Timothy Seay-Morrison, Senior Vice President of Service Lines and Chief of Ambulatory Care Operations at Stanford Health Care

Summary

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Podcast Summary: Becker’s Healthcare Podcast – Timothy Seay-Morrison, SVP of Service Lines and Chief of Ambulatory Care Operations, Stanford Health Care

Date: January 28, 2026
Host: Elizabeth Gregerson
Guest: Timothy C. Morrison (Tim), Senior Vice President of Cancer Care and former SVP of Service Lines & Chief of Ambulatory Operations, Stanford Health Care

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Episode Overview

This episode features a candid conversation with Timothy C. Morrison, exploring the evolving landscape of ambulatory care, governance, academic medical challenges, and the future of cancer care delivery at Stanford Health Care. Tim shares both achievements and headwinds, reflecting on organizational growth, workforce resilience, and scaling access through regional partnerships.

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Key Discussion Points & Insights

1. Introduction & Background

• [01:11–03:01]
  Tim Morrison introduces his 15-year tenure at Stanford, previously overseeing 10 service lines and ambulatory care operations, now focusing on cancer care as Stanford’s largest service line.
  • Stanford Healthcare is an academic health system including a quaternary hospital, a community hospital, and close collaboration with Stanford Children’s Health.
  • The system comprises faculty practices, a physician foundation, and is prioritizing cancer care due to the global rise in cancer burden.

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2. Ambulatory Governance – A Major 2025 Milestone

• [03:46–06:18]
  Tim describes unifying ambulatory care governance across disparate physician groups, building trust, and aligning operational standards.
  • They established shared governance across 18 clinical departments and community medical groups despite not having a single practice plan.
  • Monumental work included:
    • Setting standards for room utilization and access.
    • Agreeing on operational oversight and recalibrating site footprints.
    • Unifying Vizient quality data reporting (across foundation and faculty practices), driving Stanford’s leap to #6 in the Vizient Ambulatory Quality & Accountability Scorecard.
    • Resulted in improved new patient access, lower wait times, higher utilization, and reduced ED visits for ambulatory conditions.

  "It's taken a couple years of trust building... but in the last year it really matured... we were able to... advance standards really specifically around access goals and standards."
  — Timothy C. Morrison [04:56] "We moved ourselves into number six in the ambulatory quality and accountability scorecard because we saw how that unified system helps us improve new patient access..."
  — Timothy C. Morrison [05:46]

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3. Looking Forward: Priorities and Headwinds for 2026

• [07:05–09:19]
  Tim discusses regulatory pressures, Medicaid shifts, telehealth legislation, and research funding as current headwinds:
  • Site-of-service and telehealth reimbursement uncertainties are especially critical, given Stanford’s high virtual care utilization.
  • Research funding changes and potential NIH cutbacks threaten the academic mission.
  • The focus is on sustaining clinical research and expanding clinical trials, especially in cancer, to "democratize" access to advanced therapies across their network and beyond.

  "It is a leading part of our access strategy because of sort of the real estate compression that exists. We're able to extend our reach by using telehealth."
  — Timothy C. Morrison [07:54] "...funding implications and changes in overhead and NIH funding, I think are things we're really watching because in our minds pose a threat to the integrity of academic medicine..."
  — Timothy C. Morrison [08:25]

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4. Biggest Challenges Ahead: Workforce & Access

• [09:46–11:39]
  Beyond industry challenges, Tim touches on personal and professional strains, emphasizing provider engagement, community access, and physician resilience:
  • Maintaining motivation and fulfillment for healthcare professionals amid financial and regulatory stressors is a top concern.
  • Allocating resources sustainably, especially for vulnerable populations with poor access.

  "The struggle of the community health organizations to meet the demand of the community... and I think we're all going to need to focus on that balance so that all the health systems can remain healthy and, and think about the shared burden of the American health system."
  — Timothy C. Morrison [10:24] "I worry about the resilience of our physician workforce and the pressures on physicians... that we're making sure our practice environments continue to support that so that we're thinking about, you know, the marathon, not just the sprint."
  — Timothy C. Morrison [11:21]

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5. The Role of AI and Human Connection in Care

• [12:02–12:22]
  Tim is optimistic about AI's ability to democratize healthcare protocols but stresses the core importance of human connection.

