MGMA Podcasts

Daniel Williams: 00:02

Well, hi, everyone. I'm Daniel Williams, senior editor at MGMA and host of the MGMA Podcast Network. We are back today with another one of our award winners. We are recognizing one of our twenty twenty five Future Five award winners today. And our guest today is Macy Dotty.

Daniel Williams: 00:23

Macy is a Clinic Director of interventional pain neurology, urology, and visiting specialist at Cuyuna Regional Medical Center in Crosby, Minnesota. And Macy and I were having an opportunity to talk a little bit before we hit record here. And in addition to all the work that Macy's doing at the clinic, she's also an active runner. Getting married here in the fall. We may talk about that a little bit as well.

Daniel Williams: 00:56

And loves to bake, I believe. Macy can correct me on that in a minute.

Macy Doty: 01:03

I'm into the sourdough.

Daniel Williams: 01:05

That's right, the sourdough. So, Macy, first of all, welcome to the podcast.

Macy Doty: 01:11

Thank you very much. Thank you for having me.

Daniel Williams: 01:14

Yeah, it's so good to have you on here. We have been talking to all of our award winners over the last few weeks. We're going to honor all of you at our, MGMA Leaders Conference. For anybody who hadn't been listening to the podcast lately, the Leaders Conference is gonna be September 28 through October 1 in Orlando. So I'm gonna drop information on that, but I'll just go ahead and give that.

Daniel Williams: 01:44

If anybody wants to register for that, they can go to mgma.combackslashleaders. It'll take you right to the event. You can learn all about all of our sessions and the venue and everything else and go ahead and register for it. So, lot of information there. Well, Macy, let's chat a little bit about your background.

Daniel Williams: 02:08

So you are located in Minnesota. You and I were talking earlier that you're a little unique to the area perhaps that you live in Minnesota, you're a native of Minnesota. However, you don't like to do a lot of the activities there in Minnesota. I don't.

Macy Doty: 02:28

I don't. Yes. And I think a lot of the Minnesota things are hunting, fishing, snowmobiling. Don't do a lot of those. But, but we do enjoy my family and my fiance and I being on the lake.

Macy Doty: 02:40

We've got, we are the land of 10,000 lakes. So we do love that. And I do enjoy some golf. I did just learn that Minnesota's got one of the biggest populations of golfers from here to other states. That's incredible.

Daniel Williams: 02:55

So that is so cool. I was gonna mention to you about thirty years ago, I've to Minnesota one time, and I went there to visit some friends. We went ice fishing, and we rode a snowmobile out to get to the ice fishing. And it was it was either in January or February. I just know it was really cold, and we bundled up a lot before we left the house.

Daniel Williams: 03:23

And then, oh, we also did a snowmobiling tour, like a pub crawl, but a snowmobile pub crawl. Is that such a thing? Have you heard of these before?

Macy Doty: 03:34

It is. Because that's the the frozen links are definitely one thing that people are surprised by when they come to Minnesota. Absolutely. And you can drive more than just the Somerville. You can take your truck out there in February.

Daniel Williams: 03:47

Well, we had a lot of fun, but it was about thirty years ago. I vaguely remember it. But I just remember, I will tell you this, I never got all that cold because they had very warm clothing for us, things to wear before going outside. Where actually Yeah. Is the coldest I've ever been in my life was in Chicago in the winter because I didn't realize it got so cold there.

Daniel Williams: 04:13

I was, again, about thirty, maybe thirty five years ago, and I just didn't have the information I needed and spent a lot of time walking outside in the winter and the wind coming off the lakes, and still the coldest I've ever been in my life. In Minnesota, I know it was very, very, very cold, but y'all have, like, prepared for it. We even went to a T Wolves basketball game, and we drove downtown, and then everything was underneath the city. I mean, all the connect that we connected place to place to place, we weren't outside walking a lot, so if at all. Is is any of this resonating with you?

Daniel Williams: 04:55

Is it making sense? Oh, yeah.

