Hey you guys I got an ineresting email from Stephen Klasko about USF's future goals and current progress.
All HSC mail users got this email but for those of you who aren't on that server its an interesting read regarding USF COM:
This is long but its an interesting read
Dear Faculty, Friends and Colleagues,
2007 was a pivotal year for USF College of Medicine and I did not want the year to go by without expressing my appreciation for everything you do
every day! Often in our zeal to develop strategy and implement plans for growth we lose sight of the most important asset in any academic medical enterpriseour faculty, staff and students.
Three years ago, we set out a blueprint for strategic action that encompassed five major pointsnational prominence, creative educational models, the recognition that research really matters, the development of an entrepreneurial academic model, and a truly integrated USF Health. While no one has ever accused me of being poetic, I am struck by the phrase, we have come so far
and have so many miles to go.
2007 saw our number one priority, our students and the faculty that teach them, being recognized in a grand way. Our LCME site visit went off flawlessly, due in great part to the selfless hours that were undertaken by our faculty, including eighteen months worth of committees. We were rewarded with a maximum accreditation of eight years, a true accomplishment given the rate of change that had occurred over the previous few years. Our long time vice dean of education, Paul Wallach, left us to pursue his dream of becoming a dean and Bryan Bognar has done a great job maintaining our focus while a national search is completed. Most importantly, our students continue to surpass every expectation we could have of them, whether in USMLE pass rates or giving back to the community with the BRIDGE clinic, the Carl Sagan academy, or the many international projects that they have embraced. I could not be more grateful for the caliber and character of our students medical students as well as masters and doctoral candidates.
Research really matters. While in most medical schools that would be akin to saying the sky is blue we at USF had to refocus our efforts on building cores, recruiting and retaining faculty, creating a research infrastructure and beginning the process of building the appropriate space for a top-fifty research academic medical center. Dr Abdul Rao and his staff, the basic science chairs (Drs Nicosia, Lindsey and Solomonson) and faculty as well as the clinical chairs and faculty embraced this challenge and 2007 saw significant grant renewals, grant awards, intellectual property breakthroughs and most importantly the beginning of rebuilding research cores (a project that almost had to be begun from scratch). We could not be more proud of Dr Krischer and his $169 million NIH diabetes award and the many faculty members who have bucked the decreasing flow of dollars from NIH and other federal agencies. However, this is where the many miles to go part comes in. As the leader of the medical school, I need to work with you to bring in new philanthropic dollars and other sources of funding to start to quickly build up our space and core facilities in order to take advantage of these great faculty efforts. My goal over the next year is to begin construction on expanded research space while planning for a state of the art health sciences research building, the universitys top priority on our five year PECO funding list.
Strategy and implementation are two different worldsand in the entrepreneurial academic model, the faculty practice group is seeing those worlds collide. Since this medical school was born, so the historians (thank you Dr Curran and Dr Haynie) tell me, this medical school has struggled with its community medical school roots (e.g. no owned hospital) and its desire to move ahead in the academic world. We have now reached the nexus of that struggle in that we have overachieved in our academic pursuits for a community based medical school, yet we have not accomplished what is necessary to move out of that classification. So, as with most successful transformations, the first thing we need to do is look in the mirror. Our faculty practice group has enjoyed the ability to maintain itself with little business development or strategy around the development of a true multispecialty group. That is no longer the case. There is no practice group in the nation that can prosper without hospital based specialties, facility fees and hospital revenues.
We have come so far
The building and moving in of the Center for Advanced Healthcare South was a herculean effort by staff, faculty and administration. Sprinkle in a new electronic medical record and 2007s legacy will be one of recognizing the hard work that resulted in our first differentiated clinical building in many years. But thats not all, we are on the eve of moving into our first new ambulatory campus facility, the Carol and Frank Morsani Center for Advanced Healthcare, which will transform our ability to do state of the art procedures on our campus and enjoy the full range of reimbursement that heretofore had been lost to us. Most importantly, we will be living our vision of making our patients lives better, through an innovative approach to womens health, breast care, orthopedics, sports medicine. Digestive disorders and the other areas that will have providers from many specialties integrated into a unique patient centric environment.
We have so many miles to go
.
