Latest / Becker’s Healthcare Podcast / Stuart Levine, MD, FACP, President of MedStar Franklin Square Medical Center and Senior Vice President at MedStar Health

Transcript

Stuart Levine, MD, FACP, President of MedStar Franklin Square Medical Center and Senior Vice President at MedStar Health · Becker’s Healthcare Podcast

• 0:02
  The most important health care decisions don't happen
• 0:05
  in isolation.
• 0:06
  They happen when leaders come together.
• 0:08
  Becker's sixteenth annual meeting brings together more than
• 0:11
  3,500
• 0:12
  hospital and health system executives this April in
• 0:15
  Chicago.
• 0:16
  With 800 speakers from Ascension,
• 0:18
  Cleveland Clinic, CommonSpirit and more, the conversations get
• 0:22
  real. Leaders will share how their scenario planning
• 0:24
  for policy shifts, breaking through value based care
• 0:27
  barriers, and building clinical teams that translate
• 0:37
  event
• 0:38
  details,
• 0:39
  visit beckershospitalreview.com
• 0:41
  and click on the events tab in the
• 0:43
  upper right.
• 0:46
  This is Alan Condon with the Becker's Healthcare
• 0:49
  Podcast.
• 0:50
  And today, I'm thrilled to be joined by
• 0:52
  doctor Stuart Levine,
• 0:54
  president of MedStar Franklin Square Medical Center and
• 0:57
  also senior vice president of MedStar
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  Health. That's an integrated health system that includes
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  10 hospitals, I believe, across Maryland and across
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  Washington, DC.
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  Doctor Levine,
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  fantastic to have you make your debut appearance
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  in the podcast with us today.
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  For those of our listeners who might be
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  as well acquainted with yourself,
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  MedStar Health, and the fantastic work that you
• 1:18
  and your colleagues do, do you mind giving
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  us a little bit more insight into your
• 1:22
  role and your background at the health system?
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  Well, sure. So, first of all, thanks so
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  so much for having me. Thanks for inviting
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  me, and I just appreciate all the work
• 1:28
  that Becker's does, on behalf of the health
• 1:30
  care industry.
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  You're one of my go to,
• 1:34
  early morning reads, to
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  to understand what's happening, in the industry across
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  the country. So just appreciate,
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  the organization and the opportunity to speak with
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  you today.
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  So you know, you stole a little bit
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  of my thunder in your introduction. You mentioned,
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  MedStar Health and our organization. So we are,
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  the largest integrated health system in the Mid
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  Atlantic,
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  you know, touching,
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  you know, over one in five
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  folks in, in the Mid Atlantic covering Maryland,
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  DC, Northern Virginia.
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  We do have 10 hospitals, over 300 care
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  sites,
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  and, just a lot of connect points.
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  In between, over 6,000,000 outpatient visits a year,
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  37,000
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  associates. So we're a big integrated health system.
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  My little piece of it, so I am
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  the president
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  of MedStar Franklin Square Medical Center, so one
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  of our four Baltimore,
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  area hospitals. It is the largest of our
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  Maryland hospital portfolio, so I'm really proud
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  of, of that.
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  We, we're up here in Eastern Baltimore County,
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  kind of midway between sort of Baltimore and
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  the Delaware line. And so we we have
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  a very, very
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  large, service area, that that,
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  that we treat sort of bordering,
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  on the Chesapeake, the Northern Chesapeake Bay, and
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  then kind of up in Northern Baltimore County,
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  to Delaware. I'm, I'm a physician by training.
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  I'm actually the first
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  physician,
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  president of this organization, which has been around
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  for over a hundred years. So, my medical
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  staff loves that fact and, they're they're really
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  happy
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  about that. Franklin Square, we've got about 3,000
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  associates,
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  kind of a large,
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  increasingly tertiary care, a medical center in, in
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  this local community. And I know we'll we'll
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  talk more about some of our programs. I'm
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  a rheumatologist
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  by training.
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  I, was an academic rheumatologist,
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  you know, in
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  the Johns Hopkins system before coming to MedStar
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  back in 2010
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  and I've served a variety of roles at
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  MedStar since
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  joining.
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  I've been a chief medical officer of two
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  of our hospitals including Franklin Square and I've
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  been the president of two of our hospitals,
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  one in Baltimore City, MedStar Harbor Hospital. And
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  then,
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  starting about almost six years ago as the
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  pandemic was getting underway, I started,
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  as the president here at Franklin Square.