Macy Doty: 04:59

College I went to in Minnesota, we didn't even have to go outside to get to class. There was a tunnel system to go underground.

Daniel Williams: 05:04

There you go. See, you're prepared for it. And I grew up in the South, and any time that it iced over or snowed, they just shut everything down for about a week because they were not prepared for that there. And so we didn't know how to how to handle that. And you'd see people.

Daniel Williams: 05:21

We didn't have snow tires or anything, and people get out, drive about 100 feet, and then just slide ice slide right into a ditch or something. So Yeah. Yeah. You don't kinda don't leave the house in the South if it gets a little bit cold there. So wanted to share with everybody our weather report here about Minnesota.

Daniel Williams: 05:44

So now, Macy, I'd like to chat with you about your background in health care. Did you always know you wanted to get into health care? Or tell us a little bit about your origin story about how you kind of matriculated to, health care in the first place? Any highlights you might want to share?

Macy Doty: 06:02

Sure. I think it's, important to note that you just mentioned weather report because growing up, I would have told you I was going to be a meteorologist, And that just didn't work out. That's not something I had stayed interested in. But going to college, I started and wasn't quite sure what path I wanted to go down. While I was there, discovered we had a program there that was, for healthcare management, which is not something that you see across a lot of colleges.

Macy Doty: 06:28

So it was just something I went down. I knew that if I took that route, there'd be lots of opportunities in healthcare to still have an impact in helping care for people without doing the physical touch patient care stuff. That was not something that I was interested in, but still knew I had an interest in healthcare. And was willing to kind of get that degree to figure out what it was going to be and where I would land. Ended up graduating in the 2020.

Macy Doty: 06:57

So as we all know, quite the year. And kind of all the opportunities that we thought we had by graduating class for careers just kind of all fell through because the world was in crisis. So I ended up moving back home, which is only I think half an hour from where I currently work. So stayed there for months and later that fall was able to land a six month contract opportunity here at this hospital, which I was jazzed about. I was so excited to just have a job and I'd have experience.

Macy Doty: 07:29

I did interview after interview after interview trying to find something to go do after graduating and I couldn't do it. Nobody was interested in a new graduate, no experience. So I was like, this is perfect. Close to home. We'll get through COVID.

Macy Doty: 07:45

Six months should get us through. Right? Maybe.

Daniel Williams: 07:48

Right.

Macy Doty: 07:49

So we thought. So then I think about three months in, they had asked me if I wanted to stay here full time and I happily accepted. It just, it felt good to be work to be back working in my community, the community that I grew up in. So like I said, only thirty minutes away, but in Minnesota time, I mean, thirty minutes is your community. It's all it's in rural areas.

Macy Doty: 08:13

You can drive an hour and still home. But yeah, so shortly after coming here, yes, I agreed to stay on. And at that time I was an analyst. So I did that role for a little over two years in the quality department. And then we had some leadership shifts and I was one of our quality managers here again for a little while.

Macy Doty: 08:34

Then like about a year and a half ago, I took on the role of clinic director. So I think, I mean, shortly after joining the team here at CRMC, I really realized how much of an impact strong leadership can have on not only the staff, but when you can strongly impact staff, then that reflects on patients and their families. And again, working in a really small rural community hospital really helped me kind of get that sense of purpose that pulled me back into wanting to stay here and serve the area that I live in. So not only a Minnesota native, but back in my hometown.

Daniel Williams: 09:13

All right. Well, thank you so much for that, Macy. Now, what we're talking about today, we'll learn a little bit more about your background, but also this honor that you've received. You're one of MGMA's twenty twenty five Future Five award winners. I've been asking everybody when they learned of their, honor, where they were, what kind of feelings they went through in learning about this.

Daniel Williams: 09:42

So where were you? Were you at home, in a meeting? What was going on? And did you have any idea that you had even been nominated for this?

