/ en Tue, 29 Apr 2025 02:19:27 -0500 Mon, 04 Jan 21 13:16:50 -0600 /videos/2021-01-04-video-meeting-2021-aha-chair-rod-hochman-md <p></p> Mon, 04 Jan 2021 13:16:50 -0600 AHA Board Profiles /news/insights-and-analysis/2019-06-26-white-plains-hospital-center-ceo-fox-keeps-focus-patients <p>AHA board member Susan Fox, president and CEO of White Plains (N.Y.) Hospital, a member of Montefiore Health System, says her background as a pediatric nurse in the intensive care unit has shaped her career. </p> <p>Fox began her health care career as a pediatric ICU nurse at New York-Presbyterian Hospital before earning a master’s degree in business and health care administration, followed by 10 years at Ernst & Young in its health care consulting practice. She then went to work for one of her clients, Long Island Jewish Health System, which was on the verge of merging with another large tertiary care institution, now Northwell Health. Fox spent more than a dozen years at the health system, where she oversaw the creation and expansion of the physician and ambulatory network, aligning physicians with the network from both a clinical and business perspective as senior vice president of clinical services and faculty practice. </p> <p>Somewhere along the way, and in the midst of unprecedented change in the industry, Fox realized she wanted a leadership position as a hospital CEO. “I wanted to see how an organization could transform,” she says. She was made aware of an opportunity at White Plains Hospital, the community hospital where she lived and where the CEO was thinking about succession planning. “He had been there for 35 years and needed a partner,” Fox said. ”He was looking for someone who could help him think about the future strategy of the hospital and work with physicians differently.” </p> <p>After a few years of working closely together, Fox took over as president and CEO of White Plains Hospital. “I’ve been very fortunate to have had the clinical and business experience through each of my roles — and then take all of that and apply it to improving the health of a community,” she said. </p> <p>As a leader, Fox underscores the importance of open communications. “Leadership means a lot of things, but at its most basic level, it means keeping your door open and having the ability to converse with everyone from doctors to housekeepers to valets,” Fox said. “I always try to convey that every employee is important and that I’m listening. They each have a key role in the patient experience, and they can help inform me on what’s working and what isn’t and offer new ideas.” </p> <p>Fox has stayed grounded in her nursing roots, always looking to improve the patient experience by motivating and equipping staff with the resources they need to succeed. A critical factor for her: the workplace culture. “It was important to me in leading my own organization to focus on how culture enables an organizations success,” Fox said. “A culture of working together, teamwork, purpose, focus and respect makes all the difference.” </p> <h2>Redefining the community hospital to serve more patients where they are</h2> <p>Prior to being named CEO in 2015, Fox was instrumental in the process of selecting the system partner for White Plains Hospital — one that would enable the hospital to realize its full potential as a regional leader in advanced care. White Plains Hospital partnered with the Montefiore Health System, becoming the tertiary hub in their network and bringing highly specialized, advanced programs to Westchester and the Hudson Valley. </p> <p>Since her arrival in 2010, the hospital has undergone the most significant facility renovation and expansion in its 126-year history, including a new lobby, patient tower, operating suites and cancer center, and recently broke ground on an outpatient pavilion. During the growth, the employee commitment to providing an optimal patient experience “regardless of whether you work at the bedside or in the kitchen has been paramount,” Fox says.  </p> <p>Under Fox’s watch, the hospital also twice earned Magnet designation by the American Nurses Credentialing Center. </p> <p>“As a tertiary hub in a major health system, we’ve been following a plan that redefines us and what we need to be in the future,” she says. In addition to bringing higher-level services closer to home, this includes “providing new services in the community, creating a strong ambulatory strategy, and partnering with local physicians and other organizations, such as schools and churches, to promote good health,” Fox said. As CEO, she has prioritized the growing focus on preventive care, upstream interventions and keeping people healthy. </p> <p>Fox serves as chair of AHA’s Regional Policy Board 2. In January, she joined the AHA Board of Trustees, where she hopes to keep the patient at the forefront, a focus rooted in her nursing days. </p> <p>In a framed photograph in her office, she holds in her arms a baby girl, Gladys, who was born with HIV during the 1980s rise of the AIDS epidemic. </p> <p>“The privilege of caring for patients is something you don’t forget,” Fox says. “You realize how much of a difference you can make. The courage you get from wanting so strongly to help your patients — that has carried me and kept me moving forward.”