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  Fantastic. So, no, I think really important to
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  kind of the a little bit more background
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  context kind of about the makeup of your
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  health system. Obviously, your your tenure at the
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  health system as well wearing many different hats.
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  But I guess in that role that you
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  sit in now, that dual role, obviously, you're
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  president of Frankencire Medical Center and senior vice
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  president of the health system more
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  broadly.
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  No doubt there are many different paths we
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  could go down here with this question. No
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  doubt there are very ton of initiatives you
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  wanna highlight. But looking back over 2025, was
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  there one standout initiative that you led last
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  year that you're particularly proud of? And maybe
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  if you could kinda give us some insight
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  into what the the initiative was and maybe
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  some of the results.
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  Yeah. It's a it's a a great question.
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  And, you know, we we talked, obviously, in
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  the introduction and then in in, my introduction,
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  speaking about the integrated nature of our system.
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  And we have a a favorite term, in
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  our system, we call it systemness, and I
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  know that's a term that's increasingly being used
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  across the country to describe,
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  system integration,
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  as, you know, as, initially hospital systems
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  integrate
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  ambulatory
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  and value based care arrangements and the like.
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  We we were kind of an early adopter
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  of of this concept going back over twenty
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  years. And so
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  what what I've been really proud to help
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  lead,
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  over these, these last several years is
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  cross system integration of service lines. So we
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  have one of the,
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  largest medical groups, employed medical groups, in the
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  country with, over, nearly 4,500,
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  employed providers.
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  So huge, huge chasses.
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  And over these last five years, we've really
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  developed system
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  service lines cutting across our entire, not just
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  region, but entire system. So one of the
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  projects that I've been involved with based here
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  at Franklin, but leveraging
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  the, incredible talent, skill, and experience of our
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  academic partners in our system in the Washington,
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  DC area, the MedStar Washington Hospital Center, and
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  our academic anchor, MedStar Georgetown University Hospital.
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  We developed,
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  and implemented,
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  and opened,
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  and
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  in this last year, were redesignated by Joint
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  Commission as a comprehensive stroke center. We were
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  the newest, comprehensive stroke center in the state
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  of Maryland.
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  We are now one of the busiest.
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  I employ four full time neurointensivists.
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  We have grown
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  dramatically
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  over the last few years. We accepted over
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  300 inbound transfers
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  for Complex Stroke Care from all over the
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  state of Maryland, Delaware,
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  amended, the whole Mid Atlantic region.
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  And remember, you know, we were a primary
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  stroke center, when I started, in this role,
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  six years ago, and in just a three
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  and a half year period of time,
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  leveraging our system resources,
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  significant capital,
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  and human resource, and physician
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  investment,
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  and all of the support that, that comes
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  with that,
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  we were able to, within a few years,
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  move from a primary stroke center to a
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  thrombectomy capable stroke center to a comprehensive stroke
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  center. And just over the last few months,
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  we were redesignated,
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  by both the Joint Commission and the Maryland
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  Emergency Medical,
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  System,
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  which runs out the EMS, the statewide EMS
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  system.
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  So when I look
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  at
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  developing
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  these types of really tertiary and in some
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  cases even quaternary services out here in a
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  large community hospital,
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  That kind of project wouldn't be possible if
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  we weren't part of a large integrated system
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  with common electronic health records, very common,
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  revenue cycle platforms, common purchasing,
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  you know, platforms, quality and safety infrastructure,
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  all of and, of course, the the the
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  talent,
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  of the the physicians and leveraging, of course,
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  our academic partners to be able to recruit
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  world class physicians to come and practice in
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  this area. When I kind of look at
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  at all of that and I see what
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  what we're able to provide
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  to, patients,
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  with, with these advanced needs from this region,
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  it's a it's a pretty easy to walk
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  through the door every morning. It's a pretty
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  proud moment.
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  Yeah. No. I mean, fantastic to hear about
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  the the growth of the comprehensive Stokes Stokes
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  Center, that redesignation
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  to your point.
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  I wonder if you could maybe just going
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  back to your your earlier point in terms
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  of that, quote, unquote, systemness. It's it's a
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  a kind of a term that we hear
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  kind of more frequently amongst other systems, other
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  CEOs, executives, C suite leaders across the country.
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  Been a big focus at MedStar Health for
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  quite some time to your point. In terms
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  of that cross system integration
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  of service lines,
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  can you kinda walk us through maybe where
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  you stand currently there, and what's the big
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  focus going forward as you continue to leverage
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  that system as it meant to our health?
