Additionally, a new leadership structure was announced, effective immediately, before the potential merger with ChristianaCare.
Crozer Health, a for-profit health system in Springfield, Pennsylvania, announced several leadership changes this week.
Among those changes is a new health system CEO—which has now seen three leaders in the role just this year.
Anthony Esposito, who previously served as president of Crozer Health Medical Group (CHMG) and president of the Prospect Physician Enterprise, succeeds Kevin Spiegel who took on the role in February 2022.
Additionally, Dina Capalongo, DO, was appointed chief medical officer of the system and will remain as CMO of CHMG. "We will continue our focus on access to quality care for patients, families, and our communities," Capalongo said in a statement.
C. Nathan Okechukwu, MD, was appointed president of clinical operations and will remain in his position as chair for the department of medicine.
"We are grateful to the physicians and clinical and support staff for all they have done to transition Crozer Health out of the pandemic and into a solid future," Sam Lee, president of Prospect Medical, said in a statement. "We're excited to announce these changes as we believe leadership should be locally based and include physician leaders."
According to a press release, Spiegel will continue his work with Crozer Health's parent company, Los Angeles-based Prospect Medical Holdings, to aid in special projects.
Spiegel took on the CEO role following Peter Adamo's exit in early 2022 after serving as system CEO for two years. Following Adamo's exit, the health system also laid off an estimated 300 employees.
Around the time Spiegel became CEO in February, it was announced that ChristianaCare Health System, Inc. signed a letter of intent to buy Crozer Health from Prospect Medical Holdings.
The deal, which is still in the works and is expected to be finalized later this year, includes the sale of Crozer-Chester Medical Center, Delaware County Memorial Hospital, Springfield Hospital, Taylor Hospital, and all of Crozer's related businesses, real estate assets, Crozer Health Medical Group and the associated assets, ambulatory centers, medical office buildings, physician clinics and ancillary outpatient services.
Financial terms have not been disclosed for the deal. Under ChristianaCare's ownership, Crozer Health will become a nonprofit organization.
Joe Sluka's decision to step down will take effect the week of July 12.
The president and CEO of St. Charles Health System, a nonprofit, four-hospital network headquartered in Bend, Oregon, announced his decision to depart from his position on Tuesday.
Joe Sluka, who led the system for nearly eight years, stated in a public letter that it was with "mixed emotions" that he had come to the decision.
"Having served in this role for nearly eight years, I feel deeply connected to Central Oregon and the communities St. Charles has the privilege to serve. This is not an easy decision," Sluka said in his letter.
"At the same time, after leading through more than two years of a global pandemic and the corresponding recovery I feel it is time for me to step aside, recharge and provide the opportunity for new operational leaders to guide St. Charles forward."
Steve Gordon, MD, a former member of the St. Charles board of directors and an experienced healthcare executive, will serve as interim CEO, while Sluka will transition into a new role serving as a strategic advisor.
"Having spent several years on the St. Charles Board of Directors, I understand the unique role our health system plays in the Central Oregon community. I am energized to build on Joe's legacy and advance and strengthen St. Charles despite the current challenges the health care industry faces," Gordon said in a statement. "I will continue to work closely with Joe in his strategic advisor role and am grateful that I’ll have his support, insight and ideas moving forward."
During Sluka's tenure as president and CEO, the regional health system had strategic growth initiatives, including the construction of a new patient tower at St. Charles Bend, the expansion and remodel of St. Charles Madras and St. Charles Prineville campuses, the expansion of services in Redmond, and additional outpatient clinics were created in La Pine and Bend South.
"Joe’s leadership through a period of growth for the health system and throughout the past very challenging two years of a global pandemic have been exemplary," said Jamie Orlikoff, chairman of the St. Charles board of directors, said in a statement. "He has been a reassuring and trusted voice to the Central Oregon community and has also been an important advocate for health care resources at the state and national level. On behalf of the entire board, I would like to thank Joe for his service."
The leadership transition will happen sometime this week, the organization said in the press release. A national search for a permanent president and CEO, run by the St. Charles board, will be forthcoming.
Sluka's decision to step down follows the health system's rocky financial start in the first half of 2022.
In May, St. Charles reported a $17.2 million operating loss for the first quarter of the year, affected by delayed surgeries during the COVID-19 pandemic. Additionally, that same month, the health system cut 181 workforce positions, which impacted 105 caregivers.
In June, physicians and other healthcare workers filed for union representation from the American Federation of Teachers, HealthLeaders previously reported.
