By Megan Woodward
When Ella Dullea travels, she likes to notice the details most people ignore: how a thoughtful hotel check-in can reduce friction, how an airline sets expectations, or how a restaurant recovers when something goes wrong.
She brings that same attention to healthcare, where the stakes are higher and the systems are more complex. At SNOW, she helps design and improve patient support services, thinking deeply about how programs run behind the scenes and how small decisions can help us show up in real life for patients.
Ella realized that it’s not just the big moments, it’s also the small ones that can contribute to something feeling more intuitive and less overwhelming.
“Sometimes the fix is tiny,” Ella says. “Change the order of steps, clarify one message, and patients stop getting stuck.”
She’s constantly looking for those moments where a thoughtful adjustment can have a real impact. It’s not just about designing something that works on paper. It’s about understanding how people interact with care—often at a time in their life that already feels complicated, uncertain, or heavy.
From Curiosity to Calling
Ella’s path to her current role began by earning a graduate degree in public health, followed by working in healthcare public relations and communications. But over time, she found herself most interested in interrogating how the systems behind the information could contribute to successful communication.
“I realized I loved asking questions,” Ella says. “Like, why are we doing it this way, and how could it be better?”
That type of inquiry is how she found her passion for the operational side of the work.
“I like the messy middle: all the details that determine whether something works in real life,” Ella says. “The opportunity to shape processes in ways that haven’t been fully explored before is exciting.”
Why Experience Matters
For Ella, the importance of patient experience isn’t just intuitive, it’s something she’s seen reinforced through data and observation.
“I’ve seen how much patient experience impacts outcomes,” Ella says. “I’ve also seen how often it’s overlooked because the moments that matter most can be invisible.”
She often finds inspiration by looking outside of healthcare. In other industries, she’s noticed how much attention is given to the details of an experience, like tracking a package or receiving personalized recommendations.
Ella recognizes how a patient’s experience is shaped long before they ever interact with a program.
“Even though healthcare is more complex, patients still bring expectations with them,” Ella says.
Being aware of them helps her think differently about how healthcare interactions are designed, and how they can better meet (and exceed) those expectations.
Thoughtful modifications can transform experiences. Ella often invokes a story about a leader at GE Healthcare who wanted to address how scary getting an MRI can be for a child. Instead of focusing on the technology only, the team redesigned the experience by creating themed environments like pirate ships or jungles.
“It’s a good reminder that innovations—whether highly visible or behind the scenes—can fundamentally change how people engage with care, and ultimately improve outcomes,” Ella says.
Where Ideas Meet Reality
When Ella joined SNOW, she found a place where she could make a meaningful contribution through practical innovations in patient support services. What stood out to her about SNOW was how closely teams collaborate with patients—not just to understand how patients move through programs but to build better programs alongside them.
“If something sounds great in theory but never actually reaches patients, it’s not that helpful,” Ella says.
For Ella, the goal isn’t just to design something thoughtful, it’s to design something that works. Something that meets people where they are.
That starts with listening.
“We want to understand every part of the process, hear directly from patients, and ensure that what we’re building leads to a real, tangible impact in the healthcare,” Ella says.
What Drives Her
Ella thinks a lot about how disconnected healthcare experiences can feel—and how much opportunity there is to change that.
From her perspective, challenges like cost, access, and adherence aren’t separate from the experience.
They are the experience.
“How can we take what patients are telling us and actually build it into the way programs work?” Ella says.
It’s not just what patients say, either.
“Sometimes it’s not just the words,” Ella says. “It’s the context, the tone, everything around it.”
Ella cares about listening to the pauses, the context, and the emotion behind the words— and she carries those insights into her work every day.
Life Outside of Work
Ella lives on the Upper East Side with her husband and their mini labradoodle, Steve—who she loves taking on long walks around the city. She’s also a runner and takes full advantage of Central Park.
“I’ll take any chance I can get to be outside,” Ella says.
And if there’s a concert worth traveling for? She’s in. Case in point: a trip to Sweden to see Taylor Swift in May 2024.
Ella’s also a fan of documentaries—especially the unexpected ones, like a deep dive into Martha Stewart’s life that completely surprised her because there were so many things she didn’t know about her life.
Looking Ahead
As SNOW continues to grow, Ella is excited about the opportunity to collaborate with team members who share similar values and a deep commitment to patients.
“Our teams bring different skills and specialties,” Ella says. “But they complement each other in ways that can really elevate the patient experience and patient engagement as a whole.”
For Ella, the work is never just about systems or strategy. It’s about making things feel a little more clear. A little more connected. A little more human.
And for the patients moving through those programs, that can make all the difference.