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  Yeah. So, you know, we we, came to
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  be as a system like many, integrated health
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  systems, right, by partnership and acquisition over, a
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  long period of time. And, you know, community
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  hospitals
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  have very strong traditions, very strong roots.
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  And frequently, and especially in the early days
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  of systems coming together, a lot of the,
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  a lot of those, those systems sort of
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  become,
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  you know, integrated into the system, but you
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  don't really have,
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  kind of standard operating procedures that cut across,
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  all of those entities. We've done a really,
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  really nice job at really accelerating over the
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  last, you know, five, six years
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  to,
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  to sort
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  of do a little bit more horizontal integration
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  across
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  across our our entire system. So, you mentioned
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  that in my introduction that I hold two
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  titles. Every hospital president in the system holds
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  a local title, that we are the the
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  leader, the CEO of our local entity. But
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  we also are a vice president, a senior
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  vice president of the system. And we often
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  talk about, putting on our two hats. Right?
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  So so, you know, Stu, you gotta put
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  your system hat on to think about this.
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  And so I have a stake in what's
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  happening in our Southern Maryland region and in
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  developing,
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  service lines if we're developing, ambulatory surgical centers.
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  It might be several, physicians who are affiliated
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  with several hospitals coming together,
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  in a new regional,
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  ambulatory center to, to develop,
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  that, you know, off hospital campus resource because,
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  of course, patients,
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  prefer to be in the community and to
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  have,
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  to have care closer to home and not
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  to have to navigate large hospital campuses.
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  So when we talk system is, yes, we
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  have integrated,
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  system operation structures and pharmacy and supply chain
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  and, you know, legal and compliance and all
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  of the the back you know, the the
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  office functions that that keep a system going.
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  We've got central functions,
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  with local deployment. So,
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  and and then within regions, you know, I'm
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  very close friends with the other hospital presidents
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  in this region,
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  and we meet all the time to talk
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  about how we can optimize each of our
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  campuses,
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  how we can specialize each of our campuses,
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  to really, be able to operate at scale
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  and to avoid duplication and waste, and to
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  be as efficient as we can so that
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  we can put all of those resources back
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  into,
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  capital investment and really be strategic about about
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  how we operate. So we have now functional,
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  service lines of across the the really,
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  of of everything we do. So our individual
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  hospitals don't employ physicians anymore. All of our
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  physician contracting is now through
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  one system, a medical group,
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  and that medical group then, deploys physicians to
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  all the hospitals.
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  After, I just, you know, after I I,
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  finished speaking with you, I will be meeting
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  with, all of the, the the system service
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  line leads. I have monthly meetings with my
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  chief medical officer and all of the we
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  call them pillars, but the pillars are,
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  are broadly,
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  medical specialty based in in surgical services, in
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  hospital based services, etcetera.
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  And we meet and we, have discussions about
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  strategic priorities, about staffing, about recruiting,
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  about,
• 11:52
  you know, technical all the the technical wrap
• 11:54
  around services that, new physicians or or current
• 11:57
  physicians will need to do their jobs. So
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  full and in there, I'm wearing both my
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  hats as the as the hospital president, but
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  but also thinking, you know, what is in
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  the best interest of our system and our
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  region, and then how can we work together,
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  to break down those silos, be much more
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  horizontally integrated,
• 12:13
  and,
• 12:14
  and, you know, ultimately, so we can provide
• 12:16
  the best service for our patients.
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  Yeah. No. Fascinating. I I really appreciate you
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  kinda diving a little bit deeper into what
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  that term breaking down that term for me
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  and kinda how you work with the other
• 12:25
  hospital leaders within MedStar.
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  Really fascinating to kinda hear that one bit
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  deeper.
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  So, doctor Levine,
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  the challenges facing hospital health systems are well
• 12:36
  documented.
• 12:37
  You talked about some of your key priorities,
• 12:39
  some of your growth there initially already.
• 12:41
  2026 for this year, can you kinda give
• 12:43
  me a breakdown?
• 12:45
  How is MedStar coming up, tackling, or pushing
• 12:47
  back against some of these headwinds? What are
• 12:49
  your key priorities, I guess, for this year?
