Eric W. Dickson, M.D., president & CEO of UMass Memorial Health Care, was named the 80th Chair of the Massachusetts Health & Hospital Association on Friday. He succeeds Jody A. White, president & CEO of Lowell General Hospital and Circle Health. 
  
In his inaugural address to a virtual meeting of the MHA Board of Trustees and invited guests, Dickson said his top priorities include continued advancement of MHA’s “Caring for the Caregiver” initiative and the association’s work to address social determinants of health and other healthcare disparities among Massachusetts residents. The COVID-19 pandemic, he said, has challenged the entire healthcare community and its most valuable resource –caregivers – as never before.
  
“Our teams are true heroes. These heroes need a break and they certainly deserve their turn to be cared for by others,” Dickson said. “The pandemic also shone a bright light on the disparities our underserved populations face daily. We as a healthcare system must prioritize caring for the patients who otherwise fall through the cracks. And we need to ensure all of our healthcare organizations – particularly our safety net hospitals – are provided with the tools that they need to care for our most vulnerable patients.”
  
Dickson also spoke about the remarkable collaboration that was a hallmark of 2020 for the healthcare community.
  
“My hope for the coming year is for all of us as healthcare leaders to remember how we came together during this challenging year and helped each other in ways we hadn’t before” he said. “We were one united health system for the commonwealth – all with one singular goal – to save as many lives as possible.”
  
Both Dickson and MHA President & CEO Steve Walsh praised White for his exemplary and extended 18-month tenure as the association’s board chair, leading the association through its response to the historic public health crisis. 
  
“Even in the midst of a pandemic, Jody demonstrated incredible focus and selflessness on behalf of our healthcare system,” said Walsh. “He ensured that the choreography between acute and post-acute providers, home care agencies, state and federal regulators, insurers, and many other interests was precise and able to meet the profound challenges we all faced. Most importantly, his leadership helped keep our hospitals open and accessible to their communities.”
  
MHA's Executive Committee for 2021-2022 consists of: Chair Dr. Dickson; Chair-elect Kevin B. Churchwell, M.D., president & COO, Boston Children’s Hospital; Treasurer Christine C. Schuster, R.N., president & CEO, Emerson Hospital; Secretary Kevin Tabb, M.D., president & CEO, Beth Israel Lahey Health; Immediate Past Chair Jody White; Past Chair Most Recently Retired Mark A. Keroack, M.D., president & CEO, Baystate Health; and MHA’s Walsh.
  

President Joseph Biden discussed the pandemic during his inaugural address on Wednesday, January 20, and hours later signed a series of executive orders to transform the nation’s response to COVID-19. The following day, he signed 10 additional COVID-specific executive orders and directives, and posted the 198-page National Strategy for the COVID-19 Response and Pandemic Preparedness. That document notes that the Department of Health and Human Services will ask the Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services to consider whether current payment rates for vaccine administration are appropriate or whether a higher rate may more accurately compensate providers.
  
“Our national plan launches a full-scale wartime effort to address the supply shortages by ramping up production and protective equipment, syringes, needles, you name it,” Biden said on Thursday. “And when I say wartime, people kind of look at me like ‘wartime?’ Well, as I said last night, 400,000 Americans have died. That's more than have died in all of World War II – 400,000. This is a wartime undertaking.”
  
The president, through his executive actions on Inaugural Day, launched a “100 days mask challenge,” saying it was citizens’ “patriotic duty” to mask up. He ended the Trump Administration’s withdrawal from the World Health Organization, and created the position of Coordinator of the COVID-19 Response and Counselor to the President. 
  
On Thursday, his 10 COVID orders and directives focused on: accelerating the production of personal protective equipment; reimbursing states fully for the cost of mobilizing the National Guard and other actions to fight the pandemic; establishing a COVID-19 Pandemic Testing Board; ensuring that access to clinical trials reaches all populations; enhancing the collection and analysis of data; revising guidance to employers on workplace safety during the COVID-19 pandemic; providing guidance to states to help them reopen schools; mandating mask wearing on domestic travel (airlines, trains, buses, boats); improving the United States’ work internationally in fighting the pandemic; and creating within the Department of Health and Human Services a COVID-19 Health Equity Task Force to address how the pandemic has disproportionally affected communities of color and underserved populations. 
  
“We must set aside the politics and finally face this pandemic as one nation,” Biden said in his inaugural address.
  
In addition to the COVID-specific actions, the new president also immediately addressed other issues that affect the health of individuals. For example, he issued an order calling on federal agencies to eliminate policies that discriminate against individuals based on their gender identity and sexual orientation, and he signed a directive committing the United States to rejoin the Paris Climate Agreement.
  
“President Biden’s executive orders and directives are a welcome sign for providers in Massachusetts, as they signal the administration’s dedication to stabilizing our nation’s healthcare system and its commitment to partnering with the scientific community,” said MHA President & CEO Steve Walsh. “These orders drive home some of the core priorities for our healthcare community here in the commonwealth: addressing health inequity, mounting a unified national response to the COVID-19 crisis, and promoting public health measures like mask wearing. We look forward to working with the new administration to combat the COVID-19 pandemic and increase equitable access to high-quality, affordable care for all.”
  
To read all of the Biden Administration’s executive orders and other recent actions, visit the White House Briefing Room.
  

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Mass General Brigham has appointed Sunil “Sunny” Eappen, M.D. as interim president of Brigham and Women’s Hospital, effective March 1. Eappen currently serves as Senior Vice President of Medical Affairs and Chief Medical Officer at Brigham and Women’s. He replaces Betsy Nabel, M.D., who recently announced her resignation. Prior to joining the Brigham in 2018, Eappen served as CMO and Chief of Anesthesiology at Mass Eye and Ear. He earned his bachelor’s degree in mathematics and computer science from the University of Illinois at Urbana- Champaign, his M.D. from the University of Chicago’s Pritzker School of Medicine, and an MBA from the Yale University School of Management. He completed his residency in anesthesiology at Brigham and Women’s Hospital.

Micky Tripathi, well known in Massachusetts as the CEO of the Massachusetts eHealth Collaborative from 2005 until it ceased operations last year, is the new National Coordinator for Health Information Technology in the Biden Administration. In his important new role, he'll help coordinate nationwide efforts to implement advanced health information technology and the secure electronic exchange of health information. Tripathi has an AB in political science from Vassar, an MPP in quantitative methods from Harvard’s Kennedy School, and a PhD in political science from the Massachusetts Institute of Technology.

Gregory P. Toot, CEO of Vibra Hospital of Western Massachusetts – Central Campus, will be leaving his post at the end of January as he moves to Pennsylvania.

CMS’ Final Price Transparency Rule—Is Your Hospital Ready?

Tuesday, February 9; 1 – 3 p.m. ET; Virtual Webcast 

The new price transparency rule became effective on January 1, 2021. This virtual webcast will review hospitals' obligations for posting standard charges in a machine-readable format and for posting 300 "shoppable services" in a consumer-friendly format. Learn from experts on the continuing questions, new CMS transparency website, legalities, compliance concerns, and how to remain prepared for the new transparency rule. Register here.