As OSF HealthCare prepares for its CEO transition in April, the system is doubling down on innovation and agility as it expands access to care throughout its communities.
Michelle Conger, president of OSF HealthCare, will step in as CEO of the Peoria, Ill.-based health system in April following the retirement of Bob Sehring, who has led the system since 2017. Both are longtime leaders who have served the organization since 1994 and 2002, respectively.
OSF HealthCare has grown significantly since Mr. Sehring joined, expanding from five hospitals to 17 over the past two decades.
As Ms. Conger, who previously served as chief strategy officer, prepares to step into the CEO role, she is focused on taking that growth to the next level by further integrating the system’s facilities. This will include using digital tools differently in some rural areas and aggregating clinical resources to provide the highest level of care that is safe and accessible in hubs.
The strategy builds on OSF’s recent work to advance its delivery system redesign. The system created regional hubs to group specialists and deliver higher-level care across broader areas, which has helped improve rural recruitment, support more robust ICU services and keep care closer to patients’ homes.
The system’s three large hubs connect to OSF’s destination center through its flagship hospital, OSF St. Francis Medical Center in Peoria, as well as OSF Children’s Hospital of Illinois and the system’s cardiovascular, neurological and cancer institutes. The hub-and-spoke model includes destination centers, regional hubs and surrounding facilities that provide care locally. If higher-acuity care is needed, a patient can be moved to a hub or the destination center.
For small-urban systems like OSF, leaders are constantly evolving to ensure they can reach as many patients as possible geographically — but it is not possible to bring every service to every patient, Mr. Sehring told Becker’s. It is about positioning resources appropriately to meet the needs of the broadest population, he said.
OSF has largely focused on expanding access to care throughout communities in Illinois. The system also operates one critical access hospital in Michigan, which is about 60 miles from the next closest facility — highlighting the need for local access, Mr. Sehring said.
“In order to be clinically connected and able to drive clinical performance, you need to be closer geographically,” he said. “You can’t be spread across the country and expect clinicians to align across that broad geography.”
Ms. Conger said now is the right time to continue advancing that level of clinical integration.
“That’s where the real value happens,” she said. “The value to the patient is our ability to scale those resources across all of our communities, and that requires a level of integration that will take time. While we’ve made significant progress in that realm, I do think that it continues to be an opportunity.”
One focus area is cancer care, she said. The system has invested heavily in its cancer institute in Peoria and offers cancer care across Illinois. The next step is further integration so that a patient anywhere in the state could access a clinical trial they might not have previously had access to locally.
What’s next for OSF?
Because she has worked so closely with Mr. Sehring over the past few years — and especially in recent months — Ms. Conger does not expect the organization to experience a significant shift once she steps into the CEO role in April.
“I think what it will feel like is a strong continuation of where we started, and a lot of that would be around our Destination OSF work,” she said, which includes developing capabilities at the system’s highest levels of care and building out its hubs. “So wherever you come into OSF, you’re getting the same level of quality and service that you would get at our critical access hospital or our largest 625-bed hospital.”
One of Ms. Conger’s strengths is her focus on innovation, whether in the digital space or other areas, Mr. Sehring said.
“Her leadership as chief strategy officer, then overseeing our digital health efforts, really positions her to think about how to integrate — not just have the resources, but how to integrate them into how we look at care,” Mr. Sehring said. “That’s the area I think Michelle will likely take forward into the future.”
OSF’s next focus in digital health will be the safe and effective use of artificial intelligence, including improving efficiency and automation in its cost structure and exploring ways clinicians can use new tools, Ms. Conger said.
“I believe that’s the next wave of innovation,” she said. “I think it will be helpful both on the clinical and nonclinical side for our mission partners and our patients. I know there’s a lot of unknown there, but I don’t think it’s something any organization can ignore.”
OSF has created a team to guide AI decision-making, including which technologies to begin piloting and which should move beyond the pilot stage. The system started with governance to evaluate the ethics, safety and security of the tools before they are piloted, Ms. Conger said.
The team then focuses on where the biggest impact can be made in the organization. OSF has since explored and implemented some AI capabilities in the revenue cycle and call center. The system has also begun piloting ambient listening tools with physicians and advanced practice providers to manage documentation and remain more engaged with patients.
“I don’t see AI as ever displacing the workforce,” she said. “It’s about helping our workforce do the things that are more rewarding for them and enabling them to be more efficient and effective in their work.”
From long-term strategy to constant agility
Leading through the pandemic and other changes over the years, Mr. Sehring said it is difficult to predict exactly what the healthcare industry — and the country — will look like in five years.
“But we can hire, recruit, train and upskill leaders to help navigate that,” he said. “Surrounding yourself with great people is really the way to prepare for that.”
Ms. Conger said there has been a shift from long-term strategy to agility. “There’s so much that’s unknown that you almost have to prepare to understand you’re going to have to make pivots along the way,” she said.
Mr. Sehring said decades ago he could develop a 10-year budget or strategic plan. Over time those timelines shortened, and during the pandemic OSF was planning only three months ahead.
“It’s gotten a little bit more than that, but I’d say not much more than a year or so that you can effectively plan and say, ‘What does supply chain look like? What does clinical support look like? What does AI look like?’” Mr. Sehring said. “It’s really more about agility — whether it’s a pivot or a redirection — that becomes the most critical skill going forward.”
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