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  No doubt a challenging year, arguably more challenging
• 12:55
  than we've seen in recent years given the
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  impending
• 12:58
  cuts coming down the pipeline. When you think
• 12:59
  about Medicaid, ACA subsidies still up in the
• 13:01
  air, likely not to be here. So much
• 13:04
  going on your play, but I guess kind
• 13:05
  of what are the key kind of areas
• 13:07
  that you're looking to tackle, push back against
• 13:09
  some of these challenges and headwinds? Yeah. Well,
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  you certainly mentioned, I mean, I think this
• 13:12
  is a a period of high anxiety,
• 13:15
  you know, for the health care community, and
• 13:17
  especially hospital based subsystems. Right? As as more
• 13:19
  and more care is moving into the ambulatory
• 13:22
  space as,
• 13:23
  you know, cost pressures and inflation certainly for
• 13:26
  labor and and really especially for supplies and
• 13:29
  especially sort of high cost supplies,
• 13:32
  such as, you know, chemotherapeutics
• 13:34
  and, and you know, biologic therapies and some
• 13:37
  of
• 13:38
  the more advanced technical robotic platforms and the
• 13:40
  like.
• 13:42
  Managing, you know, all of those,
• 13:44
  all of those pressures
• 13:46
  with a growing population,
• 13:48
  who is more discerning and, yes, more more
• 13:51
  demanding of
• 13:52
  a full plate of services
• 13:54
  in the setting of all of the, the
• 13:55
  headwinds that you described, I think is is
• 13:57
  our challenge. We're not certainly unique at MedStar
• 14:00
  in facing those down.
• 14:02
  You know, so that that those things are
• 14:04
  in the background. But as background. But as
• 14:05
  as our CEO,
• 14:06
  Ken Sam, it always likes to say, you
• 14:08
  know, over the last twenty years as we've
• 14:11
  moved from strategic plan to strategic plan, right,
• 14:13
  pre ACA, we had a strategic plan.
• 14:17
  We never
• 14:18
  designed our strategic plan based on sort of
• 14:20
  the the anxiety of the day. It was
• 14:23
  they're always looking forward, always really looking at
• 14:26
  what is happening in the market, what is
• 14:27
  happening with the way that that people and
• 14:30
  communities
• 14:31
  want to receive their care and and will
• 14:33
  expect
• 14:34
  to receive their care. And we develop a
• 14:36
  set of integrated strategies based on those factors.
• 14:39
  There are always gonna be headwinds regarding health
• 14:41
  care financing and,
• 14:43
  and, you know, we we had,
• 14:45
  developed strategies before Medicaid where you know, Maryland
• 14:48
  is a large Medicaid expansion state as you
• 14:50
  know, but our strategic plans predated Medicaid expansion.
• 14:54
  So we had to we had to adjust,
• 14:56
  operationally for that, but we didn't have to
• 14:58
  do any large strategic pivots.
• 15:00
  And that is true, today as we as
• 15:02
  we look at the headwinds.
• 15:04
  Our our service line model development was one
• 15:06
  of the,
• 15:07
  one of the strategies to buttress against some
• 15:10
  of these, kind of whiplash effects of of
• 15:12
  changes in health care financing.
• 15:14
  We have, we are are deeply involved in,
• 15:18
  value based care. We do have,
• 15:20
  a, Medicaid managed care organization both in the
• 15:23
  district and in,
• 15:24
  in the state of Maryland.
• 15:26
  And so we're we're, very familiar and savvy.
• 15:29
  We've been a part of several ACOs.
• 15:32
  So we are very, well positioned,
• 15:35
  for
• 15:37
  increasing,
• 15:38
  value based arrangements across our system, and that
• 15:40
  is part of of the DNA of our
• 15:42
  system.
• 15:44
  And because we have,
• 15:46
  you know, a a a significant foothold in
• 15:48
  the state of Maryland, which is you're you're
• 15:49
  likely aware has a unique health care financing,
• 15:52
  model, amongst the 50 states,
• 15:55
  we literally are a few weeks into,
• 15:58
  the new AHEAD model.
• 16:00
  AHEAD is, a demonstration project. It's the evolution
• 16:03
  of the Maryland,
• 16:05
  global budgeting model,
• 16:07
  that, we just entered a new ten year
• 16:09
  agreement with CMS.
• 16:10
  AHEAD stands for Achieving Healthcare Efficiency through Accountable
• 16:13
  Design.