  "AI is super exciting... and we're going to see so many opportunities to advance and democratize protocols and how healthcare is delivered. And we're still a human service at the core of it."
  — Timothy C. Morrison [12:09]

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6. Growth Opportunities: Collaborations and Network Expansion

• [12:34–14:06]
  • Stanford Cancer Centers are embarking on a joint venture with a significant community health system in Northern California, opening a new building in the fall in Oakland.
  • These partnerships extend Stanford’s reach, blend academic and community strengths, and help prioritize clinical portfolios for maximum impact.
  • The organization is also broadening its cancer network and partnering statewide.

  "We're building a building together that we intend to open in the fall. And this is an incredible learning experience about bringing a very large community system together with an academic system that helps us extend our reach into Oakland..."
  — Timothy C. Morrison [12:47] "I think that's going to help us grow because it's going to provide the strength that the community needs and at the same time, then provide the capacity and capability to do what's best in an academic center."
  — Timothy C. Morrison [13:52]

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Notable Quotes & Memorable Moments

• On governance and trust:
  "It's taken a couple years of trust building... but in the last year it really matured... we were able to... advance standards really specifically around access goals and standards."
  — Timothy C. Morrison [04:56]

• On provider burnout:
  "I worry about the resilience of our physician workforce and the pressures on physicians... so that we're thinking about, you know, the marathon, not just the sprint."
  — Timothy C. Morrison [11:21]

• On technology's potential and humanism:
  "We're still a human service at the core of it—all the people have to be shored up through this journey together."
  — Timothy C. Morrison [12:17]

• On cancer care network growth:
  "It's a really exciting, I think, learning opportunity about bringing these systems together... as we look at how we're partnering with other organizations throughout the state and here in the western region to think about extending the capabilities of what Stanford offers again to other communities."
  — Timothy C. Morrison [13:11]

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Segment Timestamps

• 01:11–03:01 – Guest Introduction & Stanford Health system overview
• 03:46–06:18 – Ambulatory governance and standardization success
• 07:05–09:19 – Major headwinds: regulation, telehealth, research funding
• 09:46–11:39 – Workforce engagement, equity, and resilience challenges
• 12:02–12:22 – The promise and limits of AI in healthcare
• 12:34–14:06 – Cancer care growth: joint ventures & network expansion

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Final Thoughts

Tim Morrison’s interview spotlights the complexity and dynamism facing academic medical centers—balancing cutting-edge research with operational realities, expanding access via innovation and partnerships, and sustaining the human spirit within the healthcare workforce. This episode is a valuable listen for healthcare leaders navigating similar crossroads of governance, technology, and organizational growth.

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Transcript

[Becker's Healthcare Announcer]

The most important healthcare decisions don't happen in isolation. They happen when leaders come together. Becker's 16th annual meeting brings together more than 3,500 hospital and health system executives this April in Chicago. With 800 speakers from Ascension, Cleveland Clinic, Common Spirit, and more, the conversations get real. Leaders will share how their scenario planning for policy shifts brief breaking through value based care barriers and building clinical teams that translate new ideas into real world care. Join top decision makers in the room April 13th through the 16th. For the agenda and event details, visit BeckersHospitalReview.com and click on the Events tab in the upper right.

[Elizabeth Gregerson]

Welcome to the Beckers Healthcare Podcast. I'm Elizabeth Gregerson, a reporter here at Beckers and I'm thrilled to interview Timothy C. Morrison, Senior Vice President of Cancer Care at Stanford Healthcare, on the podcast today. Thank you so much for joining me. I'm so grateful to share your insights with our podcast audience.

[Timothy C. Morrison]

Thank you. I'm really glad to be here.

[Elizabeth Gregerson]

Before we dive in, could you introduce yourself to our audience and maybe tell us a little bit about your role and your organization?