Macy Doty: 09:51

Yeah, this is actually a little bit of a funny story, maybe funny to me. But I knew I was nominated, and I had thought about it. Like the week before, I was like, I wonder if anybody got picked for that. I'm sure it'll come out eventually. And I was in a meeting, and I had gotten a call and like any, maybe let's just say good millennia, we don't answer strange numbers that we don't know.

Macy Doty: 10:11

So I was like, Nope, sent you to voicemail. They called again. And I was like, What in the world? Why is it again? Ignored it.

Macy Doty: 10:19

I just assumed this is a scam. Called the third time and I just let it go. And then again, like any good millennial, we Google search the phone number. So I put the phone number into Google and it comes up as MGMA. I was sitting next to the person that had nominated me.

Macy Doty: 10:33

And I was like, I bet they don't call.

Daniel Williams: 10:36

Right.

Macy Doty: 10:37

But you didn't give it. Right. Her phone started ringing. Because they then called her and they were like, Hey, we tried to call Macy and I don't think her numbers work. So, it was kind of funny.

Macy Doty: 10:50

And then yes, I tried to call back, from my phone and I got some random line and they're like, we don't know who called. So get back to my desk. I got the voicemail on my desk. Right. But ultimately I was shocked and surprised, but it really, it means a lot to me because I have really poured a lot into my organization and into my career, early here.

Macy Doty: 11:20

But I think it's, it's not just reflective of me and it's not just a personal achievement to me. So it also reflects like all of the incredible teams and other groups that I've been a part of here. Not just groups that I've been able to lead, but also the leaders I've been able to learn from. I wouldn't have been able to get here or like wouldn't, wouldn't be who I am without all of them. So it's really not something that I feel that I earned alone.

Macy Doty: 11:46

And I think on another level, it also motivates me to continue the push to improving care for patients and supporting our staff. And like I've said, just really being able to help and support our rural community, where every change here really does make a big difference. I think, you know, healthcare is hard. It's a hard place to be in right now. So yeah, it just really kind of gives you that drive to you are doing the right thing.

Macy Doty: 12:13

You're doing a good job. And it was really meaningful. It's kind of like, Oh my gosh, you know, I'm doing it.

Daniel Williams: 12:23

Yeah, that is, I mean, it's great to get that kind of feedback that you're being recognized. It's been such an interesting ride for you, just you already alluding to it, when you started in the 2020, when the pandemic was happening, when lockdowns were happening, when the world was really seismically shifting at that moment in time. You don't really have anything to compare it to because that's when you started, but give us an idea of what it was like to really get indoctrinated into healthcare at such a unique moment in time in global history. I mean, just such an interesting time. Tell us about what that was like.

Daniel Williams: 13:12

Yeah,

Macy Doty: 13:13

I'll tell a little story just from the beginning. So when I first started here, like I said, I was an analyst. I was here for six months. And lots of my team, was in the quality team. They were all like hot and heavy in COVID.

Macy Doty: 13:25

They were doing instant command. We had infection control and all of that in the group. So really they hired me on so that somebody could be in the office, somebody to just help out. But it's just kind of funny. So one of my first things that they had me do outside of that day to day quality work was help guide and work through how we were going to run through vaccines.

Macy Doty: 13:49

Right? How are we going to get those out? How are we going to roll it out? And you talked about Minnesota and you talked about ice fishing. So we actually had a fish house, CRMC fish house that we turned into part of our drive through COVID vaccine system.

Macy Doty: 14:05

So that was one of the first things that they had me do. They were like, she doesn't have any responsibilities. She was eager to learn. Let's help her or have her figure out how we're going to run through all this. So I was on a group that started like our call line.

Macy Doty: 14:20

So we opened it up, we had people come in. I mean, there's, we've done a lot since then. But I think kind of back to your question, like coming in during the pandemic was both a challenge and also a real opportunity. I think that's part of what gave me my opportunity to kind of grow and learn on a different training path. I mean, I started here, didn't have traditional training, didn't have traditional onboarding.