• 16:14
  And,
• 16:15
  we are, so as you say, well, what
• 16:17
  are we looking looking at as in this
• 16:19
  next year? Certainly planning,
• 16:22
  now that we are in this new model
• 16:23
  for increased focus on value based care, increased
• 16:26
  my out migration of, lower complexity service from
• 16:30
  hospitals into the ambulatory space, much more primary
• 16:33
  care investment and primary care partnership, and then
• 16:36
  thinking about how we continue to expand value
• 16:39
  based arrangements. From a system perspective, those are
• 16:42
  a significant set of priorities for us.
• 16:45
  On the you know, since I'm a rheumatologist,
• 16:47
  you know, my my team always jokes that
• 16:48
  I can't do a town hall without mentioning
• 16:50
  connective tissue, but the connective tissue and so
• 16:53
  I'm not gonna break my streak now. We're
• 16:55
  we're gonna talk connective tissue. But one of
• 16:57
  the, the the the obvious and most important,
• 17:01
  enablers of being able to be an integrated
• 17:03
  system is having,
• 17:06
  an IT platform and IT chassis that allows
• 17:09
  you to seamlessly
• 17:10
  share and pass information,
• 17:12
  across the organization. And so as, as Becker
• 17:15
  has reported,
• 17:16
  MedStar Health is one of the systems that
• 17:17
  has, made the decision to transition
• 17:20
  from Oracle Cerner electronic health record to the
• 17:23
  EPIC electronic
• 17:24
  health record. We just kicked off that,
• 17:27
  that process just,
• 17:29
  last
• 17:30
  last week.
• 17:31
  And, we will be,
• 17:33
  implementing
• 17:34
  fully fully going, live with Epic,
• 17:37
  in approximately eighteen months. So,
• 17:39
  the Epic deployment,
• 17:41
  work groups, I am, proud to be co
• 17:44
  chairing the clinical steering committee,
• 17:46
  for this, this prod this project. So this
• 17:48
  is gonna take a a lot of my
• 17:49
  time as we build this system. But we
• 17:52
  will have a fully, fully integrated,
• 17:55
  health record,
• 17:56
  revenue cycle management system, and then all of
• 17:59
  the,
• 18:00
  decision supports and AI enabled tools that, that
• 18:03
  Epic has available.
• 18:05
  That's gonna be a major, major enabler for
• 18:08
  us to, we think, add a little add
• 18:10
  some tailwinds,
• 18:11
  to to tackle some of those headwinds to
• 18:14
  become even better integrated and even better and
• 18:16
  more efficient than we we have been up
• 18:19
  to this time.
• 18:20
  Yeah. I mean, no doubt ties right back
• 18:22
  into what we were talking about earlier in
• 18:23
  terms of really leveraging and then leading more
• 18:26
  and more into that system that's like you'd
• 18:27
  said, that that big switch from from,
• 18:30
  Cerner to the Epic EHR.
• 18:32
  No doubt some substantial efficiencies on the administrative
• 18:35
  side, the clinical side, so great to see
• 18:37
  there. I guess just one quick follow-up on
• 18:39
  that. As a physician leader yourself,
• 18:42
  is there one particularly,
• 18:44
  one particularly area that you're excited about when
• 18:47
  you think about making that transition and getting
• 18:49
  to the other side of the Epic EHR?
• 18:51
  Now I know there's a ton of token
• 18:53
  tools there that comes with the Epic platform.
• 18:55
  Physicians are really excited about it. But as
• 18:57
  a physician leader yourself, is there one particular
• 18:59
  area, that you're particularly excited by? Yeah. I
• 19:01
  think I think, you know, I've, I had
• 19:03
  the the pleasure of working clinically in both
• 19:05
  systems. I I was part of the EPIC
• 19:07
  transition when the Johns Hopkins Health System, went,
• 19:10
  went live with EPIC, over a decade ago.
• 19:13
  And then as I was transitioning to MedStar,
• 19:14
  we were going live with,
• 19:16
  Cerner at the time, and then obviously obviously
• 19:19
  it, was purchased
• 19:21
  or acquired by Oracle.
• 19:22
  So I've actually worked in both systems clinically.
• 19:25
  And what I'm most excited about for my
• 19:28
  physician, of course, and nursing and all other
• 19:30
  colleagues, but, the the beauty of EPIC is
• 19:32
  how, incredibly well integrated it is.
• 19:36
  And I think for for physicians, just the
• 19:39
  ease of, ease of documentation,
• 19:41
  ease of moving information between the ambulatory and
• 19:44
  inpatient spaces,
• 19:45
  ease of communicating with patients.
