading through explosive growth and innovation, as well as through some tough seasons like Hurricane Katrina and COVID.

In 2022, after more than two decades at Ochsner, Warner did something that I think gets harder the more successful you become.

He started over.

Uh, I oversee the revenue cycle, HIM, utilization review, decision support, and operational finance like productivity and all that.

Um, originally, so I started my career in the revenue cycle at Ochsner.

Um, and I was a denials an- analyst in that role, and then I moved into the operational finance side of the world, um, at, at Ochsner Baptist, which is their women's facility.

And I had a really great experience, uh, at that organization, and then moved into this role almost five years ago now.

Well, it's great to hear and, and definitely exciting to have that type of background coming into the current space.

And so when you've got all of these moving parts and things kind of constantly shifting, and I know technology is part of that too, um, how do you keep the teams, your teams focused on the most important things and making sure they're, you know, uh, really chasing down those extra dollars, so, um, you're bringing that in and, and, um, really able to continue to keep the, the revenue cycle func- functioning efficiently and effectively?

Uh, so I think the biggest thing really is being strategic with how we spend our resources.

And, um, Stephanie Wells at Ochsner used to call her analytics team the secret sauce, and I think that that is something that I definitely took from her leadership, is that, uh, when I got to Singing River, I did establish an analytics, a rev cycle analytics team.

This is Laura DiErdo with the Becker's Healthcare podcast.

I'm thrilled today to be joined by Dan Shields, Chief Executive Officer of Digital Medicine at Ochsner Health.

Dan, it's a pleasure to have you on the podcast today.

Thanks for having me, Laura.