<br />  </p> Wed, 26 Jun 2019 09:07:48 -0500 AHA Board Profiles /news/insights-and-analysis/2019-06-19-baylor-scott-white-hillcrests-robinson-leads-patient-safety <p>As a former news anchor in Mobile, Ala., Glenn Robinson used to tell hospitals’ stories. Now he’s part of creating them. </p> <p>After he reported in the 1980s on patient care efforts at USA Medical Center (now USA Health University Hospital), executives at the safety-net hospital asked Robinson to join their board. The experience later led him to take a marketing position at the hospital. Some three decades (and various roles) later, Robinson is now president of Baylor Scott & White Medical Center — Hillcrest in Waco, Texas, where he says he is honored to lead an organization focused on doing “sacred work.”</p> <p>According to Robinson, sacred work is “about finding within our own hearts, each day, ways in which to make a difference in the lives of our patients, our patients’ families and our visitors.”</p> <p>For example, Robinson encourages staff to escort patients and visitors directly to their destinations when they request directions, and to extend to them other small, empathetic gestures when possible. There’s the emergency department nurse who bought a flower for an elderly patient who was separated from her family on Mother’s Day, and the pre-surgical nurse who gave her patient a written note of encouragement before the patient’s operation, for instance. This kind of compassion can go a long way, Robinson said.</p> <p>A culture that empowers staff is crucial when hospitals are challenged to provide cost-effective care with limited resources, he said. For example, many of the organization’s best ideas — such as its waste-reduction initiatives, its patient- and work-safety efforts and its cost-reduction programs — have come from staff who feel empowered to speak up during the organization’s daily huddles. </p> <p>Over four years, the hospital has implemented more than 1,200 ideas that were generated from the huddles.</p> <p>“That's a real, key part of our culture, to which our team is deeply committed, and is really how we roll here every day,” Robinson said.</p> <p>Robinson joined the AHA Board of Trustees in January. In addition to his leadership focus on culture and affordability, Robinson brings his experience in leading the hospital’s Zero Harm patient-safety initiative. </p> <p>He said he is particularly pleased to contribute to the board of an organization that is at the forefront of improving maternal health and outcomes. “I am so proud of our AHA leadership that identified these initiatives,” he said. </p> Wed, 19 Jun 2019 09:06:11 -0500 AHA Board Profiles /news/insights-and-analysis/2019-06-13-alaska-state-hospital-nursing-home-associations-hultberg <p>Before Becky Hultberg was president and CEO of the Alaska State Hospital & Nursing Home Association, she helped the state dramatically reduce its unfunded retiree health care debt as commissioner of the Alaska Department of Administration. </p> <p>Hultberg said the pension world is having “a very similar conversation to the one we're now having in the health care world — How do we keep the promises we've made, and ensure that we're not burdening future generations?”</p> <p>At ASHNHA, Hultberg has worked with the state’s hospitals to significantly reduce sepsis mortality, improve behavioral health and address the unique challenges of rural hospitals. </p> <p>“Rural hospitals are very connected to their communities; they're very connected to individual patients; they manage chronic disease really well,” she said. “They ensure access to the appropriate level of care. But the financial model right now doesn't always reward the value they bring in managing the health of their communities.”</p> <p>Hultberg said partnerships are crucial for small, independent and rural hospitals, who face dire financial challenges. </p> <p>“Those may be partnerships with other hospitals, partnerships with their association, or partnerships with other providers in their community,” she said. “But as resources become more constrained, partnerships are going to be important to all of us to ensure that we can continue to deliver the services we deliver today."</p> <p>Hultberg joined the AHA Board of Trustees in January. She brings that rural focus to the AHA board and welcomes AHA’s leadership in advocating for these organizations.  </p> <p>“I appreciate AHA's focus on the challenges of rural health care,” Hultberg said. “It's a willingness to look at new solutions to the problem of access to care in rural America.”