Podcast
Join Patient Access Collaborative Founder and Executive Director, Elizabeth Woodcock, as she guides you through some of the most relevant conversations taking place in the Access world today. Take a behind-the-scenes look at all things access in the ambulatory enterprise. Here, patient access leaders from academic health systems and industry experts share their expertise on hot topics in access including best practices, process development, organizational dynamics, technological innovation, and patient experience.
Listen and subscribe on Apple Podcasts or Spotify.
Seeing Access Through a Shared Lens: Using the Patient Access Collaborative's Group Assessment to Understand the Current Stat
What if patient access isn’t just an operational problem—but a shared organizational belief system?
In this episode of All Access Pass, host Chris Profeta, Senior Director of Research and Analytics at the Patient Access Collaborative, sits down with Austin Loomis, MHA, AVP of Ambulatory Access and Analytics, Mandy Newman, MA, Vice President of Ambulatory Operations, and Catherine Mims, MD, Vice President and Associate Chief Physician Executive for the Ambulatory Practice at OU Health. Together, they unpack a new evolution of the Patient Access Framework: a group-based assessment that captures how access is perceived across an entire organization.
With more than 20 leaders—from finance and HR to physician chairs and executive leadership—participating in the assessment, OU Health gained a rare, enterprise-wide view of access. The conversation explores what happens when those perspectives align, where they diverge, and why those gaps often represent the greatest opportunities for system improvement. Along the way, the group reflects on why access blind spots persist, how shared language changes strategy, and what it means to truly measure access as an enterprise responsibility.
Tune in to hear how group assessments can surface hidden friction, strengthen cross-departmental alignment, and turn access from a siloed function into a shared organizational priority—covering the evolution of the Patient Access Framework, the rationale behind group scoring, leadership alignment, organizational blind spots, and practical insights for system-level access improvement.
Category: Strategy
Published: January 15, 2026
From Cost Center to Value Engine: Reframing Patient Access as Enterprise Strategy
Patient access is often measured by speed—but its true value runs much deeper.
In this episode of The All-Access Pass, Elizabeth Woodcock, DrPH, MBA, is joined by Brett Butler, Vice President of Access Services at Baylor Scott & White Health, for a candid conversation about what it really takes to elevate access from a transactional function to a system-level strategy.
Together, they explore how governance, relationships, and intentional design can unlock capacity, improve clinician experience, and create more equitable, patient-centered care—even amid financial pressure and constrained supply. Brett shares how Baylor Scott & White is scaling access across a complex, multi-market enterprise, why fragmentation is access’s greatest enemy, and how technology can illuminate opportunity rather than promise false fixes.
This episode challenges access leaders to ask a different question: not how fast can we schedule, but how might we redesign care to truly meet demand—for patients, clinicians, and the system alike.
Category: Strategy
Published: January 15, 2026
The Future of Scheduling in the Age of Artificial Intelligence
AI may automate the “what” of scheduling, but the “why” still belongs to humans. In this episode of All Access Pass, host Elizabeth Woodcock sits down with Aramis Cherrington, Vice President of Patient Access at RWJBarnabas Health to explore how artificial intelligence is reshaping the work of access centers, shifting them from reactive call hubs to predictive, omni-channel orchestrators of the patient journey.
They discuss why AI will likely handle most routine transactions while elevating human schedulers into empathetic care navigators, what it means to design access around the patient rather than the process, and how traditional metrics like abandonment rate and average speed of answer fall short of capturing true accessibility.
In this episode, we cover AI’s impact on scheduler roles, the rise of omnichannel digital front doors, new outcome- and experience-based access metrics, and why investing equally in people and platforms is essential to delivering frictionless, timely, connected care.
Category: Strategy
Published: December 15
Beyond the Waitlist: Rethinking Demand and Flow in Healthcare
Waiting lists have long been treated as an unavoidable part of healthcare — a symptom of limited capacity. But Professor Katherine Harding believes otherwise.
In this episode, she joins PAC founder Elizabeth Woodcock to unpack the STAT model, a research-backed approach developed in Australia that replaces backlogs with real-time scheduling and equitable flow. Harding shares insights from clinical trials, lessons from implementation, and her bold challenge to health systems everywhere: waiting isn’t destiny — it’s design.
Tune in to learn how STAT reframes access, equity, and efficiency for modern healthcare.
Category: Strategy
Published: November 15
Timely Access in Oncology: Lessons from Cancer Care
Behind every oncology referral is a patient—and a family—waiting, hoping, and depending on the system to move fast. In this episode, host Dr. Elizabeth Woodcock, Executive Director of the Patient Access Collaborative, is joined by three oncology access leaders: Kristen Thatcher of The James at Ohio State University, Jennifer Kennedy-Stovall of Duke Cancer Institute, and Kate Healy-Levine of Memorial Sloan Kettering Cancer Center. Together, they explore how leading cancer programs are redefining timely access—balancing urgency with empathy, operational efficiency with equity, and data with culture.
Tune in to hear how these systems are tackling workforce constraints, leveraging APPs, and redesigning scheduling models to ensure that every patient receives the right care, at the right time.
Topics include culture and urgency in access, diagnostic and APP models, template standardization, financial navigation, and equity in oncology care.
Category: Strategy
Published: October 20