A physician involved in the move to seek union representation at St. Charles Medical Group told HealthLeaders that the primary impetus of the effort is to gain decision-making authority at the medical group and St. Charles Health System.
"It is mainly concern about bad administrative decisions. It has gone from bad decisions to frustration and concern about the healthcare that we are providing. The term union tends to make people think about things like pay and strikes, and that is not a major part of the discussion. It is concern about patient care," Lester Dixon, MD, an emergency room physician at St. Charles Medical Group, said.
Marketing executives shared creative strategies that their teams have used to address workforce issues during the recent Healthcare Workforce of the Future roundtable event.
The evolution of healthcare marketing is driven by the creative innovations that marketing teams adopt to keep up with the ever-changing demands of consumers. Those same factors and innovations come into play when addressing workforce shortages.
Hospitals and health systems are experiencing what's being called the Great Resignation, and they're facing new competition in recruiting needed staff. While clinical care staff has been in short demand, the marketing departments have also experienced turnover.
During the recent HealthLeaders Healthcare Workforce of the Future roundtable event, chief marketing executives— Sandra Mackey, the chief marketing officer for Bon Secours Mercy Health and William "Skip" Hidlay, the chief communications and marketing officer for The Ohio State University Wexner Medical Center—had a candid discussion about the creative innovations their organizations have created to address workforce issues.
Collaborating With Human Resources on Recruitment
At Bon Secours Mercy Health, a Catholic health system headquartered in Cincinnati, Ohio, the marketing and HR teams came together to collaborate on external recruitment efforts and internal messaging.
Building on a strong relationship between the CHRO and CMO, The HR recruitment team approached marketing initially for help with digital recruitment. What the teams quickly agreed upon was a more comprehensive effort by appealing to candidates who would be attracted to the mission of the organization that were called to serve, Mackey said.
"What we recommended is that we use some of the consumer-driven strategies to attract HR candidates," Mackey said "We took a lot of our consumer marketing plans and adapted them into the HR environment. We built storytelling campaigns around it."
"There was a division of labor," she added. "What we recognized is that we could be way more efficient if we own different components. We took over the messaging and the campaign development aspects of the recruiting effort. The recruitment teams then focused heavily on throughput, on engaging candidates, getting them through the pipeline quickly, and making offers quickly."
Demand for staff, especially nurses, quadrupled the HR team's work, Mackey said. By dividing up the work between the two teams, HR was able to focus on onboarding more employees while marketing took over campaign development and insights.
By using insights from current employees, the marketing team was able to develop consumer-driven campaigns by focusing on what was important to the employees.
"Then we converted those key findings and messages into our campaign message and that built a lot more traction," she said. The team also developed KPIs and had tracking mechanisms to understand how the campaigns were performing, and what adjustments needed to be made.
"The tracking alone became an incredibly important tool to HR, and so with us focusing all of our efforts upfront on the campaign development and execution, while allowing them to work more on the operational aspects, it created greater accountability in terms of how we were spending our campaign dollars," Mackey said.
"We were able to see daily and weekly where the most effective strategies were being deployed market by market, and also be able to shift dollars as campaigns were more successful or less successful," she added. "That, in and of itself, was a tremendous benefit to HR and allowed them to be a lot more efficient and effective."
Due to those efforts, the organization saw a dramatic increase in the number of candidates that were engaged, and the number of recruited candidates also went up exponentially.
"HR gave us a lot of credit for being able to take those consumer-driven principles and apply them to the workforce, using the same type of insights to drive our campaign activity," Mackey said. "In fact, HR deserves much of the credit for their bold approach to exploring new ways to tackle recruiting and flexibility in making real-time adjustments."
Engaging Employee Needs and Wellbeing
At The Ohio State University Wexner Medical Center, an academic medical center in Columbus, Ohio, the marketing department is focused on more than just the organization's patients and consumers, it's also focused on its internal audience: the employees.
During the pandemic, the marketing team got larger, Hidlay said, and played a vital role in the organization's pandemic response.
Currently, the team works around 80% remote, 10% hybrid, and 10% in the office.
"I'm in the office every day, but we're trying to meet people sort of where they are, and we've had to be very innovative in how we lead the team, because we've been subjected to the great resignation," Hidlay said. "What's interesting is we lost 17 people within a six-month period all to higher-paying, 100% remote jobs."
A back-to-the-office plan was in the works with a proposal to spend two to three days in the office during the week, but Hidlay changed the plan. "Coming off of the holidays, I rethought that whole approach because I felt if we forced people back into the office in an artificial way, we would then accelerate more turnover," he said.
