Employee Spotlight: Julia Berry

Julia Berry, Director, Health Education & Engagement

Meet Julia Berry. As Director of Health Education and Engagement at Kii Health, she oversees our health education content, which is delivered through Kii Health’s IMD patient education platform as well as the Kii platform.

The IMD platform was initially designed as a tool for health care providers to find the content they need to educate their patients. As Kii Health continues to deliver on our commitment of Empowering Healthier Living, the platform has grown to include user self-led experiences as well, such as the Kii reference library and self-guided iCBT (Internet-based Cognitive Behavioural Therapy) modules.

Our full database includes medical information and disease education for thousands of topics, a drug database of all approved treatments in Canada, and condition management and supportive care content from our incredible partners in the healthcare space. We curate this information into topics that are easy to navigate, and we have integrated email tools that allow health care providers to select and send content directly to patients. It’s a great way to share dynamic resources like videos, and an effective tool to help patients learn about their conditions and how to manage them. We also work with healthcare organizations to build custom versions of this platform for their clinical staff, with the goals of increasing clinic efficiency (through time savings), increasing patient understanding and readiness for treatment, and ultimately positively impacting treatment adherence. Our mission is to create happier, healthier, and better-informed patients by equipping healthcare providers with the resources they need, when and where they need them.

1. What does managing these health education platforms involve?

The health education and engagement team oversees hundreds of custom versions of the IMD platform (including the bilingual version in the Kii platform), thousands of health topics and more than 110,000 educational assets in various formats (PDFs, videos, infographics). We ensure every version of the platform and every resource is up to date and well organized so users can easily find the information they need. We also coordinate with health associations and content partners to review, update, and expand our library, keeping it both credible and current. Canada-specific content is difficult to source, and these partners are doing incredible work to serve patients and healthcare providers across Canada. These are organizations like the Canadian Cancer Society, Breakthrough T1D, and about 100 others, all serving specific patient populations, and doing very important fundraising to support research and treatment.

2. What impact have you seen from providing health education tools and resources to our members? Any examples that stand out? (Without compromising confidentiality.)

It’s very easy to get overwhelmed by information when you’re looking into a health concern. There’s a ton of misinformation on the internet, which is a huge challenge, but there are also a lot of worst-case scenarios out there that can cause unnecessary stress and anxiety. Our content in the Kii platform is designed to help users cut through that noise, making it easy to find information to help them support their health, from the best sources in Canada, with the most credible content.

Supporting patients with the information they need is challenging for health care providers as well, who want to counsel patients with information that will help support them, but are challenged by lack of resources. Many clinics still give out paper handouts to patients because they don’t have the right tools, or they’re giving very broad information that is not highly specific to the individual.

This results in underinformed or misinformed patients, a lack of readiness for treatment, and can impact treatment plan adherence. The value of our platform is that we can create custom versions with the right content, organized for efficiency in the clinic, to help care providers send personalized packages to patients so that they can learn more about a diagnosis or health concern, help them through their treatment, or help them manage their condition or symptoms from home. Some of the best feedback we’ve gotten is from the clinicians who use our platform:

“IMD has been a godsend for our clinic and has made patient counselling much more efficient for us.”

“When I was using IMD in the clinical setting, it cut my teaching in half. It went from 45 minutes down to 20.”

“The videos are a huge bonus. People like them; they are very short and sweet; they are patient centered…IMD has reduced our phone calls to the triage desk for symptom management.”

It’s also been very well received by patients, as a digital record of the information that their care provider walked them through. We’ve heard from patients that they value being able to access the content digitally and the ability to access the information whenever a question comes up.

3. How do you think our approach to health education sets us apart from other workplace wellness providers?

The breadth and depth of our medical information is unique to this space. Many wellness providers focus on surface-level content about health and wellness, but we provide a lot of actionable information for employees seeking to improve their health, both mental and physical.

4. What health topics are you seeing the most interest in?

Lately, we’re seeing strong engagement around:

• Mental health and resilience
• Metabolic health, with cholesterol, diabetes, and heart healthy weight being the most frequently accessed medical topics
• Nutrition and sleep
• Respiratory health

5. What are some trends in employee engagement or health education that you think employers should be paying attention to?

Patients and employees will have the best experience with a balance of digital and personal support. Programs that combine accessible online tools with opportunities for personal connection and guidance will lead to the best outcomes.

6. What does health and wellness mean to you personally, and how does that influence your work?

Improving your health and wellness means empowering yourself. Stress can be detrimental to your health and to your quality of life, which is why I believe so strongly in maintaining healthy boundaries, minimizing unnecessary stress, and making time to recharge. It’s important to find the outlets and tools that work best for you personally, whether that’s a particular hobby, a specific type of exercise, or any form of therapy. When I prioritize wellness, I’m more focused, creative, and resilient.