</p> Thu, 13 Jun 2019 10:19:20 -0500 AHA Board Profiles /news/insights-and-analysis/2019-06-12-alameda-health-system-ceo-finley-strives-improve-population <p>As a chemistry student at Emory University, AHA board member Delvecchio Finley worked part time at Piedmont Hospital in Atlanta in a range of areas — from parking deck security to medical records to admitting patients to the emergency department as a registrar to having a clinical role in a cardiovascular intensive care unit. </p> <p>“I got to see a lot of different perspectives in health care delivery and administration, as well as the operations of a complex facility providing services to patients,” Finley said. “It was a really great experience, and it reinforced that I wanted to be in health care.” </p> <p>Today, he leads Alameda (Calif.) Health System as it works to improve population health and expand services into the community to address the crucial importance of prevention and upstream interventions. He also joined the AHA Board of Trustees this year. </p> <p>“The AHA is devoted to advancing health in our communities, and not just health <em>care</em>,” Finley said. “That really resonates with me — that we’re not seeking to simply advocate for the sustainability of health care enterprises in and of themselves, but we’re doing it as a conduit for making sure we are there to support the establishment and maintenance of health in our community.” </p> <p>To better coordinate care and ensure more seamless experiences for patients, Finley said Alameda is implementing a system-wide electronic health record system, modernizing its records system to better integrate and coordinate care, partnering with community stakeholders to address the community’s health care needs, and aligning physicians “in ways that allow us to be more systematic in our approach to the care that we offer.” </p> <p>As hospitals and health systems strive to transform health care delivery to meet the changing needs of patients, many struggle to keep their doors open to the community and help patients afford the cost of care, Finley said. </p> <p>During his three-year term on the AHA board, he hopes to make health care affordability and accessibility his priorities, as well as working with communities to eliminate health care disparities by addressing the social determinants of health. He also appreciates the opportunity to learn from other board members.</p> <p>“To be able to have that information exchange and knowledge transfer with other board members, and then bring it back to your own community and really accelerate your efforts, that’s been wonderful,” Finley said.<br />  </p> Wed, 12 Jun 2019 09:24:56 -0500 AHA Board Profiles /news/insights-and-analysis/2019-05-08-sheppard-pratt-ceo-trivedi-hopes-help-hospitals-address <p>Harsh Trivedi, a physician who serves as president and CEO of Sheppard Pratt Health System, has long sought to help improve health in his community. </p> <p>Driven by a desire to “fundamentally impact people’s lives,” Trivedi gravitated toward classes on population health early in his advanced medical training. He wanted to have an impact not just on the patient in his office, but to improve the health and well-being of his entire community. He chose to specialize in child psychiatry as this was the field of medicine with the greatest shortage of physicians. </p> <p>“Making even a small difference in a child’s life can lead to a completely different trajectory for that individual over the course of a lifetime,” Trivedi said. “Our ability to impact social determinants of health can similarly change the trajectory of an entire community's health and well-being.” </p> <p>At Sheppard Pratt, an organization with more than 350 sites of service and thousands of employees, he’s focused on making health care more reliable and effective.</p> <p>“We are a health system that has integrated deeply into the community, well beyond the walls of our hospitals,” Trivedi said. “We are advancing behavioral health, delivering innovative programs, and helping people live, work and thrive.” </p> <p>Trivedi sees his role on the AHA board as a continuation of that service, an opportunity to help hospitals and health systems navigate the opioid crisis, the nation’s rising suicide rate and numerous other behavioral health challenges facing the field.</p> <p>“My hope, and my goal over my time on the AHA board, is to help hospitals across the country think about the right solutions for their communities in addressing the very real challenges that exist regarding behavioral health,” he said.</p> <p>Because the solutions to these issues vary based on a community’s specific needs, there is no one-size-fits-all solution, Trivedi said. </p> <p>“We can help member hospitals understand the needs in their communities, and then empower them to bring about the specific solutions for their communities,” he said.</p> <p>The AHA’s resources already go a long way, he said.</p> <p>“Advancing behavioral health involves a complex set of solutions,” Trivedi said. “The AHA can create a toolbox to assess what your community needs. It can create a change package to move the needle on issues your community is facing, and it can advocate for policy changes at the federal level to empower change.”<br />  </p> Wed, 08 May 2019 09:28:51 -0500 AHA Board Profiles /news/insights-and-analysis/2019-05-02-intermountain-healthcares-poulsen-decades-long-path-foster <p>Greg Poulsen once wanted to be a biophysicist. But after completing his undergraduate degree and attending business school, he realized his real passion was improving health care value. </p> <p>“I felt strongly that the cost of health care was putting our country at a disadvantage,” he said. </p> <p>Poulsen found plenty of opportunity to put the analytical and mathematical strengths that helped him succeed in biophysics toward his health care career.