Interview Questions
Interviewee: Kimberly Boyer, Administrator, BSN, MHSA
Emergency & Trauma Services
Tallahassee Memorial Healthcare
Educational Background: Bachelor's of Science in Nursing
Masters of Health Services Administration
Job Description: Service line Administrator of Emergency & Trauma Services
Length of time in position: 2 years at Tallahassee Memorial Healthcare and 35 years in healthcare.
1) Me: Customer segments define the different groups of people or organizations as an enterprise aims to reach and serve. When dealing with different customer segments, Mount Sinai in New York personalizes the experience, preempts service failure, and is more accessible. What is your approach to customer segments?
Kimberly Boyer: We accept all consumers. We dont know the payers. We deal with the sickest and the most urgent first. We dont treat anyone different. It depends on how high the acquity is and how sick the population is. We are the safety net for the community. That being said we work to treat every patient with respect, dignity, and compassionate. Every patient is important to us
2) Me: Channels describes how a company communicates with and receives its customer segments. According to Information Week Healthcare, some hospitals reduce wait times by improving interdepartmental cooperation. How do you communicate with patients that may feel that they’ve waited too long to be serviced?
Kimberly Boyer: Alot of things impact the wait time. So, working together as a team is important. From both the front end of the emergency room to the back. We sit down with a team to look at patient scores and reviews and data. We also want to hire people who are good at communication with patients. So, I look for both communication and clinical skills when doing interviews. As a team we breakdown each segment of care in minutes and set goals so we can focus on specific areas where bottlenecks occur.
3) Me: Key activities is defined as daily routines used within a business. According to the Agency for Healthcare Research and Quality, the importance of creating a patient flow improvement team cannot be understood. However, what are your key activities when your patient flow may be heavy?
Kimberly Boyer: We have a capacity plan that we go by in the ER and throughout the organization. We usually get backed up because of admissions. The capacity plan explains certain criterias and the explains the steps to take when delays occur. I also meet weekly with the Medical Director as teamwork between nursing and physicians is extremely important.
4) Me: Revenue streams represents the cash a company generates from each customer segment. OBP Medical said “The average patient probably doesn’t see a hospital of the Emergency Department(ER) as what it truly is- a business”. What are your revenue streams at TMH’s ER?
Kimberly Boyer: We have commerical payers, Medicare, Medicaid,and self payers. We'll be lucky to get fifty cents on a dollar of the charges. 30 percent of our patients are self pay. Government payers are the most prevalent. ERs are expensive places due to the overhead of having equipment, supplies, and human resources continually ready for whatever comes through the door
5) Me: Value propositions are usually the reasons that customers choose one company over another. According to American College of Emergency Physicians, short ER’s wait times makes a hospital more appealing. What are your value propositions in the ER?
Kimber Boyer: We are great at trauma, heart attacks and stroke. We are the hospital to go to. We get most of the EMS(Emergency Medical Services). We are working to get a better caring/ compassion reputation. We want patients to feel cared for. There are always oppurtunities to get better.