Latest / Becker’s Healthcare - Clinical Leadership Podcast / Dr. Lindsay Mazzotti, Chief Medical Officer of Medical Education and Science at Sutter Health

Transcript

Dr. Lindsay Mazzotti, Chief Medical Officer of Medical Education and Science at Sutter Health · Becker’s Healthcare - Clinical Leadership Podcast

• 0:00
  Hello. Welcome to the Becker's podcast.
• 0:02
  I am so excited to be joined today
• 0:04
  by doctor Lindsey Mazzotti, chief medical officer of
• 0:08
  medical education and science at Sutter Health,
• 0:11
  a large hospital system based in California.
• 0:14
  My name is Paige Twenter. I'm a reporter
• 0:17
  and assistant editor here at Becker's HealthCare.
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  And, doctor Mazzotti, I'd love to just turn
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  the floor over to you and hear from
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  you. To kick us off, can you introduce
• 0:26
  yourself and kinda share a bit about your
• 0:27
  background?
• 0:29
  Yeah. I'd be happy to, Paige. Thanks.
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  I'm a hospital medicine physician by training. I'm
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  also board certified in palliative care.
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  And I knew early on that I loved
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  medical education and really fell into a role
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  of being a a teacher of physicians and
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  also,
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  I loved to grow faculty and develop faculty.
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  I was lucky. I I did my undergrad
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  at Stanford. I did my medical school and
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  residency at UCSF
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  where I had a lot of support to
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  grow as a clinician educator.
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  I spent about fourteen years at Kaiser Permanente,
• 1:02
  in medical education roles and helping found the
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  Kaiser Permanente Bernard j Tyson School of Medicine.
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  And I've been with Sutter Health in this
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  role for about two years. I'm here because
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  we are building medical education programs and really
• 1:15
  thinking about
• 1:16
  medical education as part of our greater strategy.
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  Yeah. I then you spoke with my colleague,
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  Erica Serutti a few months ago about for
• 1:26
  the past few years, Sutter has made
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  a really strong investment
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  and, you know, focused investment in adding,
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  it sounds like, 11 residency and fellowship
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  programs in the past few years. Can you
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  kinda share more about Sutter's physician residency
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  initiatives?
• 1:44
  Sure. Absolutely.
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  So we started,
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  before I joined Sutter. Sutter's had a long
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  tradition of medical education both in San Francisco
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  as well as in some, outstanding family medicine
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  programs
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  in Santa Rosa and in Sacramento. So across
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  Northern California, we've always had an educational system,
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  but we had about 13 residency and fellowship
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  programs.
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  And as we started exploring
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  first the changes ahead in the in the
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  shrinking physician workforce and the anticipated shortages by
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  the end of this decade,
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  we thought really differently about how we might
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  continue to expand access to care, not just
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  for sort of, you know, growing more care
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  centers, but actually how to deliberately grow more
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  physicians.
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  And so medical education has been part of
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  that strategy. We've,
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  now have a plan to begin,
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  52 total residency and fellowship programs by,
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  2035.
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  So we're quadrupling our GME footprint.
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  We're growing to have roughly a thousand residents,
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  towards the end of this journey every year,
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  residents and fellows.
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  And that has been, I think, really critical
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  in in terms of how we think about
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  expanding access to care, training the next generation
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  of doctors,
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  particularly where access is gonna be limited
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  and is already limited.
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  And then thinking about how we actually
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  grow mission aligned local physicians who wanna stay
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  and serve in in the communities that we
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  serve. So it's been fantastic. We have five
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  new programs this year that are launching.
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  You know, we have hundreds of new residents
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  who joined us in July
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  and,
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  just, you know, thousands of people looking at
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  our programs,
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  100% match rate, all these, you know, kind
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  of outstanding indicators that we're we're moving in
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  the right direction.
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  No. I, podcast listeners, won't be able to
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  see that. I give a very shocked face
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  when you said quadrupling,
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  you know, residency and fellowship programs by 2035
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  up to 52,
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  nearly a thousand residents by the next ten
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  years.
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  How are you, you know, planning for that
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  infrastructure,
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  and all the resources you're gonna need for
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  that one.
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  It's, it's
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  very deliberate. It's very fast moving. So I
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  personally find that really exciting. I I love
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  the the building phase and kind of imagining
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  what's gonna be somewhere and then working to,
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  you know, strategically get there.
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  That said, it's a lot of new programs.
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  And so each program requires, you know, applications,
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  new faculty, maybe who in departments that haven't
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  had teaching faculty before,
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  new program directors who are, either
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  joining us as physician leaders or who are
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  entering into a new role as a physician
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  leader within Sutter Health.