Macy Doty: 14:45

So I really had to learn from the get go how to be resourceful and lead heavily on curiosity, persistence. I knew I didn't have a lot of, I mean, had resources, but we're rural healthcare, we don't have a ton of resources. So if I didn't know how to do something, I learned it. Lots of late nights because it was early in my career and I had the time teaching myself, asking questions, practicing different things until I knew how to use them and could be of assistance.

Daniel Williams: 15:18

You were mentioning the rural healthcare setting. So give us an idea of Cuyuna, what it's like there. What is this practice, the patient population, the geographical location of it? Just give us a little bit about the setting so we can get an understanding of what that patient population is like and how y'all interact with your patients?

Macy Doty: 15:42

For sure. So, like I said, we are located at a hospital here in Crosby. And the population of Crosby, it looks like was around 2,300. Not pretty big here. Like to say we're a small but mighty hospital.

Macy Doty: 15:58

So we're critical access hospital. If you're not familiar with critical access, we're a 25 licensed bed hospital. But we are also a very large surgery center. We did, I think last year did over 10,000 surgeries here, which is huge, huge for a small community. But more than just the Crosby community, we serve like all of the communities around us.

Macy Doty: 16:19

So okay, I think around one of our last, communities needs assessments said it's a community of around fifty, sixty thousand. Okay. But a lot of them are rural. We've got I mean, some areas that still don't have Internet. That was something we ran into, like I said, during the COVID times and people wanting vaccines, they didn't have Internet connection.

Macy Doty: 16:42

So we have a community that is very it's very Kind of broad, we've got the older community, we've got the younger people, but we do see a lot of older people here. It is a heavy retirement community, which means we still have a we have a lot of snowbirds that head south. So, yeah, we've got, I think it ends up being like 40 specialties. So 40 at critical access hospital, we like to say we're small but mighty. We do things different here.

Macy Doty: 17:15

And we provide a unique experience where people will pass larger other healthcare organizations to come here to receive the care.

Daniel Williams: 17:23

Yeah, you brought up a really interesting point. Your community and your patient population does have some you have some older patients. You have people who are snowbirds, mentioned. Do you work out this is unique to me because I've not had an opportunity to ever ask any of the people I've interviewed through MGMA about this. But when you have an older population that is snowbirding, do you work out protocols so that they have continuous care for those months when they are in Arizona or Florida or wherever they are?

Macy Doty: 18:00

Yeah, so we find that our falls here are very busy. So we we've got, like I said, yeah, lots of snowbirds. Our falls here are busy. The patients really do come here before they leave. So they come and do their final visit to try to wrap things up.

Macy Doty: 18:14

So a lot of patients surprisingly take ownership of that. They know that they're going down there. So they come back, they get what they need. But also as teams, internal teams, we attempt to keep track of who those people are so that we know how to best care for them. So it's actually a project that we're working on with our urology team is how can we best understand who's leaving our area for the next six months?

Macy Doty: 18:40

So number one, we don't we don't bother them. Like we know that they're getting their care, but also make sure that their institution that they're going to see down in Arizona, Florida, wherever they may go, have what they need to best care for the people. So something we recognize we yeah, we see big influxes. Probably October, November, December, I think December is normal for most people with insurances and that kind of stuff. But usually, yeah, people start leaving as soon as it starts getting cold.

Macy Doty: 19:07

Some people stay through the holidays and then they leave in right after Christmas. So yeah, it's something we see. It's something we know. We don't like to say slow, but it does get a little quieter.

Daniel Williams: 19:19

Right. Right. For you, who is you take a lot of initiative. I can already learn that by your nomination and by talking to you here. When it does get a little bit slower, how do you fill that time?

Daniel Williams: 19:32

Do you have special projects you work on? Are there other things that you're engaged with So you have a steady flow of work as compared to that fall time when you said it gets really busy.

Macy Doty: 19:45

Yeah. I guess, are you asking me personally or about

Daniel Williams: 19:48

my Yeah, you personally. Yeah. There are things that you, long term projects or anything else that you carve out for yourself. For

Macy Doty: 19:55

sure. So given my background and kind of my upbringing and different roles here, I still have my feet in a little bit of a lot of things.

