LAS VEGAS - At the HIMSS Global Health Conference & Exhibition March 3 here, Roberta Schwartz, executive vice president at Houston Methodist Hospital, spoke as keynote speaker at the Smart Health Transformation Forum, where she focused on the journey of developing smart hospitals.

In her talk titled, "Smart Hospitals in Action: Houston Methodist's Tech-Driven Patient Experience," Schwartz outlined Houston Methodist's multi-step plan that includes multi-modal access, prearrival registration forms, leveraging text messages and creating care pathways, 

"Text messaging should be used to deliver the right message at the right time to consumers," Schwartz said.

"The success that we've had is really about basically moving into data text and making that available."

Schwartz discussed how Houston Methodist uses text systems on backend functions. 

"We found we can go text to human, text to human, whether it is HR or IT," she said. 

The hospital has 161 clear pathways that have resulted in shorter length of stay, improved patient satisfaction, more knowledge as well as fewer calls to physicians, Schwartz said. 

The hospital also installed a camera in each room with the aim of growing its virtual services.

"If we put a camera in every room, we would start to work toward centralization of services. We built a highway first from the hospital, then to the home to tether everyone to these centralized servers," said Schwartz.

Among the other initiatives the hospital has implemented are voice technology, AI asset tracking, and generative AI predictive analytics and chart summary.

In the future, the facility has plans to implement auto discharge, OR patient movement and family notification, remote ventilator management and wearable devices.

Schwartz said the use of robotics will continue to grow as well as a robotic AI combination.