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Becker’s Healthcare Podcast
Sam McCrimmon, J.D., Vice President of Development at Regional One Health
00:17:07
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- [00:02]
A
Every year, Becker's annual meeting brings healthcare leaders together to unpack the most pressing issues facing the industry. And every year, those conversations shift in profound and unexpected ways. This April, more than 3,500 healthcare executives will return to Chicago for Becker's 16th annual meeting. 795 elite speakers will offer new lessons, new case studies, and predictions about what comes next. Join us April 13th through the 16th. For the agenda and event details, visit visit BeckersHospitalView.com and click on the events tab in the upper right.
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B
This is Scott Becker with the Becker's Healthcare Podcast. I'm thrilled today to be joined by Sam McCrimmon. Sam has built this incredible career. He's a Duke graduate. He's also a lawyer. He serves currently and has just done a great job as vice president of development for Regional One Health in Tennessee. Sam, welcome to the podcast. Can you take a moment and introduce yourself and tell us a little bit about your career and what you do?
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C
Sure, Scott. Thanks for having me. Really happy to be here. Big fan of Becker's and all that you do for the healthcare industry. I'm the vice president for development at Regional One Hospital. We are the oldest hospital in Tennessee. We were actually founded in 1829. So we're coming up shortly on our 200th anniversary. Also the oldest business in Shelby County, Tennessee. We have about 300 beds. We have about 15,000 inpatient discharges a year, 168,000 outpatient visits. We have about $670 million in operating revenue. We are the only level one trauma center in 150 mile radius. And our trauma center is actually named after Elvis Presley, though I will tell you that Elvis never set foot in the trauma center. We have the only verified burn center in a 200 mile radius and we see about 12,000 trauma cases per year. We also have the high risk ob GYN center for the region and the oldest NICU in the region. We train more residents than any other hospital in Tennessee. We have about 210 of them at any time. And we are the safety net hospital for the region. We provide about $200 million in charity care annually.
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B
Amazing. And talk about in your area, what are the big trends that you're watching currently? What's top of mind when you think about the key things you're thinking about?
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C
You know, I think like a lot of providers, particularly safety net providers, we're watching the, the change in Affordable Care act subsidies very closely that impacts a number of the people that we see. You know, we've, we've over the years changed our, our payer mix from predominantly Medicaid to, to more privately insured. And certainly the Affordable Care act has helped with that. So we're, we're what that does over the next year or so to our revenue mix. And presumably that's going to increase our charitable care amount that we're going to provide as well. We're also very closely watching all the potential changes to the 340B pharmaceutical regulations that are going on in the courts these days. We have a very large 340B pharmaceutical program that we're very proud of. It's an important revenue source for us, and it's also a very important access source for many of our patients. And so we're constantly keeping an eye on that. And like most hospitals that have any sort of research, we're watching closely to the federal funding. The changes in federal funding that have happened over the past year. There's certainly been a change in both the amount of federal funding and the scope and the direction of federal funding. And we think that will continue to have an impact on the sort of programs that are able to be pursued. Everything from medical research to what we think of as community health programs that provide, you know, both health and wraparound health services for many of the patients that we see in our service area. And then lastly, I think we think a lot about the economy and we think a lot about AI these days. I think you have to think about AI in many different ways. We certainly think about it on the healthcare side. How can we use it to be more efficient? How can we use it to enhance the patient experience? But from a fundraising standpoint, we also think about it from an economic side. Right. How does that impact consumer sentiment? Are the people that we're talking to about making gifts, are they nervous about losing their jobs to AI? What does that have an impact on?
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B
Thank you. Talk about AI340B, the budget bill, the different stresses and challenges out there. Talk a little bit about the importance that that then has on charitable development, philanthropy, in trying to make things work at great health systems. Talk a little bit about the importance and the growing importance of philanthropy and development.
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C
When you think about philanthropy and development for most nonprofit health systems, you think about it as really the margin for excellence. It's the margin for new projects, it's the margin for new research. It's the funds that provide opportunities that most healthcare systems don't have because the margins are so thin. As you know, many private healthcare systems are fortunate to think of an operating margin of 1 to 1.5% as being a really exceptional margin on any given year. And so anything philanthropically that can be done, particularly at a 3 to 1 or 5 to 1 return on investment, is a pretty spectacular margin and really does provide that extra opportunity for those growth initiatives. And so it's becoming increasingly important in an era where healthcare costs are not going down and operating costs are certainly not going down, to leverage philanthropy to have those growth opportunities.
