Future Leaders: Raymond Capella, VP, Clinical Services, Enclara Pharmacia

The Future Leaders Awards program is brought to you in partnership with PointClickCare. The program is designed to recognize up-and-coming industry members who are shaping the next decade of senior housing, skilled nursing, home health and hospice care. To see this year’s future leaders, visit https://futureleaders.agingmedia.com/.

Raymond Capella, vice president of Clinical Services has been named a 2021 Future Leader by Hospice News.

To become a Future Leader, an individual is nominated by their peers. The candidate must be a high-performing employee who is 40-years-old or younger, a passionate worker who knows how to put vision into action, and an advocate for seniors and the committed professionals who ensure their well-being.

Capella sat down with Hospice News to talk about his career trajectory and the ways the industry is evolving.

What drew you to the hospice field?

Early in my career I worked both in retail and hospital pharmacy settings. At the time, I was really interested in pursuing a career in pharmacy that was more non-traditional. I learned of a local hospice pharmacy company here in Philadelphia. They were a pretty innovative company that was quickly growing.

Up until that point, I didn’t have any personal experience with hospice. I had very little professional experience with it as well. But once I began working in the hospice industry, I discovered my passion for the profession. I am really inspired by the hospice nurses and what they do day in and day out. That’s what kept me here in the field for almost 15 years.

What is the biggest lesson you’ve learned since starting to work in this industry?

To paraphrase Teddy Roosevelt, people need to know how much you care before they care how much you know. That really is the base lesson for me in this industry. No matter who I’m interacting with, C-suite, nurse, volunteer, it all starts with putting yourself in their shoes.

If you could change one thing with an eye towards the future of hospice, what would it be?

I would increase awareness and acceptance of the value of hospice care in the U.S. health care system.

What do you foresee as being different about the hospice industry as we move into 2022?

That will be the second year of the [value-based insurance design (VBID)] demonstration.

We’re in the process of really crawling our way out of the throws of this pandemic. I foresee more industry-wide conversation and focus around creating integrated and more streamlined patient care models with enhanced emphasis on the quality of care and reduction of unnecessary costs.

I am excited about the advancements in predictive analytics and artificial intelligence in the space. I’m hoping and expecting that in the not too distant future the industry will have these types of models that allow better identification of hospice patients further upstream. We then can combine that with even some of the companies that have those more sophisticated downstream models, which can project the patient’s trajectory. It’s really that “glass ball” view that providers have now to create the absolute best patient experience. 

In a word, how would you describe the future of hospice?

I guess the word to use is integration. Hospice has always been uncoupled, so I’d say better integration into the overall health ecosystem and more integration in higher health care education systems. It’s making sure that it is a topic that is readily taught, then more integration into daily conversations about what hospice is about and making sure that patients and families are aware and sensitized to it. 

If you could look back to your first day working in this industry and give yourself any advice, what would that be?

If I’m speaking to my younger self 15 years ago, it’s probably to be ready to collaborate and to be prepared to engage our hospice partners more readily. There’s definitely that mutual drive to advance the mission of hospice.

In my younger days, I probably was a little bit more hesitant to pitch an idea to a client or to a customer, or talk to a hospice provider, get their input and problem-solve with them. I think maybe I missed out on doing that a little bit earlier on in my career. Today I’m much more successful in being able to have those conversations more quickly with hospice providers, understanding that we have a mutual goal in the industry.

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