[Timothy C. Morrison]

Sure. Happy to. So, Timothy C. Morrison A lot of people professionally call me Tim Morrison. I have been with Stanford Healthcare about 15 years. Stanford is an academic medical center, academic medical system here in the bay area about 35 miles south of San Francisco in Palo Alto. We have a large on campus quaternary hospital system here in Palo Alto and also a community hospital in Pleasanton. The system is made up of of not only faculty practice, we also have a physician foundation and a very close relationship with the Stanford Children's Health which is here part of Stanford Medicine writ large. I've been here about 15 years. I recently transitioned into this SVP role for the cancer centers. Cancer is our largest social service line and where both the health system and the School of Medicine and the University are very intent on focusing attention and investment over the decade ahead as we aim to increase our capability of caring for people with cancer as the cancer burden grows in the world. The job I had most recently was as the senior vice president of the service lines, 10 of our service lines, and also as the chief of ambulatory care operations. And I'm excited to merge these things together. Cancer is predominantly an ambulatory operation too, so it kind of bridges my interest there and lets me face a new challenge in thinking about cancer care.

[Elizabeth Gregerson]

Perfect. Yeah. And you know, our audience ranges from the ASC to the academic medical center to those huge health systems. So I think your experience, you kind of touch all those different things so I'm sure our audience will be really excited to hear, you know, how you're navigating the health industry today. I guess you can take this next question right in maybe your previous role or if you've got something in the cancer care realm to share that. But when you're looking back in the last year, 2025, what do you feel is the most important initiative you led and maybe what did it take to get there and what were some of the results that you saw?

[Timothy C. Morrison]

Sure. I'm really excited about work we've done related to ambulatory governance and alignment. So at Stanford Medicine we don't have a single practice plan. We're made up of faculty physicians across 18 clinical departments and community medical groups. And everyone has an interest in the ambulatory environment. And as the svp, I also have a physician partner, Chief Medical Officer Jenny Cruz. And our work over the last couple of years, but really landing in this last year has been around advancing and maturing the governance of the ambulatory platform and really building that trust and partnership of the key leaders across all of our service lines and all of the departments and the community medical groups to think about org wide decisions so that we have standards in the way that we provide ambulatory care across our network, which has a pretty large geography. And so that's taken, you know, it's taken a couple years of trust building and practicing and thinking about the decision matrices and where things go in a very complex and matrixed organization. But in the last year it really matured and we were able to through that governance group and I think the growth of the trust that exists in those leaders, advance standards really specifically around access goals and standards, agreeing on room utilization standards that we use now for allocation for further future growth, but also recalibration of buildings, who has operational oversight of different footprints and also our quality goals. And in this last year too, we unified our vizient quality data and reporting to include the foundation practices in addition to our faculty practices. And that takes our agreement and alignment. But we moved ourselves into number six in the ambulatory quality and accountability scorecard because we saw how that unified system helps us improve new patient access, overall patient access, reduce our lag time to getting people in, as well as improving things like our high utilization rates and management of complex conditions that we don't want, having additional utilization of hospital emergency rooms. So I'm really, really proud of that kind of energy that I think took a lot of leaders coming together.

[Elizabeth Gregerson]

Yeah, absolutely. I have seen just that shift into outpatient and ambulatory care so heavily covered this past year. And I always love to hear from leaders when they say it took a lot of people coming together to make care access for all sorts of different service lines. Right. It's not just cancer care, it's not just one or the other. So I think a lot of our listeners will be able to relate to what you said and probably learn from that kind of shared governance mindset, shifting gears a little bit instead of looking back. I'd love to look ahead as you step into your new role as well. Are there any kind of big priorities or maybe even headwinds that you're focused on as you look into 2026?

[Timothy C. Morrison]

Definitely. Certainly like many of the listeners, we're all focused on headwinds with sort of the changing regulatory environment and pressure on health systems. And so for us in this academic system, we think about site of service changes, the Medicaid shifts and sort of the ability of understanding what, what will be covered and won't and liability of telehealth legislation that has a big impact here at Stanford Health Care, we're a very high user of virtual care. We have remained at a very high percentage of virtual visits across our enterprise. And it is a, it's a leading part of our access strategy because of sort of the real estate compression that exists. We're able to extend our reach by using telehealth. So it's really, really important to us stepping into cancer. But it bridges these things to the research funding implications and changes in overhead and NIH funding, I think are things we're really watching because in our minds pose a threat to the integrity of academic medicine and also our shared mission, which is about being able to advance the science so that we can then continue to help the democratization of great healthcare treatments and expand that. The kind of care that places like Stanford and other AMCs get the privilege of engaging in the development of, but making sure that that kind of research and innovation can then reach other people. And so specifically in cancer, we look to continue to think about making sure that our research enterprise and our capability to expand clinical trials and clinical trials enrollment across geographies and across our network can be strong through. And that takes, you know, infrastructure, capability and enhancement and it takes creativity around funding and efficiency and, and I think it's really important and it's also a super exciting part about why we work in academic medicine is this integration of where science meets care. And so I'm, I'm really, I am looking forward to that. Even though I know that it's going to be a big challenge for the years ahead.