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B
And when you look at philanthropy, talk a little bit about small gifts, large gifts, and the focus of a philanthropy department and development department today and how they fit into the equation and what you all do.
- [06:15]
C
Sure. Well, they all add up. Right. So small gifts are vital. They're what we think of as helpful for operating revenue. They provide everything from what we think of as transportation funds. Right. So helping patients that might have issues with transportation get to the hospital or get to the clinic so that they can receive the care that they need to providing small upgrades in things like waiting rooms, very vital things that are incredibly helpful for patient experience and make a really important difference in care. The larger gifts we use more for capital needs. We would also use them for things like nursing scholarships. How can we help retain our nurses? By helping them continue their education, by providing the cost of continuing their education. So that's a vitally important thing. And then we also think a lot about what we think of as planned giving, so estate gifts. How can we provide for a future line of philanthropic revenue? By talking to those people that have been most impacted by Regional 1. And in our case, we've been very fortunate that we've had a very successful trauma center for a number of years. And so we've had a number of people that have been very positively impacted over the years by our trauma center and want to give back and want to help continue the legacy of what's been done there. We're also looking at that in the NICU area as well. We have a large number of what we think of as NICU alumni. Right. So people that were born in the NICU that have gone on to lead very healthy and very happy and very successful lives and, you know, want to give back in that way as well.
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B
And how did the trauma center end up getting named after Elvis Presley?
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C
You know, it's a funny story. So in. In 1983, Mayor Crump, who was the mayor of Memphis at the time, in memory of Elvis's passing in 1977, decreed that the trauma center would be the Elvis Presley trauma center. And so Regional one is actually the Shelby County Healthcare Corporation. And Shelby county has two mayors. They have a. There's a city of Memphis mayor and then there is a mayor of Shelby County. And so Mayor Crump was the mayor of Shelby County. So politically he had the authority to exactly that. And so what's neat about this, Scott, is that we're the only other institution outside of Graceland that is actually able to use Elvis's name, image and likeness it for our benefit. And so we actually received donations from Elvis fan clubs around the world. We have a donor wall in our trauma center that actually has plaques from places like the Elvis Club of Indonesia or the Elvis Club of Japan.
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B
That's amazing. That's amazing. And let me ask you a question about this year coming up. Where are you most focused and excited? And then I'm going to ask you a Duke NC question in a few moments. But first I Want to know, 2026, where are you most focused and excited this year?
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C
Sure. I will tell you. Our biggest priority right now is the funding and construction of a new hospital. So our current hospital is, I will say, aging. And it's past the point of gracefully aging. The newest part of it is 30 years. And our power plant, frankly, is so old that we can't buy parts for it anymore. We have to manufacture them or hopefully find them on ebay. So we've done an awful lot of good in a building that has given us many, many good years. But it's time to move on from. And the best example there I can give you is that we see about 12,000 trauma cases a year in a building that's supposed to see about 4,000 trauma cases per year. So the fact that we're able to do that with a 97% survival rate is pretty remarkable. So that's our biggest focus. We're looking at about a $900 million facility, and we've got about $500 million of that committed already. And we're looking to commit another $250 million of that over the next few years. The second priority is really the formation and generation of an academic medical center. Memphis is one of the rare large cities in the United States that doesn't have a genuine academic medical center. So a research based hospital combined with a medical school integrally, where, you know, research based academic medicine comes and informs the patient care. And I say that only on the adult side. We obviously have St. Jude's on the pediatric side. And so there's virtually no better example of what academic medicine can do for a place. And so we're eager to continue that. And then the third thing that we have is we have a center for innovation, and we're very, very proud of this. We're essentially a safety net hospital that has the equivalent of a. An R1 University Innovation Center. And so we've been working with innovators to spin out products, you know, on all sorts of different clinical applications. And we've actually been talking with the venture capital community on ways that we can continue to be a place where we can prove clinical applications for new things that benefit patient care and hopefully benefit health across the country and the world.
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B
That's remarkable. And talk about your career a little bit, because I know you went to Duke. And I'll ask you quickly, Duke or unc, do you. Are you have thoughts on Duke versus unc? And then more importantly, I'll ask you about your allure by background as well. How did you end up in the philanthropy development space? It seems like it was a calling for you. But talk to us a little bit about those two questions. Duke versus uncle and how lawyer becomes philanthropic and in charge of development.
