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CEO Spotlight: Mike Diamond of Telemedicine Solutions LLC

OWM: Please describe the education, training, and work experiences that prepared you for your current position as CEO of Telemedicine Solutions, LLC.   I’ve always been a people-person with a keen interest in the world of medicine — so much so that at one point I was actually thinking about becoming an ER physician. However, experience told me I don’t do well with broken bones, so I graduated from business school and entered the healthcare industry in a sales capacity. This was a time where technology was leapfrogging what we could do in both medicine and communication technology. I found the intersection of these two worlds fascinating because I believe by leveraging technology you can make healthcare better. We see this all around us not only with new medicines and medical procedures, but also in the way we approach our jobs, daily workflow, and processes.   I developed a passion for improving how we work in healthcare, and this led me to health information technology (HIT) solutions. This may be a bit far removed from developing cures and providing direct patient care, but I believe HIT enables healthcare providers to drive better outcomes and work more efficiently. I was fortunate to work for leading healthcare technology firms, such as Enterprise Systems, McKesson, and Extended Care Information Network (ECIN), where we had an impact on thousands of healthcare organizations across the healthcare continuum.   This exciting period of building and scaling companies lit an entrepreneurial fire in me, leading me to executive management roles in two information technology start-ups in healthcare before I was asked to lead the Telemedicine Solutions team. OWM: What should our readers know about your company, Telemedicine Solutions LLC?   Telemedicine Solutions developed WoundRounds®, the point-of-care wound management and prevention solution that empowers nurses to deliver better wound care in less time.   In a recently published study, WoundRounds demonstrated its ability to standardize care and enable continuous quality improvement. Findings after 6 months of continuous use were universally positive in terms of reducing facility-acquired pressure ulcers, improving patient care, reducing redundancies in documentation, and better data sharing across the care team. The odds of a new facility-acquired pressure ulcer were thirty-three times less at the end of 6 months than in initial month of the study.   Additionally, users embrace the solution. Results from a nurse satisfaction survey demonstrated a 42% increase in nurses’ perceptions of how easy it is to do their job and a 33% increase in nurses’ perceptions of how effective they are doing their job.   In addition to its role in better health outcomes, reducing the number of wounds reduces the amount of work, the cost of supplies/services, and associated risks and liability. WoundRounds has consistently demonstrated savings of 8 to 10 nursing time hours per week related to wound documentation and reporting. This allows nurses to spend more time with patients and provide care proactively to prevent wounds.   Our customers report a time-savings of 8 to 10 hours per wound nurse, a 50% to 80% reduction in facility-acquired pressure ulcers, and associated lower costs of providing wound care. In short, we always hear that wound care is a team sport, and we like to think WoundRounds makes it easier for the team to play on the same field. OWM: How you were first introduced to the arena of wound care and why do you enjoy working in this arena?   Telemedicine Solutions LLC was founded by two physicians devoted to improving wound care. They realized that standardizing and automating the process would enable nurses to provide better care, and they established a whole company culture around empowering wound care nurses. The WoundRounds solution was developed by nurses working along with health IT professionals.   I joined the company with a long-held interest in improving workflow in healthcare, and I immediately became swept up in the wound care passion. In so many facilities, the wound care staff are the unsung heroes treating patients, struggling with growing workloads, often with few resources to support them. Their response to our wound care solution has been enormous, and it humbles me that I get to work with such dedicated healthcare professionals who make a difference every day in patients’ lives. Again, we exist because we improve people’s quality of life — not only the caregivers that use our solution everyday to be more effective and efficient in their jobs, but also the patients they care for. OWM: What are some of the company’s biggest accomplishments thus far? What are some of your key products and/or functions that clearly distinguish your brand?   Our wound care solution uniquely automates wound management and prevention workflow processes. Many systems collect data; WoundRounds is different. We use the data to inform the care delivery process in real time. WoundRounds was developed by and is for nurses using best practices in wound management. For example, WoundRounds is based on wound assessment standards from the Agency for Health Care Policy and Research and documentation standards from the core text used in WOCN certification. Additionally, WoundRounds automates clinically validated wound care tools, such as The Braden Scale and the PUSH Tool.   Besides automating the process and eliminating paperwork and redundant workflow, WoundRounds resonates with nurses. Numerous naysayers told us that nurses wouldn’t embrace technology, but we’ve had the opposite response. Maybe it’s because wound care nurses report our solution makes them more efficient and provides more time for direct patient care. As mentioned, a clinical study, published earlier this year in Ostomy Wound Management, found WoundRounds could improve documentation and communication among caregivers. Nurses in the study reported in ease of use and improvements in wound care effectiveness with use of WoundRounds. OWM: Please describe the mission/vision of your company and how your personal vision fits with the company’s goals.   Our mission statement is deliberately concise and direct: “We Exist Because We Improve People's Quality of Life.” We know that every day, wound care professionals are making a profound difference in patient outcomes, and we’re proud to empower that process.   As I noted earlier, I’ve always been a people-person, believing in the power of relationships, networks, and connections. Sure, our field involves IT, and we constantly hear the world is becoming more technical and less personal. I argue with that premise, because I see technology enabling people to have more time to do what matters. And personal connections matter.   Every day I hear about wound care nurses who have more time to dedicate to direct patient care because they aren’t caught up in redundant data gathering and reporting — WoundRounds generates reports at a touch of a button. Nurses tell me they have more time to talk to patients and families and to focus on preventive care. That’s one example of technology at work, helping people to make healthcare better. OWM: Please explain what must take place on a daily basis at Telemedicine Solutions LLC in order to accommodate patients, clinicians, and healthcare facilities.   The process of wound care is front-and-center for our company. We continually collect clinician and facility feedback, making improvements and rolling out new releases of the WoundRounds solution. We have a team of wound care nurses and programmers who work tirelessly to make this happen. A great example is the recent reporting changes from the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services (CMS) that affected skilled nursing facilities, long-term acute care hospitals, and inpatient rehab hospitals. We’re on top of all the required data and our reports are always ready as the reporting requirements are issued. Our customers can be confident that our reports will be compliant.   We’ve long believed that ongoing customer satisfaction is good business. It’s been driving our success, and we’re thankful for the ongoing dialogue and trust our customers place in us. OWM: Looking ahead, what are some products the company is working on?   WoundRounds is what we’re known for, but is only the first product from Telemedicine Solutions. We’re excited about future products in development that continue our tradition of providing affordable technology-enabled solutions that integrate web-based telecommunications tools with clinical processes based on best practices of care.   Besides new products in development, we’re also excited about the future for WoundRounds, particularly in the area of analytics. As new healthcare models emerge, one thing is clear: improving results and patient outcomes will matter even more. The old adage “You can’t manage what you can’t measure” is particularly true in healthcare for a myriad of reasons. Because WoundRounds captures patient data and provides analytics, our solution brings even greater value in the world of healthcare reform that’s driving towards measuring, managing and improving results because, for example, records follow the patient through the continuum of care. Improving healthcare is something we can all be excited about.

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