At the same time, he acknowledged how important in-person engagement is for building network and teams, especially for new hires.
"What we've implemented, and we've had two of these now, is we're doing monthly mandatory in-person staff retreats," Hidlay said. "[Staff] can choose: do they want to stay primarily remote or do they want to work several days in the office? No matter which they choose, we require them to attend the monthly in-person retreats."
The retreats happen in different locations on campus, he said. "We involve tours, we involve lots of socialization time, as well as communicating updates about our strategy, our priorities for the coming fiscal year, and we often bring in at least one guest speaker."
Following the monthly retreats, the marketing team is surveyed and has an opportunity to give feedback.
"The first two were 95% to 98% overwhelmingly positive," Hidlay said. "People love the interpersonal connection, they love the ability to connect with teammates, but they also appreciate that we're being progressive in allowing people to make their own decisions about what works in their own space in terms of work location. I think this will open up for us a world of recruiting and retention possibilities as we lean into this new model."
The HealthLeaders Exchange is an executive community for sharing ideas, solutions, and insights. Please join the community on LinkedIn. To inquire about attending a HealthLeaders Exchange, email us at exchange@healthleadersmedia.com.
Healthcare employment rose by 57,000 in June, which is the most jobs added in a month in 2022.
Among the sectors with notable job gains in June was the healthcare sector, the U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics (BLS) reported Friday morning.
During the month of June, employment in healthcare rose by 57,000 the agency reported, which is the highest amount of job growth this year.
This included 28,000 jobs added in the ambulatory healthcare sector, 21,000 jobs added in hospitals, and 8,000 jobs added in nursing and residential care facilities.
The sector has experienced continuous growth in employment in 2022 and is currently 176,000 jobs, or 1.1% below its pre-pandemic, February 2020 level.
Additionally, total nonfarm payroll employment rose by 372,000 in the month of June, BLS reported, continuing an average monthly gain over the prior 3 months (+383,000). Because of this, the unemployment rate continues to sit at 3.6%.
In addition to the healthcare sector, notable job gains also occurred in professional and business services and leisure and hospitality.
Compared to total nonfarm employment pre-pandemic levels in February 2020, employment is still down 524,000 or 0.3%.
Meghan Walsh, MD, MPH, FACP, shares how Hennepin Healthcare addresses the effects of community violence both inside and outside the organization's walls.
Editor's note: This conversation is a transcript from an episode of the HealthLeaders Podcast. Audio of the full interview can be found here and below. This is also part two of a three-part series on gun violence prevention in healthcare. Part one can be found here.
Meghan Walsh, MD, MPH, FACP, serves as the chief academic officer for Hennepin Healthcare, a Level I adult trauma center, Level I pediatric trauma center, and acute care hospital in the heart of Minneapolis.
Walsh joined Hennepin in 2001 where she started as an intern, then made the climb to the C-suite in 2012, where she has been the longest-serving C-suite executive for the health system.
Over the past two decades, Walsh has witnessed a lot of change and challenges, and with that, solutions and innovations were created to benefit the community, both inside and outside the walls of the organization.
One of the challenges is the increase in gun violence and its lasting effects. According to data from the Minneapolis Police Department, AP News reported that in Minneapolis in 2021, more than 600 people had been treated for gunshot wounds in the city's hospitals.
In the latest HealthLeaders Podcast episode, Walsh spoke about the gun violence epidemic and how Hennepin is addressing community violence both inside and outside the organization's walls, and she offers leadership insights.
This transcript has been edited for clarity and brevity.
HL: How is gun violence considered an epidemic?
Walsh: Firearm injury is a major public health issue, and frankly, we should think about it like we think about cancer or heart disease. When you think about a public health crisis or any sort of issue, you think about what particular disease leads to premature death. And firearm injuries do. It also causes long-term physical and emotional disability for patients, for their families, for their communities, and for the medical team who takes care of [them].
There are also significant direct emergency and medical expenses and bigger overarching economic costs to society. It falls perfectly within the public health crisis definition, and we have to think carefully about leveraging the same measures we use in all of these other system-wide diseases and crises.
HL: How has the gun violence epidemic impacted the Hennepin Healthcare workforce and students? What have you experienced?
Walsh: We see the impact of gun violence on our patients now more than ever. The highest increases in firearm homicide rates are seen among young black males and people living in high poverty areas. These groups experience an unequal burden of firearm homicide compared to white, wealthy Americans, and in 2020 it got even worse.
