06.12.2017

Walsh to Lead MHA Board, and More from Annual Meeting

Boston Medical Center President & CEO Kate Walsh to Chair MHA

Kate E. Walsh, president & CEO of Boston Medical Center, is the 77th Chair of the Massachusetts Health and Hospital Association Board of Trustees. She succeeds Keith Hovan, president & CEO of Southcoast Health in New Bedford.

In her inaugural address, Walsh discussed the chaos and disruption that have buffeted healthcare organizations in recent years, and noted Massachusetts healthcare leaders’ commitment to providing the best possible care in the communities they serve.

“We sometimes have differences, but what divides us are details not values," Walsh said. “Every day we have the chance to make a difference to patients and families – often on their toughest days. In the jobs we do, we have the chance to ask our patients not just ‘What’s the matter with you?’ but ‘What matters to you?’” 

Walsh and Hovan also surprised retiring MHA President & CEO Lynn Nicholas, FACHE, with this MHA-created video featuring messages of congratulations and appreciation from healthcare leaders, Governor Baker, and other political and business leaders from across the state and the country.

At Thursday’s annual meeting, MHA's board leadership team was announced for 2017-2018:

The officers are:

Chair: Kate E. Walsh, president & CEO, Boston Medical Center

Chair-elect: Mark A. Keroack, M.D., president & CEO, Baystate Health

Treasurer: Bruce S. Auerbach, M.D., president & CEO, Sturdy Memorial  Hospital

Secretary: Joseph A. White, FACHE; president & CEO, Lowell General Hospital and CEO, Circle Health

Immediate Past Chair: Keith A. Hovan; president & CEO, Southcoast Health

Past Chair Most Recently Retired: David E. Phelps, president & CEO, Berkshire Health Systems

MHA’s board members are:

Maureen Banks, FACHE, R.N.; president, Spaulding Hospital for Continuing Medical Care Cambridge & Spaulding Rehabilitation Hospital Cape Cod and COO, Partners Continuing Care & Spaulding Rehabilitation Network;  Kevin B. Churchwell, M.D., E.V.P., Health Affairs & COO, Boston Children’s Hospital;  Philip M. Cormier; CEO, Beverly Hospital and Northeast Health System;  Eric W. Dickson, M.D., president & CEO, UMass Memorial Health Care;  Ruth Ellen Fitch, Esq.; Trustee, Boston Medical Center;  Andrew S. Freed; Corporator, Strategic Planning Committee member, Hallmark Health System and president, Virtual, Inc.; Joanne Fucile, R.N., president-elect, Organization of Nurse Leaders and VP, Hospital Operations & Dir., Nursing, Spaulding Hospital for Continuing Medical Care Cambridge;  Howard R. Grant, J.D., M.D., president & CEO, Lahey Health System;  Gene E. Green, M.D., president & CEO, South Shore Health System;  Michael L. Gustafson, M.D., president, Brigham and Women’s Faulkner Hospital;  Trish L. Hannon, FACHE; president & CEO, New England Baptist Hospital; Kim Hollon, FACHE; president & CEO, Signature Healthcare Brockton Hospital ;  Edward J. Kelly; president & CEO, Milford Regional Medical Center;  Joanne Marqusee; president & CEO, Cooley Dickinson Health;  Christine C. Schuster, R.N., president & CEO, Emerson Hospital;  Michael J. Sheehy, M.D.; chief of population health & analytics, Reliant Medical Group;  Kevin Tabb, M.D.; CEO, Beth Israel Deaconess Medical Center;  David F. Torchiana, M.D.; president & CEO, Partners HealthCare System;  Trissa Torres, M.D., chief operations & North America programs officer, Institute for Healthcare Improvement;  Michael Wagner, M.D., president & CEO, Tufts Medical Center;  Deborah K. Weymouth, FACHE; president & CEO, HealthAlliance Hospitals;  Michael J. Widmer; retired – past president, Massachusetts Taxpayers Foundation;  Louis J. Woolf; president & CEO, Hebrew SeniorLife.

Storto Receives Prestigious Lane Award

David Storto, president of Partners Continuing Care and Spaulding Rehabilitation Network, has been awarded the prestigious 2017 William L. Lane Hospital Advocate Award from MHA.  Each year at the association’s annual meeting, MHA publicly acknowledges one senior hospital or health system executive who exemplifies exceptional leadership and the characteristics to which all healthcare provider leaders aspire.

The nominees this year were Storto; Win Brown, the CEO of Heywood Healthcarre; and Ed Moore, the CEO of Harrington Health System.

Since 1998, Storto has created and developed Partners Continuing Care as a unique, fully integrated and cohesive post-acute care services division of Partners HealthCare. The system manages access and care across the continuum of inpatient rehabilitation, long-term acute care, skilled nursing, outpatient rehabilitation and homecare under a single management and governance system.