• 19:48
  The, the MyChart,
• 19:51
  tools, you know, is, is certainly best in
• 19:53
  class, has been for a long time.
• 19:55
  And, just that ease of being able to
• 19:57
  seamlessly communicate,
• 19:59
  decrease the number of clicks in your day,
• 20:02
  use, you know, all the ambient dictation and
• 20:04
  other other tools that facilitate.
• 20:06
  But it's really having that that ecosystem that
• 20:08
  is fully integrated,
• 20:10
  that makes things just easier. Nothing bothers, physicians.
• 20:13
  And if we had my nursing colleagues on
• 20:16
  here,
• 20:16
  they would echo that for nurses as well,
• 20:18
  right? It's the tyranny of the click and
• 20:20
  the number of clicks that people need to
• 20:22
  go through in their day. And I think
• 20:24
  that that Epic,
• 20:26
  really, really has has, built a system
• 20:29
  that
• 20:29
  has that in mind and and is constantly
• 20:31
  trying to minimize
• 20:33
  the busy work for clinicians so that they
• 20:35
  can actually get to the important work of
• 20:36
  taking care of their patients.
• 20:38
  Yeah. Absolutely. And and I think the other
• 20:40
  thing that I didn't even mention, I guess,
• 20:42
  is just how much that how much of
• 20:44
  an impact that has on the patient experience
• 20:45
  as well and the physicians as well, getting
• 20:47
  that FaceTime back that that FaceTime back with
• 20:49
  your patients as well. So so key and
• 20:51
  an area we constantly hear our nurses, our
• 20:54
  physicians are really, really excited by.
• 20:57
  Doctor Levine, you've talked about a bunch of
• 21:00
  really key projects in the pipeline at MedStar
• 21:02
  Health. You talked about that epic EHR implementation,
• 21:05
  ton of growth across the system,
• 21:08
  the CMS ahead model. MedStar are
• 21:11
  in that in that cohort. One of the
• 21:12
  CMS ahead model that kicked off this year.
• 21:15
  I just wanted to flip the script. There's
• 21:17
  a a ton of big projects, a lot
• 21:18
  of excitement, but, again, a lot of challenges
• 21:21
  as well this year. When you think about
• 21:22
  that, what do you anticipate
• 21:24
  the hardest or maybe most difficult thing you'll
• 21:27
  have to do in the coming year?
• 21:30
  Yeah. So, you know, may maybe I'll I'll
• 21:32
  surprise you by my answer, but, you know,
• 21:34
  it's not a secret. We we talked about
• 21:36
  anxiety then, the anxieties that are kind of
• 21:38
  out, you know, in in the the health
• 21:40
  care world. But, I mean, let's not kid
• 21:42
  ourselves. There's a ton of anxiety and and
• 21:44
  fear about, you know, many things happening
• 21:47
  on the local, regional, national, and international,
• 21:50
  levels. And and all of those dynamics and
• 21:53
  and some of the the fracturing that we
• 21:55
  we have,
• 21:56
  politically in our country,
• 21:58
  All of those things play out in hospital
• 22:00
  and health system walls, right? We're we're not
• 22:01
  immune to any of those things. Our our
• 22:04
  associates have strong views on all sides of,
• 22:07
  of political spectrum and and that's what makes
• 22:09
  the world go round. It's one of the
• 22:10
  things that's beautiful about working in healthcare is
• 22:12
  you have this incredible
• 22:14
  diversity
• 22:15
  of thought and opinion and just brilliant people
• 22:17
  coming together
• 22:19
  to do really great things. But in all
• 22:21
  honesty, it is becoming harder and harder to
• 22:23
  keep those micro societies together as the external
• 22:27
  world, you know, comes comes into into our,
• 22:30
  our walls.
• 22:31
  I often joke with my team that, I
• 22:33
  have all these titles, but my self appointed
• 22:35
  title is that I'm the mayor of Franklintown,
• 22:37
  that I've got a small town of of
• 22:39
  3,000
• 22:40
  very diverse, very,
• 22:42
  motivated and highly skilled people.
• 22:45
  And my main job is to keep that
• 22:47
  society together and focused on our mission of,
• 22:50
  and our values and and, you know, providing
• 22:53
  excellent patient care. And I think as the
• 22:56
  temperature continues to rise outside of our walls,
• 23:01
  focusing
• 23:02
  my team and my leaders,
• 23:04
  and my associates on sort of what's important
• 23:07
  and and how,
• 23:08
  how to, you know, continue to to, you
• 23:10
  know, yes, but we don't ignore what's happening
• 23:12
  in the outside world, but we channel those
• 23:14
  anxieties
• 23:15
  into
• 23:16
  how well we care for our patients.