Daniel Williams: 20:04

Okay.

Macy Doty: 20:05

So heavily involved in a lot of continuous improvement work. So kind of, when it is our slower season, we spend a lot of time working on how can we make processes more efficient. I know that's still a lot of the work that I'm involved in. I have been heavily involved in data analytics here. I mean, a rural community hospital, we don't have a lot of the tools that larger organizations have.

Macy Doty: 20:30

So I spend a lot of time in the tools that we do have working to find different insights on what's going well here. This kind of looks weird. A little bit of here and there things and just using the data to then share back with my peers, our physician groups, helping, I guess, other emerging leaders utilize data to help make improvements in their areas. So, I like to think that I'll always wear a little bit of my data analyst hat, because that's the kind of stuff that helps drive my decision making too. It's what keeps me going.

Daniel Williams: 21:05

For sure. I have a few more questions I wanted to ask you about this. In looking at your nomination, you have some really interesting results. They're actually data points. You're talking about being interested in data.

Daniel Williams: 21:20

In your interventional pain service line, you and the team were able to reduce patient wait times from fifty four days to just over ten. That is a remarkable data point and an achievement for y'all. Talk about that, what y'all did to help reduce it. I can't even begin to do the percentage of what that is in my head, but it was a dramatic shift in patient care. So talk about that.

Macy Doty: 21:48

For sure. So when I stepped into this role, like I said, about a year and a half ago now, maybe a little less then, I really made it my goal to just go around and get to know my people, my teens. Who are they serving? What are they doing? And kind of what are the sticking points for them?

Macy Doty: 22:04

Because I had come from the quality team, where that's kind of a lot of what we do, but on a different level, more on the regulatory basis. And what I had heard a lot from my interventional team here is patients take forever to get in. They're crabby when they come here, they're in pain, it was just constantly like they're fifty four days out, they're two months out, they're two months out, and then when they come in, that they're then further out for their interventions, right? Patients are coming in to then get most of the time injections of sorts in their back, spine, neck. So one of the things I did was use my, like I said, my data background and just pulled everything I could and tried to see what is the data actually saying because staff can always say we're really busy or patients are really far out.

Macy Doty: 22:49

But in rural healthcare, like I said, we don't have the reports that just push to you and say, this is what it is. So I used what I knew and the tools that I had access to. I was able to determine that, our third next available appointment time was fifty four days, which is a long time when we're serving a very much a blue collar community, right? These people are in pain, not able to work and not getting the care that they need from our community hospital. So we spent a lot of time, myself, the providers, the APPs, the nurses, the schedulers, we sat down kind of week after week and just picked apart a different piece of the flow, whether it was the room utilization, biggest part was the provider schedule templates, other provider workflows, what were they doing with their time that was holding them up from seeing more people?

Macy Doty: 23:41

And I think what I'm most proud to say is that we didn't have to add any additional staff to get this done. It really was using the data and working with the people and the teams that I had here to improve the access. All we did really was change the schedule templates, make it so that if there's an emergent patient, there's a same day spot available. We had a team of five providers. So really we shouldn't be having these patients wait that long.

Macy Doty: 24:09

We have the tools and the people we need to do a good job. And ultimately what it meant was for patients, they weren't able to get their faster relief. If we can get them in for their initial visit earlier, they then can get their interventions and get back on that path. So they get faster relief and better outcomes. And I think what was most impactful for me was to see the relief from staff.

Macy Doty: 24:31

It reduced frustration for them because they're having to deal with the patients in a lot of pain who are having to wait a long time to get here. And it gave them a sense of pride in knowing that, like, we've kind of been able to share. There's always going to be people and reasons why it has to be further out. But yes, at the end of the last fiscal year, we pulled out the data again. And I was like, I wonder how much better this got after doing all of these things.