Firearm violence is inextricably tied to race, inequity, poverty, poor housing, limited access to healthy food, educational opportunities, and also a lack of safe places to work, live, play, walk, and socialize. Hennepin, in the heart of Minneapolis, is surrounded by a lot of these inequities and disparities in our community.
We've done a lot to try to mitigate the impact of these challenges internally. For instance, we've done more with psychological first aid for care teams. That includes doctors, nurses, social workers, chaplains, and the whole care team that is impacted by patients who are suffering such grave harm and impact.
We debrief these cases as a team in real time. That's important for resilience, for teaming, for the ability to come back to work the next day. We have more mental health resources for all our employees here at Hennepin and especially our faculty physicians, residents, and students.
[New interns] are set up with a therapy visit as a baseline. They can choose to opt out, but the idea is if we can normalize mental health support, if we can make it easy, if we can help people try it out when they aren't in distress, they'll know how to get help when they are.
All of this is part of the bigger circle of prevention, support, and partnering with our healthcare teams and our community, all in service to trying to decrease the impact that gun violence has on everyone.
HL:What other steps have the health system taken to prepare for on-site gun-related violence?
Walsh: All 7,000 of our employees receive active shooter training; this was introduced in the last five years.
We have a security team [that] is performing constant risk assessment in our clinics and our hospital. Our security team are considered valuable members of our care teams. They're part of orientation, they come into the room and team with doctors and nurses for de-escalation of patients who are ill and are at risk of harming themselves or others. We see them more as care providers than we do as security.
As the chief academic officer, I also have a role in preparing for gun-related violence here at Hennepin. For over six years, we have utilized our simulation center to provide de-escalation simulation training for every new resident that comes to Hennepin. They learn verbal de-escalation, they understand risk assessment and how to escalate concerns. We debrief about how hard this is, and what to do, and who to call for help. We build teaming, we collaborate, and that is how we can build a community that takes care of one another at Hennepin.
There are also system changes you make. COVID forced us to decrease access into our hospitals for infection prevention reasons. We have continued to streamline access for visitors, for patients, for other workers, who come in and out of this organization, and [we] route them through a few portals of entry so that we can better ensure the safety of our employees here.
HL:What is the health system doing to help address gun safety and gun violence in the community?
Walsh: We have an amazing hospital-based violence prevention program called Next Step. It connects survivors of violent injury with services, in hopes of disrupting the cycle of violence. The program has enrolled more and more patients in the last few years, and it practices through a trauma-informed approach.
We have a critical role to plan for gun violence prevention education … In Minnesota, we don't have red flag laws, so our skill-building focuses on trust building with patients and their families. These are skills that have to be taught. Residents have to learn how to ask about this stuff, and if a risk assessment is performed, and a patient is checking any of the boxes for increased risk, they need to know how to intervene and what actions they can take.
[Additionally,] our surgery program is spearheading a lot of research on gun violence and publishing in the area.
HL:What advice do you have for leaders in healthcare that are trying to address the gun violence epidemic?
Walsh: The first step is focusing on the safety of your employees. This is a hard job even on its best day, and we are seeing patients in distress on a regular basis. Do your employees know the safety protocols at your institution? Do they feel safe? Your employees are also your community, so the light they shed on concerns is likely reflecting what your community's concerns are, and [that] will probably help you start to see opportunities for doing more locally.
The second step is building out a strong system for assessing risk factors. To assess for these in our patients, [we look for] adverse childhood events and social determinants that raise the risk of experiencing violence across all sectors of the system. How do we systemize this regardless of your specialty, whether you are a patient seeing a dermatologist or a trauma surgeon?
The third step is [having] all health systems learn from the community on how to prevent gun violence. The people in these impacted communities possess knowledge and experiences that make them uniquely qualified. They can reimagine safety and remedy the cycles of trauma and violence in their communities better than we can. So how do we shift power and resources to community-led safety practices? [How do we create] policies and violence prevention efforts that go outside of the walls of the hospital, that will benefit our community and our health systems in the long run?
A lot of hospitals are scrambling to figure out how to build this type of lens in their own health system. There are great programs out there. You do not need to reinvent the wheel. One site I love is called The BulletPoints Project. This is an amazing online resource for clinicians and medical educators. It offers a curated collection of content for firearm injury prevention.
HL:How would you define your leadership style?
Walsh: I love the principle of fair process as a leader, and I employ it as a teacher and as a leader in the organization. The underpinnings of fair process are three key principles:
1. Engage. Involve individuals in decisions that affect them. That doesn't necessarily mean they get their way. Listen to the points of view, and genuinely seek their opinion and insight as you're looking to make a decision.