Getting there will require strategy, focus and discipline at an unprecedented level. Our financial challenges are significant ... decreased state funding, three new Florida medical schools competing for dollars, medicare funding reductions, increased competition
as are our operational challenges in moving from a practice plan to a vibrant multispecialty group. We are not content with the operation and focus of the practice group, and we have and will continue to make changes in its leadership, makeup and operations. Rick Green is committed to working with the faculty in 2008 to start that transformation.
But there is nowhere in the medical school where a more significant transformation needs to take place than with our hospital relationships. As your leader, I have committed to 2008 being the year in which we develop reality based relationships with our hospital partners. That means to put it simply and bluntly, we must assert ourselves as an equal partner, and recognize where it is important to collaborate and where it is necessary to compete. There is no model in the country where a medical school affiliated with three or four strategically independent (both of the medical school and each other) has been able to achieve what we intend to without changing the dynamic. Whether it is the Moffitt reorganization, our very important strategic discussions with Tampa General Hospital, our recognition that w need a new and different model with All Childrens Hospital, our reinvigorated affiliations with the VA hospitals, or our development of new partners throughout the region, every strategic move has been to increase the COMs leverage and to assert itself in any discussion of regional healthcare. None of that will be accomplished unless we immediately look at ourselves and change the paradigm of our own internal practices. We are the largest multispecialty group in the entire region yet we do not take advantage of the synergies and coordinated patient care that would be obtained through a more focused approach to keeping patients within our system. The #1 challenge for 2008 is simple the practice group administration needs to become more entrepreneurial and doctor/staff friendly, the clinical chairs need to do whatever is necessary to make it easy to refer within our group, and in hospital based areas such as pathology and radiology, we need to take advantage of our new facilities. The benefits to patient care, our ability to reward faculty and staff, the potential for reducing overheads, and our ability for reinvesting dollars in the academic and educational enterprise are staggering if we were to recognize the power that exists within our own faculty, multispecialty group and new buildings.
USF Health is more than just a brand or a billboard. That is how we started 2007, and along with Deans Petersen and Burns and Dr Quillen, we began implementing a strategy that tied the schools related to health sciences together in a meaningful way. In the areas of prevention and wellness, infectious diseases and international health we have started to make great strides toward achieving that goal. But in order to be more than a slogan, we have to ensure that all aspects of the health enterprise at USF are multifocal and interdisciplinary and that we constantly reassess our USF Healthness in our communications, our programs and in our strategic and financial allocations. 2008 is the year that I hope to make that change from a philosophy that is beginning to be implemented to an implementation strategy that embodies the philosophy. As part of this forward movement, we are also excited about continuing the journey toward our newest health college, the College of Pharmacy led by Dr Kevin Sneed.
The universitys strategic plan is all about the steps needed to make this university stand in place among the best in the country as defined by eligibility for admission to the prestigious Association of Academic Universities. National prominence has been a key goal for USF Health and the USF COM. 2007 is a year where much of the rest of the nation began to hear about the changes going on in USF Health. This has been reflected in our ability to recruit leaders such as Dr Lewis Rubin from Cleveland Clinic as the Muma chair for Neonatology or Dr Clifton Gooch from Columbia who was the choice of the search committee as the chair of Neurology. It was also reflected in several university programs being chosen by U.S. News and World Report for inclusion in the top 50 on behalf of our hospitals Dr McCaffrey and ENT for both Moffitt and TGH, Dr Keefe for Obstetrics and Gynecology at TGH, and Dr Goldman and our colleagues in Internal Medicine for renal disorders. We have had a record number of presentations to the AAMC and other national organizations about our curricular change and quality initiatives. Our students are taking an ever-increasing role in student national organizations. And as a long time Apple and Mac user, I could not be more pleased that USF is leading the way working with Apple and other great universities in pursuing the developing technologies in digital media. More and more, people around the country are recognizing that USF Health is a place for positive change.
So, 2007 is gone and a world of potential, risks, rewards and opportunities await us in 2008. I have two things that I hope to be able to say at this time next year, over and above everything else:
1) That the lives of our community as well as the careers and lives of our faculty, staff and students have been positively transformed by the changes at USF Health
2) That USF Health, USF COM and USF Practice Group are realizing their potential across all three missionsclinical, research and academicallyto becoming one of the leading health science centers in the nation.
I cant wait to get started.
Thanks and have a great holiday.
Steve
Stephen K Klasko, MD, MBA
Dean, College of Medicine
Vice President for USF Health
University of South Florida