Macy Doty: 24:56

And I was shocked to find it go from 54 to 10. I actually pulled it like three times three different ways. Am I doing That it is

Daniel Williams: 25:04

such a great success story. Now, there's one other great success story. Your leadership has been reflected in Press Ganey engagement scores with your team ranking above the ninety ninth percentile. Talk about that. That's gotta be a great reflection on the work y'all are doing as well.

Macy Doty: 25:23

Yeah, I think that was another hard one for me to accept too. Was like, I'm sure this is right. I think what really drives engagement in people, for me, like my understanding is recognizing what my own personal experiences were. Like when I was in a different role, what was it that helped me feel like my leader really cared? What was it that made me feel like no matter what was happening, they were going to back me up.

Macy Doty: 25:49

So I really, like I said, made it a priority to get to know my team. I spent a lot of time with them hanging out over there, just chatting with them, getting to know them as a person because every employee and every person has a life outside of here. And making people feel that that is just as important as their life at work, I think really helps. And really knowing and making sure that they understand that I'm here to support their growth and advocate for them with whatever the issue may be. Ultimately, people just want to be seen, heard, valued.

Macy Doty: 26:21

And anything create an environment where staff trust that their leader has their back. They're going to feel empowered to share their ideas, help like keep driving towards the next thing. And I think that's just I think that kind of leads into my last story too. If if they've got my back and I've got theirs, then we we can do whatever we want. The world is our oyster.

Daniel Williams: 26:44

That is right. I love that. That is awesome. So last question. And looking ahead, what excites you most about the future of healthcare leadership?

Daniel Williams: 26:54

You are a future five award winner, as we've mentioned numerous times here, but you're one of those people that MGMA deemed and the people that nominated you deemed someone who is the future of healthcare. So talk about what you're excited about.

Macy Doty: 27:09

Yeah, I have two things. So the first one, think is the shift towards me, lot of innovation and collaboration. Like we've said, like, healthcare is not getting any easier. It's there's going be a lot of challenges. So using data technology partnerships and smarter ways.

Macy Doty: 27:26

I think giving leaders an opportunity to be creative will help shape the way that healthcare goes. I think the more that we bog down and little tasks and this and that takes away from our ability to be creative and creativity is what's going get us through. And I think the other one, my other piece of advice would be stay up to date with your local and state legislation. See what it is that your state is doing that's either helping or hurting your organization. Not to say that any are right or wrong, but just staying in tune with what the things are that are going to drive your organization down the road is really important.

Daniel Williams: 28:09

I said that was the last question, but I forgot. We are going to see you in Orlando. So you're going to be traveling from Minnesota to Orlando. I don't know what September and October is like in Minnesota, but still, you are going down to Florida. So are you gonna take advantage of anything that's in that Orlando area?

Daniel Williams: 28:28

What are you gonna what's your agenda or itinerary look like?

Macy Doty: 28:32

Well, my fiance hopefully is going to come with me.

Daniel Williams: 28:35

Oh, that's great.

Macy Doty: 28:36

And he's never been to Disney. So I did I'm trying to lure him into going to Disney. I don't know if I'll be able to sell him on it. But anything, I'm really looking forward to just a little bit of time outside. It's still sunny here.

Macy Doty: 28:48

Had a beautiful Labor Day weekend. But by the time September rolls around, we'll have lost our beautiful weather for the most part. So looking forward to that.

Daniel Williams: 29:00

That is awesome. Well, Macy Doty, thank you for joining us today for the podcast and congratulations for being honored as a MGMA 2025 Future Five Award winner.

Macy Doty: 29:13

Thank you very much. I appreciate your time.

Daniel Williams: 29:16

Alright. Well, Macy, along with the other 2025 future five award winners and our other award winners will be recognized during the general session at the MGMA Leaders Conference. It's gonna be in Orlando. They're gonna be honored Monday, September 29 from 09:30 to 11AM eastern time. So be sure and catch that.

Daniel Williams: 29:41

And I wanted to provide the link to the event one more time, mgma.com/leaders. You can go in there and read all about it and register if you haven't already. So until then, thank you all for being MGMA podcast listeners.