Education’s Role In Influencing The Next Generation Of Healthcare Models Around The World

As education continues to evolve and develop its curriculum and programs to prepare students with 21st century skills, the industries that will employ them are also looking to improve their learning and training practices. Social-emotional learning (SEL), problem solving, and other “soft skills” emphasized in today’s classroom environments are now highly sought after in the professional development provided by businesses and organizations. Recent research by Harvard’s David Deming even suggests that soft skills will soon outweigh hard skills in workplace importance. According to Deming, although STEM jobs will continue to hold steady, fields with significant interpersonal interaction will see the most considerable growth.

Healthcare is one of the fields with the highest levels of interpersonal demand. As health facilities and institutions look to improve, they find themselves leaning into education models to enhance professional learning, best practices, safety, community, and patient and provider outcomes. The adoption of SEL models made popular in classroom environments may prove helpful in alleviating the increased stress facing healthcare professionals.

Additionally, health literacy acts as a binding element to the role education plays in the new healthcare experience. It equips patients with a better foundation to understand and advocate for their health while assisting healthcare professionals in delivering health and medical information in a manner that is thoughtful and easy to understand.

To gain a better understanding of education’s role in improving health literacy and healthcare learning environments, I spoke with Dr. Brian Donley, CEO of the Cleveland Clinic London. Brian is busy setting up a new facility, targeted for launch in 2021, that will introduce the high level of quality patient care expected by those who have become familiar with Cleveland Clinic in the U.S. as one of the leading providers of specialized medical care in the world.

Rod Berger: Brian, let’s first start with why the U.K. and, specifically, why London for Cleveland Clinic?

Brian Donley: We chose London because we feel there’s great healthcare that exists in London and the U.K. For us to learn, innovate, and continue to be better as an organization, we want to be part of the ecosystem and contribute to this ecosystem as we learn and innovate.

The second reason we chose London is our confidence in London being a city to the world and a belief it will continue to be a city to the world. As our model of care is successful in London, it allows us to grow our brand worldwide.

Berger: Speaking of that model of care, how are you integrating education as part of the glide path into the local community of London, the broader U.K. and Europe? How are you strategically managing the inherent cultural shift as you go about implementation?

Donley: I appreciate that question because we talk about the fact that when we come to London, we come with humility and we’re not coming to bring the Cleveland Clinic and stick it in London. 

Actually, we want to bring the best of what we do but also integrate with the best of U.K. healthcare. Bringing those together is what forms Cleveland Clinic London and education is at the center. It’s been core to who we’ve been as an organization for over 98 years and it’s a very important aspect of what we will do here in the U.K.

We have already worked hard on developing relationships progressing to partnerships around formalizing education as a part of Cleveland Clinic London. We’re doing it at the fellowship level focused on quality, safety and positional leadership.

We’re working on executing it at the medical school level. We are already doing it in the form of teaching an undergraduate course.

Berger: Let’s continue and drill down on that, Brian. If we think about education and the role of educating patients, I’d imagine there’s an impact on outcomes. I’d love to hear your perspective of being an American in the U.K. Are you finding patients are becoming more critical of, and savvy about, the information that determines healthcare outcomes? How does that impact the way in which you think about their experience and treatment?

Donley:  I think patients, in general, both in the U.S. and U.K., are becoming much more interested and knowledgeable about healthcare data and information which leads to transparency. It’s fundamental in healthcare to develop better outcomes.

We have worked on a platform of promoting transparency for a long time at the Cleveland Clinic. Our service line published outcome books available for anyone to look at. Online, we published a patient evaluation of our position in Cleveland. We look to bring that same level of transparency to the market here in the U.K. It’s something patients in the U.K. are beginning to want and expect, and it’s something they should have.

Berger:  Brian, you brought up data and information. One of the things I’m noticing in the education space and the global classroom is that we’re trying to find technologies that aren’t just “nice to have” but are integrated and provided within context.

We’re starting to see education technology companies being asked by healthcare operations, associations, and environments of practice to integrate technology.

I wonder what your thoughts are on the appropriate role that technology can play. Is an opportunity being missed? Or is technology being sufficiently built into the overall practice of medicine?

Donley: I believe healthcare, in general, is actively engaging with technology. We can strive to do it better and faster, but I see progress with great partnerships between education, healthcare and technology. There are many different roles that technology plays. Two important ones are: driving better patient outcomes and moving toward a better provider experience.

