Stanford Medicine Children’s Health Receives Top Honor at 23rd Annual eHealthcare Leadership Awards Presentation

// By Susan Dubuque //

The web and mobile transformation initiatives at Stanford Medicine Children’s Health focus on enhancing the experience for patients and families by providing digital tools at every touchpoint throughout their care.

Stanford Medicine Children’s Health was one of four health-related organizations to receive the Mark Gothberg eHealthcare Organizational Commitment Award at the 23rd Annual eHealthcare Leadership Awards presented at HCIC in Miami on November 9, 2022. The organization also received this coveted award in 2019 and 2020.

The Organizational Commitment Award is the award program’s highest honor, recognizing industry leadership, innovation, and commitment. Judges evaluate entries on the basis of an organization’s overall digital approach and strategy, including web and mobile, marketing, staffing, internal communications, financial investment, and results.

Kishore Reddipeta, director, web systems & technologies, Stanford Medicine Children’s Health

In addition to the Organizational Commitment Award, Stanford Children’s won three other awards in 2022 in the following categories: Best Overall Digital Patient Experience, Best Digital Physician Engagement, and Best Mobile App.

“We are all very grateful and honored to be recognized with this award,” says Kishore Reddipeta, director of web systems & technologies at Stanford Medicine Children’s Health. “It reflects the hard work of our clinical, administrative, operations, and information services teams — all working together to fulfill our mission.” 

Read on and learn how this leading healthcare system disrupts the industry by developing digital solutions that will improve the health of patients and families — and can be leveraged around the world.

Stanford Medicine Children’s Health is the largest healthcare system in the San Francisco Bay Area — and one of the few in the country exclusively dedicated to pediatric and obstetric care — with more than 65 locations across California and 85 locations in the U.S. Western region.

Digital innovation is essential to supporting Stanford Children’s vision: “To heal humanity through science and compassion, one child and family at a time.”

“Over the past six years, Stanford Children’s has made significant efforts and achieved key results in digital innovation and advancement across the enterprise,” says Reddipeta. In 2016, a web steering committee was established to provide governance, guidance, and support to web and mobile digital initiatives. In addition to the chief information officer and leadership representatives from web services, the committee includes executive leadership from other departments, including strategy, marketing, nursing, patient care services, human resources, medical information, and ambulatory access.

Focus on Patients and Families

“A seamless, fully integrated digital patient experience is a significant component of our top-quality care,” says Reddipeta. One factor that distinguishes this organization is the involvement of a family advisory council and other patient and family groups in planning and evaluating digital engagement.

“Our priority is to drastically improve access,” remarks Reddipeta. “We’ve flipped the mode of delivery to take healthcare to children, families, and expectant mothers. Our telehealth virtual visits are a convenient way to consult directly with our providers from home to get expert advice when needed, using mobile device or desktop computer through use of our robust virtual visit telehealth system.”

Stanford Children’s mobile app is designed to enhance patient experience, delivers myriad services, and makes information and care available globally — from finding a doctor and making appointments to paying bills and navigating the campus. The award-winning mobile app, available in English and Spanish, aligns with the organization’s core values of health equity, diversity, and inclusion. The app serves more than 1.5 million user sessions annually and continues to grow to meet the needs of patients and families.

Stanford Medicine Children’s custom-developed application allows families to search, register, and participate in classes and webinars. The web app also helps staff search for classes such as professional certifications for nursing and allied health professionals, leadership classes, and other healthcare opportunities. During COVID, the organization moved to 100 percent digital registration and virtual class offerings, allowing continuous enrichment and learning. More than $500,000 is generated annually from online classes.

Providing seamless access to care is vital to enhancing patient experience and building trust between patients and providers. Families have the convenience of scheduling, changing, or canceling appointments online. Since its launch, more than 30,000 online appointments have been scheduled, and during the pandemic, more than half of vaccination appointments were made through the app platform.

One of the most endearing and differentiating members of Stanford Children’s digital family of offerings is an app, Puffin. “In addition to being a cute bird with a colorful beak, the name represents Pregnancy, Fetal, and Neonatal,” says Reddipeta. “This application enables the fetal and pregnancy health team to track critical information for complex pregnancies — setting us apart from other health systems.”

Digital Physician Engagement

During the past year, Stanford Children’s undertook a journey to implement an innovative physician relationship management (PRM) digital platform. The aim is to provide the physician liaison team with an effective means of managing, tracking, trending, and reporting on physician relations activities. “This initiative is tied to our organizational growth strategy to expand our clinical footprint and academic platforms on a regional, national, and global basis,” says Reddipeta. Of equal importance is the opportunity to identify underserved communities and improve patient care in alignment with the organization’s commitment to health equity.

Stanford Children’s digital platform now includes a database of more than 22,000 providers and serves as a centralized hub for physician communication and engagement.

Digital Innovations Benefit All Team Members

The Connect Anywhere initiative facilitates employee engagement and remote work collaboration through a team member intranet. “Our team members have ready access to a broad range of information and services,” says Reddipeta. Through the platform, employees can connect with colleagues from other departments, learn about employee benefits, develop leadership and clinical skills, and improve productivity, among other useful functions.

Stanford Children’s empowers its workforce and encourages individuals to offer constructive and innovative ideas through the Everyday Improvement Idea digital tool. Any employee who identifies a challenge or opportunity for improvement can submit a proposed solution online. To date, more than 35,000 ideas have been offered, and more than half have been implemented, resulting in process and organizational enhancements.

The intranet also serves as a convenient portal to nominate fellow employees for various types of recognition, including the Rose Award for service excellence, Daisy Awards for nursing, Dahlia Team Awards, and Nightingale Excellence Awards. Team members can track their own Recognition of Colleague (ROC) Star achievements online.

Critical Success Factors

The fact that Stanford Medicine Children’s Health received the Organizational Commitment Award for the third time is not by happenstance. Reddipeta offers the following success factors that contribute to this health system’s stellar outcomes year after year:

• Governance structure. Having executive and leadership team members who provide support, sponsorship, and guidance for digital innovation.
• Putting the right people in place who use technology as a tool to solve problems, improve care and service, and enhance experiences.
• Trusted partnership. Establishing trust across the enterprise and within information services, allowing for greater collaboration at all levels.
• In the cloud. Building a next-generation digital web and mobile information structure enabling teams to respond quickly and efficiently.
• Culture of service. Focusing on the people we serve and always remembering that people may change, but our mission to provide the best healthcare to all remains constant.
• Alignment with mission and vision. Aligning digital innovation and transformation initiatives with our organization’s goals.

­­­­­­­­For more than two decades, the eHealthcare Leadership Awards have showcased creativity and innovation in digital communications that support healthcare organizations’ marketing and business goals and enhance patient and consumer experiences. Entries for the 2023 awards open on May 1, 2023.