Key Takeaways
- Virtua Health CEO Dennis Pullin believes a lack of health literacy hinders how patients navigate care and drives many of the system's prominent pain points.
- Misinformation is forcing provider organizations and leaders to take a more active role in educating patients.
- Expanding access requires meeting patients in their communities and building trust over time.
Virtua Health's Mobile Clinics Bring Care to Underserved Communities
Health systems across the country are looking for new ways to reach patients beyond traditional care settings. For Dennis Pullin, president and CEO of Virtua Health, those efforts are rooted in a deeper issue.
"If you were to ask me, 'Dennis, what do you think one of the biggest problems in healthcare is today?' I would tell you that it's health literacy," Pullin told HealthLeaders.
It's a challenge that sits beneath many of the current pressures facing providers, one Pullin has confronted since becoming CEO of the New Jersey-based academic health system in 2017. As rising costs continue to plague organizations, patient access and affordability remain uneven. Hospitals are only one part of an equation that includes payers and pharmaceutical companies, but patients often struggle to understand a complicated healthcare system.
"Unfortunately, this is a very complex, confusing ecosystem to navigate," Pullin said.
Confusion affects how patients use the system, with many seeking care in the wrong setting or delaying it altogether, driving up costs and worsening outcomes. For example, patients often turn to emergency departments for issues that could be addressed in primary care or through virtual visits, Pullin highlighted.
"If we could do a better job of educating people how to utilize the system, and then secondly, how to better take care of themselves, that would go a long way to alleviating some of the pain points that we have to deal with," he said.
Closing the information gap
The problem has grown more complicated as the volume of health information has expanded. Patients have more ways than ever to seek answers, but not all of them lead to reliable guidance.
"There's a tremendous amount of misinformation that's out there," Pullin said. "Far too many people rely on [social media outlets] as opposed to tapping into the healthcare professionals."
That reality has changed how health systems think about their role. It's no longer enough to administer care when patients arrive; providers are also competing with a constant stream of information that impacts how patients think about their health before they ever walk through the door.
To combat that, Pullin emphasized that leaders must be more visible and willing to engage directly with the public, even on platforms that may feel unfamiliar. "For some of us OGs, it's a heavy lift as someone who is old school," said Pullin, who has more than three decades of experience in the industry.
Still, he's leaned into platforms like LinkedIn and nudged his executive team to do the same, using them to share reliable information. "I encourage other leaders to start posting and sharing information such that people know that it's coming from a trusted source," he said.
Pullin has also turned to longer-form conversations through his podcast, Here for Good, which features discussions with community leaders and public figures focused on health, wellness, and social impact. A companion series titled Here for Good: Inside Edition, highlights the work of Virtua colleagues across the organization.
In addition to his own podcast, he's sought national media opportunities to reach wider audiences and reinforce messaging around prevention and access. Pullin pointed to his recent appearance on The Breakfast Club, a hip-hop and pop culture-focused syndicated radio show that is popular among young adults, as a way of breaking down barriers and providing education.
"We want to be the trusted source in this journey of healthcare or wellness," he said. "We do everything possible to make sure that there is quality information in a way that's digestible, in a way that's accessible to folks."
An emphasis on trust carries through to how Pullin views the patient experience. From his perspective, trust is built through consistency and respect.
"If you have an experience that was positive and people feel like they're heard, you're listening to them, you are treating them as a unique individual, and not just a number, that's what's going to provide the stickiness in the relationship," he said.
Extending care beyond hospital walls
The patient-provider relationship becomes harder to establish when the former can't easily access care in the first place. For Pullin, addressing those gaps requires extending care into the community.
"For those that can't get to us, we have to extend a hand," he said.
Building one of the largest mobile fleets in the country has been a key outreach strategy for Virtua, according to Pullin, with units focused on pediatric care, cancer screening, and other essential services.
"We know that in our service area, there are pockets that are food deserts," he said. "There are communities that don't have a grocery store."
In response, the system launched a mobile grocery store that provides fresh, affordable, and nutritious food on a consistent schedule. "It's reliable," Pullin said. "They know on Mondays it's going to be at this location, on Tuesdays at this location."
The same model applies to clinical care. Mobile pediatric units provide physicals, screenings, and dental services for children who might otherwise miss routine care. Mobile cancer screening programs bring mammography services into communities where early detection can be harder to access.
"That does create a relationship between us and the patient," Pullin said. "It does enhance the experience when they feel that they are seen and heard and treated with respect. And it does help the experience when they know that we care about that."
