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| Fort HealthCare: Empowered Collaboration |
| Corporate Spotlight | |
| Written by Amanda Gaines | |
| Tuesday, 01 January 2008 | |
 Michael Wallace outlines how this independent health system finds harmony in collaboration.  Michael Wallace, President and CEO With more than 20 years of experience in the healthcare industry, Wallace said he was attracted to Fort HealthCare in 2006 for a number of reasons. As a community-based hospital, Fort Memorial Hospital had a focus he liked, and its independent standing meant no heavy-handed parent organization. Additionally, he was not entering into a turnaround situation. “When I arrived, my first goal was to establish a rapport with the medical staff, employees, and community leaders that are valuable stakeholders to the organization,” he said. “Then, as a team, we focused on restating and recommitting to our mission—why we exist, our values and behaviors—what we expect of each other and what our patients can come to expect of us, and our vision.” Wallace acknowledges that every organization has a mission and vision, but he believes the differentiator at Fort HealthCare is the number of people who have committed those tenets to heart. During his first year as president and CEO, Wallace rewarded any employee who could recite the mission (Fort Healthcare provides excellent, compassionate care for the people of its communities), vision (be the best independent community health system), and core commitments (quality, safety, service, finance, and growth) with $100. “Our mission, vision, and core commitments are written so simply that each employee should be able to understand them,” Wallace said, “They are our roadmap. It’s something everyone, from an entry-level employee to the chief of staff, should understand. It was a fun and rewarding way to instill them to all who work here.” Positive outcomes This cultural invigoration resulted in a number of positive outcomes for the health system, including extreme growth in its physician group. In the past 18 months, Fort Medical Group grew from 20 physicians to 40 physicians. Although it’s rare for hospital CEOs to say they enjoy a healthy relationship with the medical staff, nothing could be more accurate for Wallace. “In my experience, hospitals collaborate with the medical staff while competing with them,” he said. “We don’t have that here. Our provider surgeons fully maximize the utilization of our hospital’s resources, programs, and services, and we enjoy that relationship.” Fort Medical Group started 20 years ago with a small number of primary care providers and an obstetrician. Originally seen as a solution to the physician quandary of wanting to practice but not wanting to handle the administrative side of healthcare, the group has evolved into a regional healthcare solution. In tandem with Fort Memorial Hospital, the medical group operates on a hub-and-spoke model, with the hospital as the hub. Physicians are based in Fort Atkinson near the hospital’s campus in medical office buildings, as well as on the spokes of the wheel in the hospital’s primary service area, including Cambridge, Jefferson, Johnson Creek, Palmyra, and Whitewater. “We are meeting the needs of the 60,000 to 80,000 people in our service area by focusing on our primary and secondary care, and our physicians are aligned with that strategy.” The hospital also benefits from the economies of scale inherent to the physician relationship, and although the two entities compete to improve quality and outcomes, duplication of services and resources is not an issue. “Other than a few retirements, very few of the physicians who join Fort Medical Group leave,” said Wallace. “They’re loyal to their group but also to the hospital; it’s a wonderful position to be in as an administrator.” The right direction Which goes back to one of Wallace’s original attractions to Fort HealthCare: its independence. “One of our competitive advantages is our speed,” he said. “We decide in what direction we’re going to move, and we all move together.” One of those directions is upgrading the hospital’s ORs, which were designed in the 1970s. Although physicians continue to provide outstanding care, the OR experience has changed. Equipment is on booms, more minimally invasive surgeries are performed, and more monitoring equipment is required. “As we continue to recruit younger surgeons who are trained on more minimally invasive techniques, we need to ensure we can accommodate their needs while continuing to provide our patients with the highest quality services,” Wallace said. He also plans to enhance the hospital’s demonstrated ability to collaborate with other providers for services it doesn’t have enough expertise, or volume, to do on its own. Fort Memorial Hospital already works in this way with nearby Watertown Memorial Hospital and the University of Wisconsin’s Paul P. Carbone Comprehensive Cancer Center, as each entity owns one-third of the UW Cancer Center Johnson Creek. But Wallace is aware there is much more to do. “We’re working hard to meet the needs of our physicians and employees,” he said. “We’re trading in a currency of trust, and so far, it has steered us in the right direction.” |
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