</p> <p>Fresh out of business school in 1982, Poulsen joined Salt Lake City-based Intermountain Healthcare and its then 25-person leadership team to affect health care value as a strategic analyst. Determined to move Intermountain to a different payment mechanism, Poulsen helped put in motion the organization’s health plan, SelectHealth, during the first few years of his tenure. The plan ultimately empowered Intermountain’s caregivers to move toward value-based payment and is now the largest insurance plan in Intermountain’s service area, Poulsen said.</p> <p>“Whenever you’re caring for people for whom you’ve received a flat payment, there are far more levers to pull in terms of keeping them healthy in an efficient and effective way,” he said. “SelectHealth has been very, very motivational in helping us to think about health care from a total value perspective.” </p> <p>Poulsen, now senior vice president, policy, continues to help Intermountain improve value and is excited for his service on the AHA board, where he will help the field tackle these issues. </p> <p>“There are other things that excite me – the enhancement of key quality issues, the ability to maintain access to high-quality care in rural communities – but number one would be value,” he said. </p> <p>To succeed in advancing value, the field must hold itself accountable “for the totality of both quality and cost for the people we care for,” Poulsen said. “Our responsibility extends to making things affordable as well as ensuring superb quality.”</p> <p>Thirty-six years after making the switch to health care, Poulsen says he is honored to  have “grown up” with Intermountain and has found fulfillment in helping to “align the hearts and minds” of its staff around a common vision.</p> <p>“That’s something I’m proud of our organization for doing, and that I’m happy to have been a part of,” he said.</p> Thu, 02 May 2019 09:28:20 -0500 AHA Board Profiles /news/insights-and-analysis/2019-04-03-yale-new-haven-health-ceo-borgstrom-strives-provide <p>As a child, AHA board member Marna Borgstrom, CEO of Yale New Haven Health and Yale New Haven Hospital in Connecticut, went on house calls with her father, a community-based physician, and her siblings, both of whom now work in health care. </p> <p>“There’s a long commitment in my family to health care and to being part of communities and community service,” Borgstrom said. “And the work we do in health care leadership sort of combines the two.” </p> <p>Borgstrom brings to the AHA board more than 40 years of experience in health care – most at New Haven Hospital, where she began working in 1979. She joined the AHA Board of Trustees this year and serves on many other boards, including those of the Connecticut Hospital Association and Vizient. </p> <p>In addition, she chairs the Coalition to Protect America’s Health Care, which includes a broad-based group of hospitals, businesses and national, state and local hospital associations dedicated to educating the public about threats to hospital funding and their impact on patients and families. </p> <p>Improving the quality of care and value for patients has been Borgstrom’s top priority at Yale New Haven Health, which includes five hospitals and a physician foundation – Northeast Medical Group. Yale New Haven Hospital last year received the Foster G. McGaw Prize for Excellence in Community Service for its exceptional efforts to build programs that promote community engagement, job growth and access to quality health care.</p> <p>“For the last several years, we’ve had one strategy for our entire health care system, and that is to provide unparalleled value to the people we are privileged to serve,” said Borgstrom. </p> <p>Borgstrom hopes to bring that focus to the AHA board to help move toward a system that prioritizes value. </p> <p>“If you can’t tell yourself that the work you are doing is improving value, then why are you doing it?” Borgstrom asks. Too often in health care, she said “we don’t stop doing things we’ve always done; we just keep adding to our plate.” </p> <p>For example, Borgstrom said that, by slowing down to examine processes and outcomes and focusing on what really adds value, clinicians might experience less burnout, a problem she witnesses too often in the field. The AHA last year launched the AHA Physician Alliance, which shares a variety of tools and resources, including ones on clinician resilience, to support physician leaders in improving care for their patients and communities. </p> <p>At Yale New Haven Health, Borgstrom credits her success and the positive impact the health system has made on the community to her  colleagues. </p> <p>“The holy grail is in execution,” she said. “Everybody’s got the same strategy, but to execute well, you have to have a fabulous team of leaders who trust one another and are committed to the same health care values. I’m privileged to say I have that at Yale New Haven Health.”</p> <p>Borgstrom also is excited to serve on the AHA board with likeminded individuals who share her values. </p> <p>“I like being part of a great team of people who do great work and who also know how to have fun,” she said. </p> Wed, 03 Apr 2019 08:43:31 -0500 AHA Board Profiles