• 23:20
  I think that's that's
• 23:22
  a a daily you know, it's it's the
• 23:24
  thing that I I think about the most
• 23:26
  in my day as I park my car,
• 23:28
  and start to to make the walk in
• 23:30
  is how, you know, how what am I
• 23:32
  gonna do today to make sure that I'm
• 23:34
  giving my team everything they need to make
• 23:36
  them feel the best about walking through these
• 23:39
  doors with me? And you know one of
• 23:41
  my biggest anxieties, and I think every healthcare
• 23:43
  leader, if you ask what is the one
• 23:45
  thing that keeps you up at night, it's
• 23:47
  not how we're going to pay for service.
• 23:48
  It's not inflation. It's not, you know, labor
• 23:51
  shortage issues. Those are all important but the
• 23:54
  biggest issue is security, right? People, the fear
• 23:57
  of workplace violence, the fear of campus security,
• 24:01
  that is,
• 24:02
  that's all consuming. If we, if we don't
• 24:04
  feel that we can be safe on our
• 24:06
  campuses,
• 24:07
  it's impossible to take care of our patients.
• 24:09
  I'm so proud at MedStar that we have
• 24:11
  invested so heavily,
• 24:12
  in our security posture, in,
• 24:14
  having world class,
• 24:16
  human resources,
• 24:18
  and then lots of technical enablers including deployment
• 24:21
  of evolved weapons detection system
• 24:23
  and, and many other,
• 24:25
  other items just to to make sure that
• 24:27
  our physical security,
• 24:29
  is there.
• 24:30
  Then working with our teams to make sure
• 24:31
  we have behavioral health response teams and and
• 24:33
  all of those items that we need,
• 24:36
  to to keep safe. So the hardest thing
• 24:38
  that I have to do, is is also,
• 24:40
  you know, because I've interviewed a lot in
• 24:42
  my life, so I'm gonna turn the negative
• 24:43
  into a positive on you.
• 24:45
  Because also the the biggest blessing that I
• 24:47
  have as a as a hospital CEO in
• 24:49
  this era is that I get to do
• 24:52
  that hard work every day,
• 24:53
  and it's paying off. And my, you know,
• 24:55
  associate engagement scores are the best they've ever
• 24:57
  been at this organization. And, patient experience scores
• 25:00
  are on the rise and that have been
• 25:02
  an area of challenge for us.
• 25:04
  Our recruitment rates are spectacular. We have the
• 25:06
  best retention,
• 25:08
  that we've had, with turnover,
• 25:10
  rates, which you hear other systems have real
• 25:12
  struggle.
• 25:13
  I've got one of the lowest nursing turnover
• 25:15
  rates below two percent that we've ever had
• 25:16
  in the history of the organization.
• 25:18
  So I feel that it's working. It's never
• 25:21
  you're never it's never job done in in
• 25:23
  these types of positions.
• 25:25
  But it's, it's just a privilege to get
• 25:27
  to tackle those kinds of problems every day.
• 25:30
  Yeah. I I think so so so well
• 25:31
  said, doctor Levine. A real pleasure kinda hearing
• 25:34
  about your leadership points. So how you work
• 25:36
  with your teams and sort of fantastic work
• 25:38
  at MedStar.
• 25:39
  On that note, I know that you're coming
• 25:40
  up with your you're meeting with your hospital
• 25:42
  presence soon, so I know we're coming right
• 25:43
  up on time here. So last last question
• 25:46
  before I let you go.
• 25:48
  I'd love to hear maybe just looking ahead
• 25:50
  two, three years, MedStar Health, biggest opportunities, focus
• 25:53
  areas for growth for the organization. We've talked
• 25:55
  about a couple already, but any other areas
• 25:57
  you'd love to highlight before we wrap? Yeah.
• 25:59
  Sure. I think, you know, for for MedStar
• 26:00
  Health, overall, service lines, a ton of ambulatory
• 26:04
  expansion. So we have dramatically,
• 26:06
  increased our ambulatory network. We're the largest urgent
• 26:09
  care provider in this region.
• 26:12
  We have multiple ambulatory
• 26:13
  specialty centers, sort of hospitals
• 26:15
  without bed type of multi specialty units.
