Wednesday, April 9, 2025 · 11:00 AM – 12:00 NOON ET
About the Webinar
Consumers often feel confused and frustrated by the inconsistencies they experience within a single branded healthcare delivery system. This confusion stems from separate contact centers for billing questions vs. scheduling appointments, which may be further broken down by hospital vs. provider billing and primary care vs. specialty care appointment scheduling. Each independent contact center may utilize different technologies and have different performance standards, which means the consumer experience can be significantly different at each touchpoint. This webinar offers a sneak peek into how Sentara Health (an integrated, not-for-profit healthcare delivery system) unified its appointment scheduling and hospital communications contact centers into a Clinical Access Center and made it a Center of Excellence for further consolidation.
Key Takeaways
- Understand the Importance of Standardizing Contact Centers for Enhanced Patient Experience
Learn how unified contact center operations contribute to consistent, seamless patient interactions across healthcare services. - Insights from Sentara’s Journey to a Unified Contact Center
Get an inside look at how Sentara, a leading not-for-profit healthcare system, successfully unified its contact centers with a centralized Clinical Access Center. Hear about the planning, implementation, and significant milestones that led to the creation of their Center of Excellence. - Operational and Technological Best Practices for Centralization
Learn best practices for establishing a consolidated contact center, from developing a Center of Excellence to creating consistent workflows and optimizing staff scheduling. - Driving Data-Informed Decisions for Staffing and Service Levels
Learn how real-time data from a centralized contact center can empower healthcare organizations to make staffing decisions based on actual demand, adjust service levels, and foster continuous performance improvement.
Speakers:
Douglas Stuver
Executive Director, Clinical Access Center, Sentara Health
As Executive Director for Sentara Health, Douglas Stuver has been instrumental in launching the Clinical Access Center. He collaborated closely with the Governance Committee to develop a centralized hub for scheduling, registration, and referral management. Currently, this center supports 171 medical practices and coordinates imaging and diagnostic testing for 12 hospitals. With a dedicated team of 488 associates, the Clinical Access Center efficiently handles 1.3 million outbound calls, 2.1 million inbound calls, and 2.5 million emergency medical alerts annually, achieving an impressive average response time of just 25 seconds and an exceptional patient satisfaction rating of 98%.
Before his role at Sentara, Doug served as the Director of Medicaid Operations at Elevance Health for nine years. There, he utilized market insights and customer feedback to devise strategies that addressed care gaps and fostered growth. Notable achievements during his tenure include launching a digital chat channel for provider lines of business, establishing two Anthem-owned service centers in the Philippines, and creating internal help desks across various lines of business to enhance call resolution and team efficiency.
Doug holds a Bachelor of Science in Business Administration and Management from the University of New Hampshire and an MBA in Management and Operations from Old Dominion University. He is recognized as a performance-driven leader known for his innovative approach to optimizing efficiencies, processes, and performance, consistently meeting and exceeding key metrics.
Stephanie Koogler
Program Director, Clinical Access Center, Sentara Health
Stephanie Koogler is an innovative leader with 19 years of experience in call center management. In 2023, Stephanie became the Program Director for Sentara’s first Clinical Access Center, where she played a key role in launching and developing this critical service.
Throughout her career, Stephanie has been recognized for her excellence in employee engagement, particularly in managing diverse teams across multiple geographic regions in remote, hybrid, and on-premise environments. She received the 2019 Sentara CEO Award for her success in developing and implementing the centralized telestroke program. Stephanie is also skilled in complex project management, successfully leading multi-year, cross-divisional efforts, including a major call center consolidation project that unified several regional centers into one larger operation. As an expert in process improvement and workflow development, Stephanie continues to work closely with executive leaders to drive impactful changes that improve operations and patient care.
Darrel Schmucker
VP – Digital Transformation, Damo Consulting
Darrel has over thirty-five years of healthcare IT leadership experience working with standalone medical groups, integrated delivery systems and rural hospitals. He has led several large transformation projects including practice management system replacements, managed care system implementation, EHR implementation, data warehouse creation, contact center consolidation and application rationalization. He is Vice President, Digital Transformation, Provider at Damo Consulting.
Darrel’s career includes nearly 30 years of IT leadership roles for Sutter Health and Common Spirit affiliates in the Sacramento region. He has focused on improving the patient and clinician experience of healthcare through implementing innovative technology solutions.
Darrel earned his bachelor’s degree in business administration with a double major in Accounting and Management Information Systems from Bowling Green State University in Ohio. During his career he has been a licensed Certified Public Accountant (CPA) in Colorado and a Certified Medical Practice Executive (CMPE) through the American College of Medical Practice Executives. He recently completed all requirements to be a HIMSS Certified Professional in Digital Health Transformation Strategy (CPDHTS).
Ritu M. Uberoy
Managing Partner, Damo Consulting
Ritu has over twenty-five years of experience in the software and information technology industry in the United States and India. She established Saviance Technologies in India and has been involved in the delivery of several successful software projects and products to clients in various industry segments. Ritu completed AI for Health Care: Concepts and Applications from the Harvard T.H. Chan School of Public Health and Applied Generative AI for Digital Transformation from MIT Professional Education. She has successfully taught Gen AI concepts in a classroom setting in Houston and in workshop settings to C-Suite leaders in Boston, Dallas, and Cleveland. She attended HIMSS in March 2024 at Orlando and the Imagination in Action AI Summit at MIT in April 2024. She is also responsible for the GenAI Center of Excellence at BigRio and the DigiMTM Digital Maturity Model and Assessment at Damo. Ritu earned her Bachelor’s degree in Computer Science from Delhi Institute of Technology (now NSIT) and a Master’s degree in Computer Science from Santa Clara University in California. She has participated in the Fellow’s program at The Wharton School, University of Pennsylvania.
