What happens when the person leading patient experience becomes the family in the waiting room?
On June 21st, Shella Southern, Chief Patient Experience Officer at OU Health, received a call no family member ever wants to receive. Her stepfather had been in a motorcycle accident and was being transported to her own Level I trauma center. What followed in the ER and Trauma ICU changed not just her personality but the way she leads.
In this session, Shella shares what she witnessed from the other side of the clipboard, the moments of humanity, presence, and compassion that stayed with her long after the clinical details faded, and how that experience became the foundation for building a patient experience strategy grounded in what patients and families actually need. Because the outcome of the patient does not dictate the experience. And the people in that building have more power than they know.