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Becker’s Healthcare Podcast
Expanding GME and Building a Sustainable Physician Workforce at Sutter Health with Leon Clark
00:12:11
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- [00:00]
A
This is Laura Dardo with the Beckers Healthcare Podcast. I'm thrilled today to be joined by Leon Clark, Chief Academic Affairs Officer at Sutter Health. Leon, it's a pleasure to have you on the podcast today.
- [00:10]
B
Well, thank you. It's my pleasure to be here with you, Laura.
- [00:14]
A
Absolutely. Now, I'm excited for our conversation. I know we're going to be digging into some of the things you're doing at Sutter around additional medical education and Sutter Health GME program. So we'll dive right in here. I know it's no secret that hospitals and health systems nationwide are grappling with how to address some of the combination of the aging population that will require more care as well as a larger population of the physician workforce nearing retirement. So could you tell us a little bit about Sutter Health GME program and how important it is for that program to create solutions to these challenges beyond just hiring more physicians?
- [00:47]
B
Yeah. Laura, thank you. Thank you for the question. I think from my perspective, GME growth is central to our strategy. It's highlighted within our strategic plan. It's how we think about building a sustainable physician workforce to address some of our pressing challenges that I think are consistent across the healthcare landscape. Critical issues like, you know, access and population health. And for us, it's about how we support our growth as a healthcare delivery system overall. And so it's not just about, you know, filling physician vacancies today, although that remains important to us. And we've had quite a bit of success in growing the number of new physicians in our practice. I think what we've come to realize, though, is that, you know, you can't really hire your way out of, you know, the physician workforce shortage in the short term. So the GME expansion and growth is really about how do we train and retain our own over time. And, you know, if we can provide an outstanding training experience for our residents and fellows, if we can create an environment and reinforce an environment that feels fair and just to them. What we know is that the retention is going to be a lot easier to achieve. Physicians are more likely to practice where they train, and that's been our strategy all along.
- [02:32]
A
That makes a lot of sense and is, you know, such helpful context because I think when you are trying to solve big problems like physician shortages and access to care in talent pipeline, there, you know, there's no easy solutions, it seems, and a lot of different factors that can go into solving that problem. So I know that Sutter Health GME program saw a lot of growth in 2020 both in terms of administrative support and the number of residents with more planned for 2026. How do you scale that growth year to year and keep the program trajectory on track?
- [03:04]
B
Well, I think that's so first that's true. I think the growth trajectory that we're on only works under two conditions. One of that is you have to be thoughtful about it and you have to be intentional. In our case, we've decided to, you know, approach this in a, in more of a stepwise fashion. So our growth plan is being executed over a series of phases that looks at, you know, how do we balance strategic priorities. I mentioned about aligning our growth to priorities like service line growth and development. So how do we balance that against operational readiness? So a lot of the growth that's occurring in what we call GME naive hospitals, that takes a lot of work to prepare the environment for new programs. And so we're trying to balance strategic intent with speed and readiness. The one other essential part of it is really trying to support growth through a strong system level governance that provides both shared services for common functions like accreditation and accreditation readiness, things like faculty development, financial planning, accounting, things that are common across all of our programs, while at the same time empowering the local teams at the hospital level, the foundation level, to really lead day to day operations. It's that balance between system wide standards and local ownership that allows us to grow while at the same time maintaining the quality of our clinical learning environment. Those are the keys in my view.
- [04:59]
A
Got it. That makes a lot of sense. It is really helpful to understand that balance. I think trying to find the right type of ways where you can accelerate and be innovative, but making sure that you're safe with it and truly having that foundation of excellence makes a big difference. I'm curious. One of the unique aspects of Sutter Health's GME approach is its partnership with other institutions like the Charles R. Drew University. How do these types of partnerships contribute to expanding the number of residents and fellows that Sutter is able to train?