2. Explanation. Explain the reasoning behind the decision to everyone; why am I making this policy change or this next step decision as a leader? Oftentimes leaders forget the "why." They forget to explain with clarity why the decision is the decision they made. That often can decrease a lot of the resistance that can occur with change.
3. Expectation clarity. Make sure everybody understands the decision you're making and what's expected of them moving forward.
If you do these three things as a leader, you'll get a lot of support, and you can effectively manage the change. I try to embody those principles in every decision I make and with nearly all of the teaching points I make as well.
HL:What advice do you have for women and others in healthcare who aspire to serve in the C suite?
Walsh: Find a mentor, someone who really sees your career trajectory and helps guide you getting there. Find an ally, someone who can align with you in your goal across particular issues. Find a confidant, someone that will never leave the role of supporting you, even when you're on opposite sides of an issue. Find a network of champions, a group of people that believe in you and are there in support of you.
Those four roles: mentor, ally, confidant, and champion, are often not the same person. Build that community around you.
I got this job because I had a male boss who truly believed in me, even when I wasn't sure I could do this job. He sponsored me and he supported me, but he also championed me publicly to other leaders. It's important to find that for your own journey, and it's important to be that for others who are just starting theirs.
Jonathan W. Curtright, MBA, MHA, will join Oklahoma academic health system, OU Health, in August.
MU Health Care announced Tuesday that the organization's CEO is leaving to join the executive team of another academic health system.
Jonathan W. Curtright, MBA, MHA, is stepping down from his post as CEO of the University of Missouri's academic health system on July 15. Curtright, who has served as CEO of MU Health since 2017, will be joining OU Health's executive team as COO in August.
In his new role, he will oversee the operations of OU Health University of Oklahoma Medical Center, Oklahoma Children's Hospital OU Health, OU Health Stephenson Cancer Center, and OU Health Edmond Medical Center.
"Jonathan brings to OU Health a wealth of experience in academic healthcare and has a successful track record of operational excellence, strategic growth, health system transformations and employee engagement," OU Health president and CEO, Richard Lofgren, MD, MPH, said in a statement. "He is uniquely qualified to step into this important role at OU Health as we focus on integrating our organization in order to bring the best outcome and experience to our patients."
Curtright's executive leadership experience spans more than 25 years, including having served in leadership roles at Indiana University Health, UK Healthcare, and Mayo Clinic. During his time at MU Health, he led strategic growth initiatives, including the development of a new children's hospital which is currently under construction, the addition of Battle and Boonville primary care clinics, and a partnership between Capital Region Medical Center and MU Health Care.
"The work already underway at OU Health is both exciting and transformative for healthcare in the state of Oklahoma and the region," Curtright said in a statement. "I am tremendously excited to be a part of Dr. Lofgren’s vision of bringing a highly integrated, high performing academic healthcare system to the citizens of the region and am looking forward to joining the Oklahoma community."
Following his exit from MU Health, Nim Chinniah, vice chancellor for health affairs at MU Health, will serve as interim CEO. A national search for a permanent CEO will be forthcoming.
Scott Wester, FACHE, will assume his new role of leading the health system on July 5.
Memorial Healthcare System in Hollywood, Florida is welcoming a new CEO next week, the South Broward Hospital District Board of Commissioners announced Wednesday.
Following a national search, Scott Wester, FACHE, will serve as the health system's new president and CEO starting on July 5. He succeeds Aurelio M. Fernandez, III, FACHE, who retired in May following a six-year tenure leading the organization.
"We are excited about the future and the impact Scott will have at Memorial and in this community. His expertise, approachable leadership style, and overall knowledge and understanding of our industry and community will help him lead this organization to greater heights," said Douglas A. Harrison, chair of the South Broward Hospital District Board of Commissioners, said in a statement. "We welcome Scott and look forward to working with him."
Wester, who has had a healthcare career spanning three decades has expertise in healthcare management and operations, finance, academia, philanthropy, and building successful partnerships, the press release says.
Most recently, Wester served as president and CEO of Our Lady of the Lake Regional Medical Center for Franciscan Missionaries of Our Lady Health System, a nonprofit, Catholic health system in Baton Rouge, Louisiana, with 880 beds. In that role, served between 2008 and 2022, his achievements include leading a $250 million partnership with Louisiana State University to align on workforce development, medical research, and interdisciplinary sciences. He also oversaw the financial growth of the center from $500 million to $1.6 million, raised more than $55 million that was used to build a free-standing children's hospital, and recruited over 400 physicians.