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  And then the staffing that happens behind that
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  to support the residents that that I call
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  it the care and feeding of residents. It's
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  a it's a daily task and journey, and
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  it's a huge commitment. And so we have
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  to not just attend to building the programs,
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  but actually make sure that we're training them
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  well and making sure they themselves are actually
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  well as they're, on this journey with us.
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  For other
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  leaders,
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  at other health systems, what recommendations would you
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  give
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  if they're interested in also
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  taking on this crazy task of quadrupling
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  residency programs?
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  Yeah. I think understanding that there is,
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  there are resources to start graduate medical education
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  programs. And so
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  as you explore
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  growth, especially in underserved areas, in primary care
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  specialties,
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  and in hospitals that haven't previously had graduate
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  medical education programs.
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  There are both at least in the state
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  of California, there's funding, grant funding,
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  through HCAI and Song Brown
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  to actually pursue this and to support the
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  start up phase, which is sometimes quite expensive.
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  On top of that, you know,
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  Medicare reimburses, at least today, graduate medical education
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  in The United States. And while it's it's
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  imperfect and it's different in different hospitals and
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  settings,
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  You can think very strategically about the resources
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  necessary to start graduate medical education programs. And
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  so it's a heavy lift, but it's sometimes
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  not as fiscally resource intensive as one would
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  imagine.
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  That was surprising whenever you started this journey?
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  It was surprising to think about it in
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  a different way. So,
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  I'll give you a great example.
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  When you started graduate medical education program, you
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  have five year a five year window in
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  a new hospital to build programs.
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  And so you have to go very, very
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  fast and kind of deep within one hospital
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  in order
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  to be able to achieve the funding.
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  And so being strategic about starting things like,
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  there are transitional year programs that are one
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  year programs
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  for people going into specialties like radiology
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  or
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  anesthesia.
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  And you can start those programs and then
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  later actually convert those slots into fellowships and
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  medical subspecialties.
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  And so it's you have to sort of
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  begin with the end in mind and think
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  deliberately about really kind of starting
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  bigger than you might otherwise start
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  in order to,
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  maximize the opportunities for medical education,
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  especially in a really large medical center.
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  It's a heavy lift. It's not heavy lift.
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  It's not a two and a half pound
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  dump bill. It is not.
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  I wanna make sure we have enough time
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  to, you know, talk about your other priorities
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  outside of, obviously, this really incredible work with
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  GME,
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  what other priorities would you say are top
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  of mind for the rest of 2025?
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  For Sutter Health, I think, you know, we're
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  really focused on expanding access. So we've talked
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  about the physician work force. We're also looking
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  at opening more care centers.
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  We've talked about sort of that next generation
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  and building local pipelines.
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  We wanna make sure that we're creating great
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  learning environments where our learners are thriving, where,
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  also, our physicians are thriving, and that's been
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  really an incredible partnership that I've seen since
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  I've started at Sutter Health is the relationship
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  between
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  Sutter Health and the physicians
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  that are,
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  working within our hospitals and our ambulatory centers.
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  And then there's just a huge focus right
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  now, obviously, on the patient experience. And so
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  we wanna make sure that, you know, we're
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  providing seamless, digital, personalized care,
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  and we wanna make sure that we're teaching
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  teaching our residents and fellows and our medical
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  students within our walls
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  how to practice medicine in this ever changing
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  environment,
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  including AI, including virtual care. You know, it's
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  a really different system than it was when
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  I trained, and it's gonna be different tomorrow,
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  and it's gonna be different in ten years.
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  So I think that's a really critical piece
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  to the journey right now of of being,
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  a learning health system.
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  I'll also say, you know, personally speaking, we've
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  been doing a lot of work in undergraduate
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  medical education, which is thinking about going, you
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  know, earlier, going upstream to think about medical
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  students.
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  So we have,
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  nine schools that we have affiliations with, and
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  we have a really exciting
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  deepened partnership with Charles R. Drew University, which
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  is based in Los Angeles
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  and is the first,
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  historically
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  black,
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  medical school West Of The Mississippi.
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  And so we've been committed
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  to helping their students pursue research and scholarship
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  and then their clinical training with us. So
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  that's been a really exciting journey for us.
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  It's a great time to be at Sutter
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  Health.
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  Yeah. Your mention of the patient experience, I
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  really wanna tap more into that with just
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  higher acuity, higher patient volumes
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  across the board, and even further projections of,
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  you know, more patients than higher acuity cases
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  and,
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  a smaller pool of physicians who can care
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  for them. Mhmm. You said, you know, in
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  five years from now, kind of that training
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  education needed is gonna be different.