[Elizabeth Gregerson]

Absolutely. And speaking of challenges, you teed me up perfectly for my next question. We can't, you know, only talk about the exciting priorities and growth opportunities without, you know, talking about maybe some of the harder things or the challenges that you'll have to face in the coming year. Are there any that are top of mind that you're thinking about right now?

[Timothy C. Morrison]

Well, most pressing for me in the year ahead is I'm going to transition my oldest kid to middle school.

[Elizabeth Gregerson]

That kind of really hard, you know.

[Timothy C. Morrison]

Like the changing pressures of aging family members and their needs. You know, at the same time, I'm sure all of you appreciate like the other part of our lives. Right, right.

[Elizabeth Gregerson]

It still is happening at the same time.

[Timothy C. Morrison]

That's right. But related to work, you know, I, I think the Hardest stuff continues to think about how we motivate the healthcare workforce, physicians, to remain engaged and feel excited about this work at a time that feels highly pressured and where there are many, many financial headwinds facing not only us, but many other organizations and the nation. The struggle of the community health organizations to meet the demand of the community at the time ahead where we're unsure about the funding of people who don't have good access to care or don't have the financial means that everybody does. And I think we're all going to need to focus on that balance so that all the health systems can remain healthy and, and think about the shared burden of the American health system. I think that's some of the hardest stuff. And I worry about the resilience of our physician workforce and the pressures on physicians. And so our challenge to provide all the professional fulfillment that comes from the joy of taking care of people. And the reason we were called to this work and why physicians were called to this work, that we're making sure our practice environments continue to support that so that we're thinking about, you know, the marathon, not just the sprint.

[Elizabeth Gregerson]

Absolutely. And you know, I think all of the important initiatives and programs and everything you've shared with us today, the backbone of all that. Right. Is the healthcare workforce. So I think that's such an important point that like you said, our audience will be able to relate to, as is always kind of that ever present concern that everyone's focusing on.

[Timothy C. Morrison]

That's right. You know, AI is super exciting and we're going to see so many opportunities to advance and democratize protocols and how healthcare is delivered. And we're still a human service at the Core of it all the people have to be shored up through this journey together.

[Elizabeth Gregerson]

Definitely. Well, for my last question, I'd love to wrap it off on a high note. Where do you see the best opportunities for organizational growth at your organization right now?

[Timothy C. Morrison]

This is a really exciting year for Stanford Cancer Centers. We are embarking on some new things for us, and we have a joint venture with another health system in Northern California, and we're building a building together that we intend to open in the fall. And this is an incredible learning experience about bringing a very large community system together with an academic system that helps us extend our reach into Oakland, a different geography and area that we are excited about, serving the community and bringing the best of both organizations together. And it's a really exciting, I think, learning opportunity about bringing these systems together. That coupled with other cancer network capabilities, as we look at how we're partnering with other organizations throughout the state and here in the western region to think about extending the capabilities of what Stanford offers again to other communities. As we think about expanding access and care and the opportunities for those of us in academic medicine are helping us think about the prioritization of our portfolio so that we continue to do what we're best at and are providing the power and leverage and support to deliver the other types of care that exist in other communities. And I think that's going to help us grow because it's going to provide the strength that the community needs and at the same time, then provide the capacity and capability to do what's best in an academic center.

[Elizabeth Gregerson]

Perfect. And yeah, you know, selfishly, I do cover oncology news, and access, you know, in the community is always such a hot topic. So I'm really excited to hear more about the cancer center that you're partnering on and excited to cover its opening later this year. Thank you so much for joining me on the podcast. I feel like it's been an amazing and informative discussion, so I really appreciate you sharing your time and your insights.

[Timothy C. Morrison]

Thank you so much. Thanks for having me.

[Elizabeth Gregerson]

Perfect. And I invite our listeners to tune into more podcasts from Becker's Healthcare by visiting our podcast [e-mail] I hope you all have a wonderful rest of your day by.