Prior to that, he served as president and CEO of St. Francis Medical Center in Monroe, Louisiana, a 620-bed hospital owned by the Franciscan Missionaries of Our Lady Health System, from 2004 to 2008. From 200 to 2004, he served as president and CEO of St. Elizabeth Hospital in Gonzales, Louisiana, a 95-bed acute care facility that is a wholly-owned subsidiary of Our Lady of the Lake Regional Medical Center.
"I felt a consistency of culture and community dedication from every person I met at Memorial during my interviews," Wester said in a statement. "I look forward to applying the tools I have gathered in my 30-year career to help propel this organization and work closely with Memorial’s workforce and other stakeholders to achieve the best for all."
Michael Dowling speaks about how gun violence affects the health of the community and how Northwell Health is addressing gun violence prevention, and he urges healthcare leaders to step up and treat gun violence as a health issue.
Editor's note: This is part one of a three-part series on gun violence prevention in healthcare.
Recently, a group of more than 550 CEOs and leaders of organizations from different sectors around the country signed a letter sent to the U.S. Senate, demanding action on gun violence. Among the signees were several healthcare executives, including Michael Dowling, president and CEO of Northwell Health, New York's largest healthcare provider.
The letter reads: Taken together, the gun violence epidemic represents apublic health crisis that continues to devastate communities – especially Black and Brown communities – and harm our national economy. All of this points to a clear need for action: the Senate must take urgent action to pass bold gun safety legislation as soon as possible in order to avoid more death and injury.
Not too long after, the Senate then passed, by a 65-33 vote, a bipartisan bill to address gun violence across the country. Now the bill will head to the House of Representatives.
Dowling is a strong voice on gun violence prevention and advocacy and has been for quite some time. In the past, he has spoken to HealthLeaders about how healthcare providers needed to rally and mobilize for gun control. He has also shared his thoughts on gun violence as a public health issue through media sources and Northwell Health's blog.
He recently spoke to HealthLeaders about the current gun violence climate, including how gun violence affects the health of the community and how Northwell is addressing gun violence prevention, and he is urging other healthcare leaders to step up and treat gun violence as a health issue.
Michael Dowling, president and CEO of Northwell Health. Photo courtesy of Northwell Health.
This transcript has been edited for clarity and brevity.
HealthLeaders: How will addressing gun violence as a public health crisis help move healthcare forward?
Michael Dowling: Those of us in healthcare have to take a broad view of what we mean by healthcare. Healthcare, in my view, is more than just the medical aspect of care delivery. It is more than treating illness. If we're really concerned about health, we've got to be concerned and take action with regard to those things that affect health.
Gun violence, in my view, is a public health issue. If you live in a community with lots of gun violence, it directly affects families and children. If you are the victim of gun violence, you end up in our emergency departments, you end up in our health centers. If you have a family member affected by gun violence, it affects the whole family. I [recently] held a meeting with [several families whose] kids had been killed by guns. If you sit and you listen to the families affected, their whole health is affected by this.
We have to take a broader definition of what we mean by health. If we're concerned about it, we've got to deal with those things that affect health overall, and gun violence is one. It broadens our perspective. We are much more than an organization that just treats you after you get injured, or hurt, or after you get shot with a gun and you end up in the emergency department, or in the morgue. It gets us to talk about things that cause ill health and that's a very positive thing.
HL: What have you and your organization experienced when it comes to gun violence?
Dowling: We've had more children so far this year come to our Children's Hospital with gunshot wounds and injuries than any time in history. We see the results of gun violence; we see the physical results, the family results, and the behavioral health results of it.
We live in the community. I've had employees killed recently. I've had an employee shot multiple times in the head by her former boyfriend.
We see this every day. And our employees, many of them, live in those communities that have a high incidence of gun violence. We are intimately involved. And it's just not good enough to say "I will treat you after you're shot." We also have that obligation to try to do everything we can to educate people and advocate for those things that help prevent that inevitability.
For example, I created a Center for Gun Violence Prevention. The person who is heading it for me is Chethan Sathya, MD. He is a former pediatric trauma surgeon. He has had to take bullets out of six-month-old babies. He had a 14-year-old come to him recently, who was [injured by] a drive-by shooting. He did surgery on her neck. She's 14 years old, just walking down the street; she is now paralyzed from the neck down.
This is the reason four years ago I went public and declared all healthcare leaders across the United States should be unbelievably involved in this, to be actively involved, and treat it as a public health issue.
We live in the community, we work with the community, we're in those communities that have a high incidence of gun violence, and we see the results in our hospitals.