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  What are you already kind of planting seeds
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  for?
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  That's a great question. I think
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  we wanna be focused on making care easier.
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  We want care to be easier for our
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  patients to access.
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  So whether that means on demand video visits,
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  two way texting, you know, really utilizing technology
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  so that
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  you know, even personally,
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  year over year, I'm seeing it so much
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  easier to to get help in the care
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  that I'm seeking for my family, for myself,
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  and we want that to be accessible and
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  just kind of, you know, in your pocket.
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  So
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  that's really critical.
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  I think also, you know, on the flip
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  side of that,
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  physicians are really busy. And in the era
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  of new technology,
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  work never stops. And that's a great thing,
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  but it also means we have to be
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  really careful
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  to set up infrastructures
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  where our physicians are doing their best work
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  and their most critical work
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  and having support, you know, whether through nursing
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  or through, advanced practice clinicians
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  so that things that can be managed by
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  other team members and,
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  really relieve the physicians of that type of
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  work. And so technology plays into that. You
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  know, it's amazing. And then, also, I think
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  I would add,
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  when you are a physician and you're caring
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  for large numbers of patients, especially in primary
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  care, you're thinking about things on a population
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  health level.
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  And so
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  being able to pull information
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  from, you know, digital technology, wearables,
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  to understand what people are doing in real
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  time and intervene
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  and intervene in a digital way. That's all
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  possible now in a way that it really
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  wasn't even possible five years ago. So tons
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  of exciting work. And then, you know, making
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  sure that our physician our current doctors and
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  our incoming physicians
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  are all training on how to do this,
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  you know, effectively, efficiently,
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  and in a way that really serves our
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  patients and communities.
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  You mentioned before also you felt like whenever
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  you joined Sutter Health, you saw a really
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  strong relationship between the organization and the current
• 11:49
  physicians,
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  right, and that support.
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  I just always go to the advice piece
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  for maybe other, you know, for listeners who
• 11:56
  are struggling for that. Any kind of recommendations
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  for them to find that foundation?
• 12:02
  Yes. I think that's been very deliberate.
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  Our CEO, Warner Thomas, has been,
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  very committed to ongoing communication. And so that
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  means bringing people together
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  on a regular cadence
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  and listening and and also providing information and
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  updates and communicating strategy.
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  And so it can be very easy, especially
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  in a large health system like this, I
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  think, for people to retreat into their silos,
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  whether it's their hospital or their office or
• 12:29
  their specialty and department.
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  And so as you're, you know, spreading
• 12:34
  messages and strategic imperatives
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  and and really trying to overcommunicate,
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  I think that's been a key,
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  success of Sutter Health in the last few
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  years because of Warner.
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  And
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  in that,
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  sometimes I think the business of medicine can
• 12:51
  stay on the side of the business of
• 12:53
  medicine, and the physicians can stay on the
• 12:55
  physician care delivery, you know, on the on
• 12:57
  the on the care of patients and their
• 12:59
  specialty.
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  That bridging that is very critical.
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  And so making sure that as a business
• 13:06
  in health care that you have physicians at
• 13:08
  the table is crucial.
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  And I've been really excited to see that
• 13:12
  at Sutter Health because we have new service
• 13:15
  lines. We're, you know, expanding and better connecting
• 13:17
  services like cancer care and heart and vascular
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  care, orthopedics,
• 13:21
  neuroscience.
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  And in each of those in each of
• 13:24
  those service lines and those settings, there's partnership
• 13:27
  between physician leaders and administrative leaders. I personally,
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  as a physician leader in education, have an
• 13:33
  administrative partner. And so we work in tandem
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  in these dyad partnerships, and I think those
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  also are are key.
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  We only have a few minutes left, and
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  now I wanna give you as much time
• 13:44
  as possible. What have we not touched on
• 13:47
  yet that you really wanna highlight?
• 13:49
  I think we covered everything.
• 13:51
  I wanted to just say, you know, education
• 13:54
  is part of our strategy for both growth
• 13:56
  and for patient experience, and we're thinking proactively
• 13:59
  about our future physician workforce
• 14:02
  and the skills and experiences that are needed
• 14:04
  for tomorrow's doctors.
• 14:06
  We're really committed to raising that next generation
• 14:08
  of physicians.
• 14:10
  Wonderful. And we're excited to do that. And
• 14:13
  thank you so much, doctor Mazzotti, for joining
• 14:15
  us today. I really appreciate it. You bet.
• 14:17
  It's been a pleasure. Thank you.