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5 minutes with: Ed Lehman, Grand Rounds

This month, we sat down with Ed Lehman—Senior VP of National Accounts and Channel Partnerships at Grand Rounds.

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At Collective Health, we know creating the healthcare experience we all deserve is not the job of one company. That’s why we spend a lot of time working with, and listening to, some of the most innovative companies and people working in our industry.

This month, we sat down with Ed Lehman—Senior VP of National Accounts and Channel Partnerships at Grand Rounds. Ed is responsible for managing and growing Grand Rounds’ enterprise client base. He and his team lead Grand Rounds’ growth efforts and help to bring Grand Rounds’ unique solutions to employers all over the country. Ed also manages Grand Rounds’ channel partnerships, including consultant, broker, and integration partner relationships.

Ed has extensive experience working with large employers as a healthcare consultant at Mercer and TowersWatson, where he led teams that helped develop and implement healthcare strategies. Ed joins Grand Rounds as the former Vice President of Sales at Cigna, and previously led the national sales team at Aetna. Ed earned his BA in Public Affairs from Indiana University, Bloomington and his MBA from Pepperdine University, Malibu.

What problem is Grand Rounds trying to solve?

At Grand Rounds, we’re trying to make sure that everybody has access to high-quality care, regardless of where they live or work. Our mission is to help people receive the right treatment as early as possible in their healthcare journey.

“Our team is driven by the direct impact our work has on people’s lives.”

How is Grand Rounds moving the industry forward?

We’re moving the industry forward with our data-driven approach to identifying the most qualified physicians for patients’ specific needs. Historically, physician quality has been a popularity contest. We’re changing that. With our proprietary quality algorithm, we rank physicians on metrics that are predictive of future outcomes, including where they practice, where they trained, research conducted, procedural volumes, and patient outcomes data. As a result, Grand Rounds delivers measurably better outcomes for patients in need of care.

What makes your team come to work every day?

Our team is driven by the direct impact our work has on people’s lives. That’s a humbling and motivating reason to come to work every day.

Why does your company feel that it’s important to partner with employers?

More than half of the US population depends on their employer for their health insurance — partnering with employers is a great way for us to help this large population get the right care at the right time. Every year I’m more and more impressed by how dedicated HR and benefits leaders are to their people’s well-being, including finding innovative ways to keep them healthy and happy.

What’s a topic in healthcare today that isn’t getting the attention it deserves?

I think the biggest thing facing the healthcare industry today is that there are a million different definitions of “quality”. At Grand Rounds, we believe that healthcare is ultimately what happens between a physician and a patient. And therefore, we go deeper by focusing on physician-level quality — the level that affects patients most. We do this through a data-driven approach to ensure the physician-patient match is right from the beginning.

For example, instead of just focusing on procedural volumes, accreditations, and fancy medical degrees, we focus on objective and relevant criteria that reflect clinical performance and patient outcomes. Our approach asks the right questions and collects the right data to perfectly match a doctor to a condition, and ultimately, the patient’s specific needs.

Word on the Street: Tell us your favorite success story

There are so many incredible stories rolling around in my head it’s hard to choose! The most recent story I can think of came from a quarterly meeting with one of our employer clients. During the meeting, we reviewed a case about a young woman who had been diagnosed with epilepsy a couple of years ago. As a result of her diagnosis, she was put on epilepsy drugs, had restrictions placed on her driver’s license and the type of work she could do, and had to live with the emotional baggage of worrying constantly about when her next seizure was going to come. A Grand Rounds second opinion revealed that she didn’t have epilepsy at all! Imagine how quickly that transformed her life. We were able to help her regain her independence — she was no longer taking the drugs that were making her feel terrible every day, and was on the path to getting better.

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