- [05:33]
B
Yeah, that's a really good and important question. In fact, we have a number of academic partners. Charles Drew is but one of many, I think, of partnerships as force multipliers. So many of our partners bring complementary expertise that allows us to gain access to a diverse talent pipeline. You know, California, as you know, is, is a diverse state and we want to grow a physician workforce that is reflective of that. I also realize that, you know, working together we can train more physicians and train them better, in fact, than any of us could do alone. So we'll continue to forge strong and lasting academic partnerships to support our workforce development needs across the organization. But partnerships such as Charles Drew is really, really important to us.
- [06:38]
A
That makes sense. And when you think about alignment and those partnerships, where do you see some of the areas that you've been able to expand, you know, create the great partnerships? How do you have the right culture in place as you're developing these relationships so that you know, you can make the most out of their potential?
- [06:59]
B
Yeah, I think growing and developing partnerships is, is a skill. And so the first thing that we try and look for is mission alignment. It's helpful to be culturally aligned. I think that to the extent that there is complementary expertise that one organization brings, whether it's capabilities and faculty development, we are very thoughtful about identifying those kinds of things. So with that sort of framework, it's really an approach, mission alignment, cultural alignment, complementary capabilities and expertise. And it really comes down to managing the relationship. And I would perhaps look underscore management. Right. It's, it's what we're looking for in our partners is something that rises above the level of a transaction. And so these are intended to be long lasting and in order to do that successfully, you have to manage the relationship with intent.
- [08:08]
A
Yeah, absolutely. Thank you for shedding a little bit more color on how you develop those in really make sure that they're flourishing. Part of Sutter Health's Destination 2030 initiative is training a thousand plus residents and fellows annually. What's next for the GME program to help reach that goal?
- [08:27]
B
Well, we're about halfway to towards our goal, but I think the next chapter, beyond just growing the number of new programs that, that we're aspiring to, is really about, you know, differentiating and strengthening the clinical learning environment, et cetera. Our goal again is to train and retain for our system and for California more broadly. But the opportunity for us, I think, is to train in a way that is reflective of the Sutter model of care. That means team based care, that means building expertise in population health management, emphasizing things like innovation and research. So it's, you know, this balance of scale plus purpose that we're after. So we'll hit our goal of training nearly a thousand residents a year by 2032. But along the way we're thinking about what direction is medicine and medical education going, for example, with more emphasis on AI and digital capabilities, digital knowledge, and how that gets applied and how it can help support new models of care. All of that is being thought about and embedded in our residency and fellowship training.
- [09:52]
A
Programs that makes a lot of sense and helpful to understand. That's a huge goal and really impressive, you know, that you're already halfway there training, you know, 500 around residents and then looking to add the rest by 2030. A huge, huge goal. What piece of advice would you have and share with graduate students exploring fellowships and residencies like Sutter Health offers through its GME program?
- [10:17]
B
Well, I think, you know, my advice is to, you know, look for a place that treats education as a core strategy and not a side project where you train, shapes how you practice. And again, one of our goals is to train our residents and fellows in a way that is reflective of how we as a system want to care for patients. Again, it's team based care. It's rooted in advanced technology, including AI. It's forward looking approaches. And so I think the graduate students, the medical students should really think about the learning environment at any place that they're looking to join. I also would encourage them to actually come and take a look. Sometimes you don't know until you see. And so we're very interested and active in inviting medical students and residents to take a look at our practice. Come here, spend some time with us. Look for the things that are going to be important to you over time, like the clinical learning environment, like fair and just culture. I think all of those things really matter when thinking about where you're going to take your next step and spend time practicing medicine.
- [11:47]
A
Absolutely. That's amazing to hear. Leon, thank you so much for joining us on the podcast today. This has been a really fascinating conversation. It's been really cool to hear more about everything that you've been doing at Sutter Health and I look forward to connecting with you again soon.
- [12:01]
B
Laura, my pleasure. Again, thanks for allowing me to share this platform with you. It's been really good. Thank you.