• 26:19
  You know, imaging centers. So we, we are
• 26:22
  accelerating
• 26:23
  the, that build out, across our region,
• 26:26
  you know, focusing in, in sort of filling
• 26:29
  in our map where, where we historically haven't
• 26:31
  had,
• 26:33
  connect points, between our hospitals and our major
• 26:35
  centers. So from a system perspective,
• 26:38
  you know, enormous build out of our ambulatory
• 26:40
  chasses.
• 26:41
  And, and I will be personally involved in
• 26:43
  one of those. We're developing an ambulatory surgical
• 26:45
  center about nine miles north of my hospital
• 26:48
  campus,
• 26:50
  in collaboration with a number of service lines
• 26:52
  across the organization. So that that,
• 26:54
  is a planned opening about also about eighteen
• 26:57
  months from now. So, that's that's a major
• 26:59
  priority.
• 27:00
  For Franklin Square, I mentioned some of our
• 27:02
  strategic service lines. I talked to you about
• 27:05
  what we're doing in neuroscience.
• 27:07
  We have a very large,
• 27:09
  integrated surgical service program here, with expected growth
• 27:12
  in bariatric surgical oncology.
• 27:15
  Our GI chassis is just popping. We just
• 27:17
  hired another advanced endoscopist and, demand in this
• 27:20
  area for those services is is very high.
• 27:23
  Our orthopedics growth will largely predicated on sort
• 27:26
  of migration into those ambulatory
• 27:29
  surgical centers. And we also,
• 27:31
  recently
• 27:32
  opened
• 27:33
  and expanded our ambulatory cardiovascular
• 27:35
  service. And, just a few years ago, we
• 27:37
  were doing about two fifty cardiac caths a
• 27:40
  year and we're, annualizing now this year, we
• 27:42
  think we'll do close to 2,000.
• 27:45
  So significant expansion of those services.
• 27:48
  And,
• 27:49
  and so I think, you know, again,
• 27:51
  it's sort of the theme that I started
• 27:53
  with, you know, this is what system this
• 27:54
  allows you to do. It allows you to
• 27:56
  focus,
• 27:57
  you know, system wide strategic service lines,
• 28:00
  and then concentrate those services
• 28:03
  in the high growth areas in your system.
• 28:06
  And as I tell my my teams, during
• 28:08
  leadership meetings and town halls,
• 28:10
  we're a large community hospital, but what I
• 28:12
  like to describe is we're a tertiary care
• 28:14
  medical center on a community hospital base.
• 28:17
  And so while we're gonna continue to grow
• 28:19
  those things, I'm probably gonna we're we're hiring
• 28:22
  a few new OBGYNs, and we'll probably do
• 28:24
  two to 300
• 28:25
  additional deliveries over the next year, on top
• 28:28
  of the 2,000 that we did last year.
• 28:30
  We have a level three NICU. We've got
• 28:32
  inpatient behavioral health. So I know you asked
• 28:34
  me to say one thing, and I did
• 28:35
  the typical CEO thing and said, no. We've
• 28:37
  got 50 priorities. But but it's all really
• 28:39
  one priority, and it's focusing on what are
• 28:42
  the needs of our community,
• 28:44
  and what do they wanna
• 28:47
  receive
• 28:48
  locally versus traveling, and then how can we
• 28:50
  wrap all those services around so that we
• 28:53
  leverage all of the talents and benefits of
• 28:56
  being in a big system
• 28:57
  right close to home where patients are. And,
• 29:00
  that's what I'm gonna be working on this
• 29:01
  year and next year and hopefully for a
• 29:03
  few years after that.
• 29:04
  Fantastic. I think sounds like you've got your
• 29:07
  hands full of a lot of exciting areas,
• 29:09
  growth opportunities in the pipeline. And doctor Veen,
• 29:12
  so greatly appreciate,
• 29:13
  you, the work that you and your team
• 29:15
  do. So greatly appreciate you taking the time
• 29:16
  out of your your very busy schedule to
• 29:18
  have a chat with us, allows us to
• 29:19
  pick your brains a little bit. And I
• 29:21
  really look forward to seeing you in person
• 29:22
  at the Becker's annual meeting here in, Chicago
• 29:25
  in April. So thank you so much. Well,
• 29:27
  you're welcome. It was a pleasure talking to
• 29:28
  you. We appreciate the opportunity, and I'll see
• 29:30
  you in a few months.