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C
Happy to do it. So with Duke and unc, there's, there's really no question, especially this time of year, it's all Duke all the way. And frankly, the fact that Duke is better than UNC in football these days makes it even more rich. And so. But I will say that both schools are wonderful academic institutions, even if one is slightly more misguided than the other.
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B
Coach K versus Dean Smith. Coach K versus Dean Smith. Who's the better coach?
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C
Well, that's a tough one because if you're talking about integrity and quality of coaching, it's really hard to. To make a direct comparison between the two of them. I would say they're both men of great integrity and both men of great coaching quality. And certainly had many, many professional athletes come out and many, many men of great character that came out. And so, you know, I, I would have to say in many ways it's a tie, but if, if you're going to force me to pick, I' go with Coach K all the way.
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B
But. But I love your answer. It acknowledges both the greatness of both and fantastic. I just love that. And talk about your career. You went back and did a law degree at some point and ended up in philanthropy. Philanthropy. You've got this great degree from Duke. Fantastic. How this was this a calling for you to be in philanthropy and development.
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C
You know, it's funny, Scott, it's now something like year 22 or 23 in philanthropy. And if you told me, back when I was gradu. Graduating from Duke, that this is what I would be doing. I would have thought you were a little bit crazy, but I went to Duke to get a Master in Theological Studies, and I was going to become a professor of theological ethics. And the advice I'd received from many of my professors is that you should only go get a PhD if you can think of nothing better to do with your life. And the reason for that is that the job market in the humanities was and still is pretty terrible. And so I got a year into my master's degree at Duke, and I absolutely loved it. Spent a lot of time focusing on biomedical ethics, still an area of interest for me. But I also realized there were some other things that I wanted to do. And it so happened that the. That there was a friend of the family that was a Catholic priest, and I went and talked to him and said, you know, I'm not sure what I want to do right away. I know I don't want to go get my PhD, but I'd like to be somewhere adjacent to higher education while I think about what I want to do. And he looked at me and he said, I think you should go into fundraising with your personality and your skill set. It might be a good fit. And so I went, and here I am. And I went then later on and got my law degree. Very proud graduate of the University of Detroit Mercy School of Law. And in the course of getting my law degree, I worked full time for the university as a fundraiser and so never really left fundraising. And when I graduated, I graduated in July of 2008 and had the opportunity to keep working for the university. And in between the time that I took the bar and passed the bar, the Great Recession hit. And so I looked at the job I had with the university as a fundraiser. I enjoyed it immensely and enjoyed the work I was doing, and I never looked back.
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B
That's an amazing career. And let me use that as a. As a kicking off point to the next question. What advice to evolving leaders wanting to have impactful careers that they love. Any advice you'd give?
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C
The first two words of advice I would give is have humility and have a sense of humor. Things aren't going to go the way you think they're going to go. If I look back to roughly 2000 or 2001, my career trajectory looked very different. I think it's the willingness to be a little flexible and understand that things aren't always going to go the way you want them to go. And the ability to make light of that at times and really laugh a little bit about life and be open to what happens. I would say then, too, don't be afraid to fail. You're going to fail in your career, you're going to fail in life. It's the people that try things that are open to opportunities and willing to give it a go. Those are the ones that jump out and have success, even if it means over time they're going to fail. And it's always worth trying something and failing as opposed to not trying it at all. The last thing I would say, Scott, and this has become increasingly important to me over the years, is pass the mentoring forward, be really intentional about it. I'm only where I am because of mentors that I had who very intentionally took a chance on me and said, we think you have something that maybe you don't even see in you. And so I've really tried, as I've grown in my career, to do that for other people who maybe weren't aware that they had skills or talents or confidences that they thought they had. And it's been probably the greatest pleasure of my career to watch people grow into things and opportunities and jobs that they didn't know that they were capable of growing into.
- [16:40]
B
No, I think that's fantastic. Sam, it's a real pleasure to visit with you. You've got just a great, principled, grounded way about you that just really admirable. Fantastic to visit Today with Samuel McCrimmon. Sam serves as Vice President Development for Regional One Health. Sam, just fantastic to visit with you. Thank you so much for joining us today on the Becker Self Care Podcast.
- [17:03]
C
Scott, thank you for having me.