HL: How do you address gun violence prevention as part of the Center for Gun Violence Prevention?
Dowling: We hold an annual forum on gun violence. We've held three of them now over the last three years. Of course, the one held during COVID was virtual.
We invite to those meetings a lot of the organizations that have been involved around the country on gun violence. We bring together advocates, people out there doing work on survivorship and gun violence.
It's a forum [where] we can get different perspectives, bring people together to exchange views, share information, figure out how to broaden and strengthen the coalition of people that want to work on this. They've been very successful. We get up to 1,000 people sign up at these meetings. We're going to be holding another one this year.
We plan to continue our advocacy and continue to work on educating people as much as we possibly can. It's all about trying to enhance safety and prevention. We are not tackling the issue of the right to own a gun or the Second Amendment, we're mostly focused on safety and prevention.
HL: How can healthcare executives address gun violence prevention while avoiding the political side of the issue? Can you give examples?
Dowling: Focus on prevention and educate people about the epidemic of gun violence; you educate people about the circumstance.
I don't know if people realize, for example, that guns are the leading cause of death among children and teenagers. It is ahead of car accidents, and more kids die of gun violence than cancer. [People don't realize it] so you do that education. Then you educate people about if they have a gun, how to make sure you keep it locked up at home.
I think every healthcare organization, especially large healthcare organizations, should create a center on gun violence prevention. What we do is, [when a] person comes to the emergency department, we ask questions about gun safety and about their interaction with guns; just like we ask questions about nutrition, and about substance abuse. And people do open up and talk about them, and people will indicate that they've had severe issues related to this, and some people need to be referred for service. We were one of the first in the country to get an NIH grant to do this.
We do a lot of education amongst our employees. We educate thousands of employees every week on what to do if there is an active shooter incident at our facility.
We have an educational program called Stop the Bleed. If there is a shooting and you are in that vicinity and somebody is bleeding out, how do you put on a tourniquet? What do you do in those circumstances? How can you assist?
The other thing we're doing, which I never thought that we would have to do, but it shows the environment that we're in, we are now putting weapon detection technology in each of our facilities. So, when you walk in, you walk through a screening device that will indicate whether you have a gun or a knife in your possession. You should not be able to walk into a healthcare facility carrying a gun.
The education also extends to how visitors behave and how the staff behaves, because you hear all the time, not only in hospitals now, about bad behavior in restaurants, bad behavior in the airports, and now the airlines. We're losing something here; the degree of civility, and decency, and dignity, and how we relate to one another. We've got to work together and we've got to respect one another, and so we provide a lot of education around that.
We work very closely with a lot of the local community-based organizations (CBOs) on gun violence issues; we have very close relationships with them. One of the local CBOs in an underserved community near us that has violence stats needed us to train them on things like Stop the Bleed. They also needed a vehicle to act as an ambulance, and we gave them one. We work with CBOs in a very deliberate way and I'm out in those communities a lot.
We have a community obligation. We are major influences of the community; every CEO of a healthcare organization is. We are out there doing things around food insecurity, how we handle diabetes, how we handle childhood asthma. We've also got to be out there dealing with the debilitating effects of gun violence. It is our responsibility. It is what we should be doing. We should not shy away from it. I've been criticized for why I am involved in this; I'm involved in this because my view is it is definitively a health issue.
We have to look forward and create a better future. That's what leadership is about, creating a better future. That future is one with zero gun violence. It's a future where people don't have to fear walking down the street. It's a future where we build that sense of community, where there is trust and reliance on one another without having to armor ourselves to exist.
Listen to and read about six women executives who are making a difference in healthcare leadership.
Every month, HealthLeaders sits down with notable and inspiring women who serve in the C-suite of hospitals and health systems and releases those interviews on the HealthLeaders Podcast.
Topics include health equity and diversity, equity, and inclusion, succession planning, healthcare worker well-being, physician-owned models, authentic leadership, and leading a resilient workforce.
Here are the first six HealthLeaders Podcast episodes from this year, that highlight women leaders who spoke about their areas of expertise and shared leadership advice for other women who are aspiring healthcare leaders.
Alisahah Jackson, MD, serves as the first system vice president of population health innovation and policy for CommonSpirit Health, which she assumed in June 2020. Her role is to help the Chicago-based health system develop strategies to care for their vulnerable populations as well as develop health equity and innovative care delivery models.
In this podcast episode, Jackson shares the population health initiatives she's led at CommonSpirit during the ongoing COVID-19 pandemic, why it's important for healthcare organizations to focus on population health, as well as offers a look into her leadership background and style, and advice for future leaders.