Around patient outcomes, an example would be devising algorithms with our data to allow us to prioritize resources to the appropriate patients so that we stratify resources and improve the outcomes for patients who have more challenging issues.

A specific example would be the remote intensive care unit (ICU) that we run. We monitor all of our ICUs from a central location with algorithms designed so that doctors overseeing in a central location can have the most challenging patients come to the forefront of their awareness, allowing them to pay more attention to their needs. They can make contact with the individual ICU─the nursing team and the local physician team─and be proactive instead of reactive to the patients’ issues and challenges.

Additionally, I’m really passionate about how technology can improve the caregiver experience as defined by nurses, physicians, or other healthcare providers. Our role as providers comes in four different sections; data acquisition, analyzing data, interpreting the data and counseling the patient. When we think of it in those four ways where technology can do its work on the data acquisition and analysis sides. I’ve heard stats that state in 1950, healthcare data doubled every 50 years. In 1980, it doubled every seven years and in 2020, it will double every 73 days.

When you think of that, there’s no way that any healthcare provider can keep up on the analyses of all the data necessary for a patient. They will never do it as well as technology.

If technology can take the aspects of data acquisition and analyses off of the provider, it allows providers to have more time for interpretation and counseling of the patient. The reason that’s critical is the fundamental core of what we do in healthcare is to provide empathy to another member of our shared humanity. So technology can drive more time for that expression of empathy.

When you read about caregiver burnout, the fundamental aspect is the diminishing meaning and purpose that our providers are feeling in their work. If we can improve the time that a provider can express empathy, that improves the time that a provider receives empathy back from a patient. That’s where you can drive improvement in caregiver burnout and technology is essential to a better future in this area.

Berger: I’m so glad you brought up burnout. It affects so many industries, including education. Speaking of healthcare, I was having a meeting the other day with a healthcare professional, in Nashville, who talked about burnout and mentioned an interesting occurrence. Apparently, inside emergency room scenarios the burnout is so great that “Dr. Google” (as I was told) shows up because physicians have to run over to Google to help them make decisions on the care of a patient in real-time.

I can’t help but think about the role education can play in understanding both the physician and the experience that physicians have in the profession so that they can do their best work and in turn, the patient receives the best care.

How do you interpret that? I know you’re a research and education institution, so I would imagine that it’s at the forefront of your mind and of leadership to support professionals in the space.

Donley: You couldn’t have said it better, Rod. It’s a hundred percent at the front of our mind; how to improve the fundamentals in our workforce to face the challenges and embrace the potential solution to those challenges. To be specific, it is around technology; it’s around data science; it’s around computer science.

I think that what we need to do is influence education at a more primary level in medical education. There are two things that need to get done. First, we need to get more focused on the understanding surrounding data and computer science in early medical education.

Secondly, as a society across all countries, we have to embrace the growth mindset early in education. You need to stimulate people to be curious, to continue to learn because so much is needed now.

When I trained, data science and computer science had nothing to do with what I ever expected would be involved in providing care. We need people to embrace the continuation of learning. The buzzword is a “growth mindset” and it can be reinforced early in the education process.

Berger:  Let’s shift but still talk about the healthcare provider. We’re seeing a talent drain in so many sectors of the economy and in healthcare specifically, there are real areas of need. Pediatrics, for instance, is seeing a decline in numbers as well as other specialties. Even medical schools are experiencing enrollment drop-offs. Specialties with less financial potential are sometimes most at risk.

What responsibility do the Cleveland Clinics of the world and other established brands in the healthcare space have in marketing the healthcare experience so that young people around the world see it as not only noble but something that they absolutely want to achieve and be involved in? What community-building role do you see institutions like the Cleveland Clinic having in promoting health and wellness literacy?

Donley: I think it’s absolutely the responsibility of organizations like ours, but I think it’s also a responsibility that all healthcare providers should have.

I think we can better fulfill that responsibility first by realizing that it is a responsibility. We can better fulfill that responsibility by actively being a member of the communities that we serve.

I’m encouraged with more of the focus on the social determinants of health. As we realize the essential aspects, it becomes clear that if the ultimate result is better patient outcomes, as healthcare providers, we have to spend more time on health education for the community. It needs to be in a proactive way instead of reactive.

For that reason, we always think of health care as two words and not one word. We think of it as “health” and “care,” not as “healthcare” because both words are very important.

The conversation has been edited and condensed for clarity.