In his nomination submission for Storto, Partners Continuing Care Board Chair Scott Schoen said, “I have marveled at David’s ability to have the vision to steadfastly focus on large scale strategic projects while never losing sight of the personal connections that make this work so meaningful. At the same time no matter the scale of issues faced, David never allows any of us to lose sight of the human connections necessary to do this work, whether personally advocating for persons with disabilities to have greater inclusion opportunities or a sharp focus on the patient quality metrics such as safety and environment of care.”

The William L. Lane Hospital Advocate Award was created to embody the spirit of William Lane, who led Holy Family Hospital in Methuen for many years. The award recognizes professional excellence, outstanding achievements, innovative accomplishments, extraordinary compassion in caring for patients, success in overcoming barriers, and exemplary contributions to effective advocacy on behalf of hospitals, patients, and the healthcare system.

An Outstanding Trustee from Lowell

Since 2005, in recognition of the importance of hospital trustees, MHA has presented the Trustee Excellence in Leadership Award to honor significant contributions by a trustee leader whose professional achievements have been of exceptional value to healthcare.  Nominations are made by any MHA member hospital or health system.

This year’s recipient is Margaret (Peggy) Palm, trustee and former board chair of Lowell General Hospital. The nominees this year were Palm; Jennifer Pline, the first female board chair of Beth Israel Deaconess Hospital--Needham and a member of BID Medical Center's Board of Directors; and Dr. Mitchell Rabkin, president & CEO of Beth Israel Hospital for 30 years and a member of the BID-Milton board. 

Palm has an extensive background in healthcare administration, particularly her work in the field of elder care, where her experience spans more than 30 years. As a long standing member of the Lowell General Hospital and Circle Health governing board, she helped steer the hospital through a time of incredible growth and transformation, and played a vital role in the transformation of healthcare in Lowell from a two-hospital city to single unified health system. In 2010, she was nominated as Board Chair, becoming the second woman to serve as chair for Lowell General Hospital in the organization’s history.

She was passionately focused on ensuring that both Lowell General Hospital and Saints Medical Center retained local control. She understood the important role that the sustainability of both hospital campus locations meant to the ability to expand healthcare to the entire community, especially to those most in need.

Her tenure as chair also saw the completions of a $95 million, 200,000 square foot expansion at Lowell General Hospital. Palm recently announced her plans to retire from the board after almost 30 years of active participation.

Lautzenheiser Delivers Hegarty Lecture

At Friday’s Stephen J. Hegarty Memorial Lecture, Will Lautzenheiser, a quadruple amputee who lost his limbs following an aggressive and sudden case of streptococcus infection in 2011 that led to necrotizing fasciitis, delivered the Stephen J. Hegarty Memorial Lecture. He spoke with seriousness and humor about what worked and didn't throughout his caregiving experiences -- from the relationships he formed with clinical staff, to how sudden transitions between care settings could be destabilizing, to even how hospital food can affect recovery.

"I came to rely on these [caregivers] not just as my friends but as people who allowed me to maintain my sanity and to see the the humor and absurdity of what had happened to me," Lautzenheiser said.

Lautzenheiser fell ill out of state, and came back to Boston for treatment at Boston Medical Center and Spaulding Rehabilitation Hospital. He received a double arm transplant at Brigham and Women's Hospital.

Congratulations ACHE Award Winners!

ACHE of Massachusetts – an independent chapter of the American College of Healthcare Executives – presented two awards at MHA’s Annual Meeting.

This year the Senior-Level Healthcare Executive Regent’s Award was presented to Patrick Muldoon, FACHE, president, UMass Memorial Medical Center.  The Early Career Healthcare Executive Award went to Ann-Marie Panebianco.

Richard Corder, FACHE, presented the awards. He is the American College of Healthcare Executives’ Regent for Massachusetts and a partner with Wellesley Partners, Ltd.

Educating Residents and Fellows About Opioids

MHA, DPH and the Massachusetts Medical Society last week issued a letter to the heads of all residency programs – or Designated Institutional Officials (DIOs) – asking them to ensure that core competencies related to the use and prescribing of opioids are incorporated into the graduate medical education and training of residents and fellows.

MHA’s Substance Use Disorder Prevention and Treatment Task Force (SUDPTTF) had previously issued guidelines for opioid management within hospitals. Recommendation #7 of those guidelines stressed that hospitals should work with appropriate residency and fellowship programs to adopt a three-part core opioid prescribing competency requirements to train prescribers. All MHA member acute care hospitals signed a commitment letter to implement the guidelines.

While the core competencies continue to be integrated into undergraduate medical education, the recent letter from MHA, DPH, and MMS stresses to hospitals and educators how critical it is that medical residency programs also incorporate opioid competency requirements.  To assist with this process, MMS has put together a compilation of free and readily accessible education modules, which have been selected to assist DIOs in integrating the competencies into their respective programs.

Transition

Kevin Coughlin has been named president and CEO of Beth Israel Deaconess Hospital-Plymouth, effective June 12.  Coughlin, who joined BID-Plymouth in 2014 as SVP of system development, has served as interim president and CEO since October 2016 when the previous CEO Peter Holden resigned.

John LoDico, Editor