Marna Borgstrom, MPH, is the retired previous CEO of Yale New Haven Health. During her more than 40-year tenure with the health system, she worked in various positions, starting as an administrative fellow at Yale New Haven Hospital in 1979. Since then, she's climbed the ranks and served as CEO of Connecticut's largest healthcare system.
Prior to her retirement in March, Borgstrom went on the podcast to speak about her upcoming retirement, her organization's focus on succession planning and DEI efforts, and looks back on her healthcare career journey.
Tanya Blackmon, MSW, MBA previously served as executive vice president and chief diversity, inclusion, and equity officer for Novant Health. She currently serves as president and founder of Auspen Consulting. Her career journey started in social work, then she joined Novant Health in 1992. Through her past experience as a social worker and experience as a leader in a variety of roles for the health system over the past two decades, she has made great strides in her mission and life's purpose of adding value to the lives of the people that she serves.
While she worked at Novant Health, Blackmon shared the health system's initiatives she leads around DEI, health equity, and healthcare worker well-being. She also offered leadership advice for current healthcare leaders around DEI and health equity, and advice for future leaders.
Kim Mikes, MBA, BSN, RN, CNOR serves as CEO of Hoag Orthopedic Institute, an orthopedic specialty hospital in Irvine, California, with a deep focus on orthopedic and spine patients. Prior to advancing into her role in 2021 to become the third consecutive woman to lead the organization, Mikes served as COO and CNO for the organization beginning in 2016. Mikes' career journey has gone full circle, as she started in the operating room as a nurse for spine and orthopedic procedures.
In this podcast episode, Mikes shares the history of HOI, the benefits of physician-owned models, how her background has helped her become a fluid leader, and advice for future leaders.
On January 1, Lisa Shannon, the former COO and president of Allina Health, took the helm and became CEO of the nonprofit health system. Shannon succeeded Penny Wheeler, MD, who retired and took a position on the board of directors. Prior to retiring, Wheeler and Shannon worked closely to ensure a smooth leadership transition for the workforce, the consumers, and the communities the system serves in Minnesota and western Wisconsin.
In this podcast episode, Shannon shares what goals she hopes to achieve in her first year as CEO, leadership transitions for the health system, and the importance of authentic leadership.
Genemarie McGee RN, BSN, MS, a registered nurse who serves as corporate vice president and chief nursing officer for Sentara Healthcare, oversees more than 8,000 nurses in the system, along with the coordination of nursing care across the health system. She has held numerous leadership positions for Sentara, including vice president and nurse executive for Sentara Leigh Hospital, and director of Sentara Norfolk General's emergency department and Level I trauma center, Nightingale Regional Air Ambulance, and the ambulatory care clinics.
In this podcast episode, McGee shared insights into her leadership background, discussed how she's helping address nursing burnout and inspire resiliency at Sentara, and offered advice for future leaders.
The El Paso health system announced new CEOs for the Sierra Campus and Memorial Campus.
The Hospitals of Providence, a regional health system in El Paso, Texas, which operates under Tenet Healthcare, recently announced two key leadership promotions for two of its campuses in the city.
The promotions, the health system said, are part of its strategy to expand access to care through east, west, and central El Paso to southern New Mexico and west Texas.
Erik Cazares, who recently served as COO for the East Campus and served as Group COO for The Hospitals of Providence, has been promoted to serve as CEO of the Sierra Campus.
Cazares, who joined the health system in 2001, has over two decades of experience in healthcare and has served in numerous leadership roles, including serving as CNO for the Sierra Campus from 2015 to 2018.
As COO and Group COO, he led the implementation of multiple new service lines at East Campus, as well as expansion projects, including the acquisition and opening of the health system's Edgemere Emergency Room, on Edgemere Boulevard.
Rob Anderson, who recently served as CEO for the Sierra Campus, was promoted to serve as CEO for the Memorial Campus and Providence Children's Hospital.
Anderson joined the health system in 2011, and has served in multiple leadership roles, including Administrator for Providence Children's Hospital and market chief strategy officer for the network. He also served as
When he served as CEO of the Sierra Campus, he was a key in building high acute service lines in cardiac, neurosciences, and orthopedics at the campus. He also developed El Paso's first structural heart program, as well as led growth efforts including the acquisition and development of Specialty Campus.
Additional leadership changes include, Nicholas Tejeda, who serves as Group CEO for The Hospitals of Providence, will also serve as CEO for the Providence Transmountain campus. The health system also noted that Tasha Hopper, who serves as CEO for the East Campus, will stay in that role.