Rod Hanners, serves as Chief Executive Officer at Keck Medicine of USC.
Rod will deliver a presentation "Creating a Culture of Resiliency and Well-Being in a Post-Pandemic World" at Becker's Hospital Review 12th Annual Meeting. As part of an ongoing series, Becker's is talking to healthcare leaders who plan to speak at the conference, which will take place in Chicago from April 25-28, 2022.
To learn more about the conference and Rod's session, click here.
Q: What are your top priorities for 2022?
Rod Hanners: Other than providing outstanding patient care and expanding services to fill gaps in care, the priority that is at the top for Keck Medicine in 2022 is taking care of our workforce. Our physicians and staff are carrying the weight of the world on their shoulders every day. While the pandemic and its lingering impacts are a big part of that, targeted racism, other social justice challenges and the baseline stressors all healthcare professionals face each day need more of our attention.
The programs we have in place are showing encouraging signs of progress, such as reduction in the risk of burnout, improvement on intention to leave indicators and higher work/life balance scores. We’ve put in place a continuous learning program so that we develop a better understanding of the problems we’re solving for, strengthen the feedback loop from people who need our support and create better metrics. Workforce resiliency is a long-term commitment for our organization, not just a rapid response to the COVID-19 crisis. We’re never going to be done exploring new and better ways to support our physicians and staff. As an organization, we are only as strong as they are.
Q: How do you plan to pivot strategies this year to better serve patients?
RH: Los Angeles sits within one of the most ethnically diverse counties in the country. For our organization, better serving patients means that we need to address issues such as access and health equity head-on. We are expanding our geographic reach with the addition of Methodist Hospital of Southern California and adding new services to our existing facilities so patients can access the best of both community and academic health care closer to home. We’re also advancing our ability to provide culturally competent and sensitive care. Our new gender-affirming care program will be providing much-needed support for our LGBTQ community, which has struggled with finding care tailored to their needs. Our transfusion-free surgery program, which is one of the most advanced in the country, allows us to accommodate religious preferences. We also continue to support our Street Medicine program and other services that allow us to bring care where people are.
Q: What technologies and innovations are you most excited about in healthcare right now?
RH: Six departments at the Keck School of Medicine are ranked in the top 10 in the country for National Institutes of Health funding. We are pursuing some exciting innovations in personalized medical care, such as the ability to biopsy tumors, study them in the lab and formulate drugs specific to individual tumors. Keck Medicine is also getting ready to launch the first program in the world that combines neuromodulation and stroke rehabilitation, which is expected to change the way rehabilitation is managed into the future.
Q: What will the lasting legacy of COVID-19 be on the healthcare system?
RH: There are many lessons learned from the pandemic, like realizing we can change and adapt much more quickly than we thought and tapping into our ability to innovate in high-stakes environments. From a leadership perspective, it was an opportunity for us to regain some of our humanity and remember what a privilege it is to care for people in their darkest hours. That’s not something I’ve ever taken for granted, but I was in complete awe of what our staff accomplished on behalf of our patients. As I watched our staff on my rounds, I was overwhelmed with humility and respect for their steadfastness in moments of crisis. That’s one of the reasons why caring for our physicians and staff will continue to be a priority for us at every level of our organization. We must create opportunities to meet their needs and ensure they take advantage of what our programs offer.