Logan Schmidt (MHA '23): Health Partners - Park Nicollet

Hello from the Land of 10,000 Lakes!

It’s been a great pleasure to be back in the Twin Cities area to intern for Park Nicollet and under the system umbrella of HealthPartners (HP). My GA preceptor Zach Pollock has mentioned this area as being a “different beast” when it comes to healthcare, and I’ve grown to understand why! HP has been named top five nationally for medium health systems (by Fortune/IBM Watson Health) and faces stark competition in the area – Allina Health and Mayo Clinic ranking within the top five for large systems (1). This environment provides strong incentives to remain nimble as the healthcare landscape shifts, ultimately providing some of the best healthcare in the nation (2). Additionally, HP is in a time of acquiring multiple smaller systems and hospitals, lending a great opportunity to witness cultural immersion and standardization.

I have been within Home and Community Based Services (HCBS) under the leadership of Linda Bauermeister. Linda has been loyal to Park Nicollet and now broadly to the HP enterprise since 1999. She is a champion of quality improvement – travelling to Japan, Scandinavia, and internally at Boeing to provide Park Nicollet/HP with principles and techniques to form a continuous improvement culture and build a Highly Reliable Organization. She has held many positions throughout her career but now holds a very important role as the system largely depends on her leadership to successfully enter the new era of value-based care. This service line broadly consists of home care, hospice, palliative care, and community senior care where complex patients are often referred here from the Big 5 ‘Ologies (cardiology, pulmonology, neurology, nephrology, and oncology) where theydepend on HCBS to complete the care continuum.

Regarding projects, I have been working on a whole bunch of them! My main three have been the following: improving documentation and validation of Health Care Agents, decreasing staff equipment overhead by working with vendors and implementing an equipment distribution policy, and improving hospice claims processing with the help of an AI scraping technology. These projects are diverse and have allowed me to work with management and frontline staff from several different programs. I have been witnessing first-hand the challenges (and opportunities) of implementing change as Linda oversees programs under multiple organizations.

As I’m chipping away at these projects and some others, I have had endless opportunities to join meetings, have meet & greets, and have shadowing experiences. I have worked from four different locations and travelled to patient homes and facilities across the Twin Cities. Community partnership is a major pillar of HealthPartners, specifically among this service line, so I have been able to see care delivered in a multitude of ways!

Outside of my internship, I have taken advantage of my need to travel throughout the cities by exploring activities/locations I’ve never thought to see while growing up in Western Wisconsin
– Lake of the Isles, Lake Minnetonka, Uptown, general Stillwater area, and many others! Also, I have travelled to the Boundary Waters in Northern Minnesota, seen the Blue Angels in Eau Claire, WI, kayaked lakes and rivers in Western Wisconsin, and soon to watch the Professional Motocross Championship in Millville, Minnesota.

I would recommend this internship for any incoming MHA student! Linda is an amazing woman, leader, and mentor. Also, I miss seeing the cohort. I’m looking forward to this fall!

  


1.      Fortune. Fortune/IBM Watson Health 100 Top Hospitals 2021: Health Systems. https://fortune.com/2021/04/27/top-health-systems-2021-ibm-watson-health/

2.      The Commonwealth Fund. 2020 Scorecard on State Health System Performance. https://2020scorecard.commonwealthfund.org


*A Note From The Editor*

If you would like to keep up with Logan, you can find him here on LinkedIn!

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