Healthcare Insights

Only You Can Prevent PX Wildfires: Systems Thinking and the Patient Experience
Conference Presentation: Beryl Institute 2019

April 3-5 2019, Dallas, TX

In 2017, the US Forest Service spent over $2.5 billion fighting fires. The fires that PX professionals fight every day are the outcome of decades of cultural undergrowth, providing ample fuel: siloed organizations, disconnected communication systems, unclear lines of authority, disagreement on shared measurements. Cost constraints and compliance requirements only add to the tinder-dry conditions.

The victims? Staff, patients, families. The answer: systems thinking. Using examples from frontline experiences, presenters shared stories of patient experience in flames, their underlying causes and the systems that have been designed to prevent them.

Tiffany Fortin, Senior Patient Experience Officer, Munson Healthcare
Sheila Moroney, Patient Experience Officer, Hennepin Healthcare
Mark VanderKlipp, Founding Partner, Connect_CX


Pit Crew: How Communication Fuels the Ambulatory Surgery Center Patient Experience
Beryl Institute 2018 Annual Conference & Webinar Series

April 16-18 2018, Chicago IL

A case study of the Copper Ridge Surgery Center patient experience process presented alongside  clients Gayle Bultsma, RN and LoAnn VandeLeest, CEO. One of the highest-rated sessions, we were later asked to present to a wider audience. Along with Tricia Wollam, PX Champion Co-Leader at the Copper Ridge Surgery Center (CRSC), Mark VanderKlipp reviewed the Healthcare Experience Design process and provided an update of the innovations that CRSC Champions have brought to their culture as a result of this initiative. 

Click here for an on-demand replay of the Webinar

Patient Experience Roundtable: Discussing the Ambulatory Surgery Center (ASC) Experience
Beryl Institute 2018 Annual Conference

Mark VanderKlipp served as event moderator to discussion groups totaling over 100 conference participants, each with an interest in ASC experience design. Participants were split into tables of 8-12 individuals, then coached to develop topics based on thought starters, engage in discussion and present findings to the larger group.


5 Building Blocks of Wayfinding
Healthcare Design Magazine

December, 2016

Healthcare designers and planners develop master plans that peer into an organization’s foreseeable future and develop built environment solutions that respond accordingly to the needs that are identified. Healthcare communications professionals perform a similar exercise, except their response is the development of communication strategies that engage and inform patients, staff, and visitors on changes to come. A comprehensive wayfinding strategy lives at the intersection of these two disciplines. For healthcare patients and visitors, what they know is just as important as what they see. An internal team, tasked with managing both informational and physical infrastructure, can proactively address wayfinding together.


Walk This Way
Healthcare Design Magazine

November, 2014

In 2012, the leadership of Munson Medical Center in Traverse City, Mich., decided to address its wayfinding system—again. They’d tried before in 2006, redesigning a system of colored floor lines into one anchored by public elevator cores and a new color/letter scheme to define locations. But between 2006 and early 2012, an incomplete rollout and a lack of internal education caused the program to languish, and complaints about wayfinding grew.

Munson’s internal wayfinding steering committee brought in Mark VanderKlipp to revisit the 2006 plan to see if it was worth picking up again or whether they should consider a new system altogether. The next step was a series of Kaizen (continuous process improvement) events to test potential solutions.


Balance in the Built Environment
Healthcare Construction + Operations

February, 2014

Every person is different. While this may not be breaking news, it is a wayfinding reality that must be addressed to reduce patient stress in a health care environment. Achieving this requires first an understanding of how people navigate, then implementing navigational tools. Some people are comfortable reading a map, while others use landmarks to navigate. Some can remember detailed verbal directions, while others lose track after their first turn. Some remember words, others colors. Each person brings a preference and a set of limitations to the task of finding their way. And if they are lost, their experience is frustrating.


Minding the Myths of Healthcare Wayfinding
Healthcare Design Magazine 

June 2013

When patients arrive late for appointments, frequently stop staff for directions, or flat-out complain about getting lost, you know a wayfinding program isn’t working. Too often something isn’t jibing in transitions between Parking Garage A, Patient Tower 2, the Red Elevator Bank, and whatever their destination might be.

But it’s not that the facility hasn’t attempted to address navigational cues; instead, the components put in place to aid the process may just be what’s breaking it down. With a few new approaches to familiar tactics, from signage to architectural elements, fixes can be found for even the worst offenders. Article by Jennifer Kovacs Silvis with Mark VanderKlipp as contributor.


Healthcare Rebrand: Stories from the Trenches
Society for Healthcare Strategy and Market Development (SHSMD) Connections
2012 Conference Roundtable

July 2012, Philadelphia PA

Joint presentation detailing the lengthy process of co-branding two formerly separate systems within the Trinity Health network, tying them together with consistent brand standards, including wayfinding signage. Presented with former clients Kelly Kurburski, Marketing Communications Director and Jeff Couzens, former VP of Marketing for Mercy Health West Michigan