Maggie McKay (Host): When your hospital gets new leadership, it's always good to know the person in charge. So today, we'll talk with the new Chief of Staff at Community Memorial Healthcare, Dr. Alison Shuman.

Welcome to Wise and Well presented by Community Memorial Healthcare. I'm your host, Maggie McKay. Thank you so much for joining us today, Dr. Shuman. Would you please introduce yourself?

Dr. Alison Shuman: Sure, thank you so much for having me, Maggie. I'm Dr. Alison Shuman, and I am the incoming Chief of Staff for Community Memorial Health System.

Host: Very exciting. What a great way to start the new year.

Dr. Alison Shuman: Yes, exciting and a little bit nerve-wracking, but I am ready to meet the challenge head on.

Host: Of course. You know what they say after a week, you're like, "Nah," it's like you've been there forever. So, can you please talk a little bit more about your experience in leadership, pediatric hospital medicine, and general pediatrics with Community Memorial Health Care?

Dr. Alison Shuman: Absolutely. So, I came to Ventura in 2008 and joined the medical staff at Community Memorial Hospital as a pediatric hospitalist and as a general outpatient pediatrician through the Centers for Family Health. I would say about a year or so into my time here, I was elected to be the chair of the Pediatric Department. And I served in that role for two years. During that time, I sat on the Medical Executive Committee. That's our medical leadership board. And what that is, is the heads of every department meeting every month to go over the business for the hospital, medical staff, well-being policies and procedures. I did that for two years. And then, every two years, there's a replacement. I stepped down, but I was then invited to be back on the medical executive committee as a member at large a couple of years later. And I accepted that with honor and gratitude. I was very excited that the medical leadership wanted me back in the fold. Came back in as member at large for a couple of years and then became chair of the Pediatric Department again. During that time, I was also the director for pediatric hospital medicine when we had our pediatric unit open at Community Memorial.

And as I stepped down being chair of Pediatrics, I was then nominated to be the Secretary Treasurer for Medical Leadership of the Medical Executive Committee. And that was, I guess, five years ago now. That was a two-year position. I then stepped into the role as Vice Chief of Staff for two years with Chris Johnson as our former Chief of Staff during my time. And as of January 1st, I'll be taking over the role of Chief of Staff at Community Memorial.

Host: Well, congratulations. Very impressive. That is a lot of experience. So, how do you hope to take the lessons you learn and apply them in your new role as Chief of Staff?

Dr. Alison Shuman: I think for me, the real thing that I've seen over these years, and I've been a part of medical leadership through the pandemic and seen how that affected the mental health of our community, but also our medical staff as part of our community. And I really hope to have a focus on the mental health, well-being, and culture for our medical staff, for our physicians.

Through that, we then affect the culture, the well-being of our employees, and that includes our advanced practitioners, our nurse practitioners, our physician's assistants, and then our staff, so our nursing, our environmental services, everybody from, you know, side to side. I don't like to say top to bottom, because I don't see it as a hierarchy. We're all members of the same team.

And so, that's really my goal, is to take what I've seen through the years and use it to create a culture of well-being, safety, not just medical safety for our patients, but mental and emotional safety for those who work under our roof.

Host: Makes sense. Dr. Shuman, could you elaborate on your primary responsibilities as Chief of Staff and how you envision your role evolving over the two years?

Dr. Alison Shuman: Sure. I feel like the Chief of Staff's role is multifaceted. We work in leadership for the medical staff, so when there are troubled physicians or there are conflicts or issues between physicians or physicians and staff, we are a part of that leadership. Enroll, we work on policies and procedures for the hospital, sort of the nitty-gritty of how the hospital policies run. And then, we act, I think, as a liaison between the medical staff and the administration. So between our medical staff leaders, our medical staff members, and our CEO, Mick Zdeblick; our Chief Financial Officer, our Chief Operating Officers, our Chief Nursing Officers. And we work with them to make sure that the hospital is running well, from a financial standpoint, not just a medical standpoint, from a quality standpoint with our quality officers. And then, we liaise with our board of trustees to let them know what's going on with our medical staff, with our programs and our development.

Host: So just quickly, Dr. Shuman, what are your top three priorities as the new Chief of Staff? How will you implement strategies to achieve these goals?

Dr. Alison Shuman: Yeah. So, I think things we've been working on, especially since Mick Zdeblick came in as our CEO, is working on our financial strength, so working with our administrative officers and our medical staff and how we can give the highest quality care while being efficient financially to help protect our system.

I think working on quality of care, we have excellent quality of care and I really want to prioritize continuing to make sure that Community Memorial is at the forefront of evidence based medicine, providing cutting edge technology and care with high quality providers to our patients. And then, I think investing in our staff to keep our physicians who are on board now happy and, again, mentally healthy, so they want to be working with us, and then to help recruit and bring in the next generation of practitioners, I want them to see how we invest in our staff, in their well-being, how we make our culture one that prioritizes the mental well-being of our physicians so that they enjoy being at work on a day to day basis, so that they can focus on giving that excellent care to their patients. So, those I think for me are my top three priorities.

Host: That sounds great. It sounds like a great atmosphere to work in. Let's talk about long-term strategic goals. What are the organization's goals and how does your role align with these objectives for the long term?

Dr. Alison Shuman: So, I think, again, we have really worked since Mr. Zdeblick came in on just those things, looking at creating a strong foundation financially for our program. The pandemic took a big toll on health care across the country. And so, rebuilding in that way, again, working to partner our hospital with local hospitals. So, as an example, our pediatric unit, we joined with VCMC to take two small programs and build an even stronger single program and working together with them.

So, partnering whether that's with our local hospitals or whether we decide to partner with bigger institutions, university institutions for some of our programs, again, to continue to ensure that we have access to the highest level of care for our patients. Partnering for our EPIC journey, we're going to have a new medical record system coming in in March so that we can have seamless access to medical records for our patients across the state and across the country to benefit everybody that both benefits our staff, our medical staff, and our patients. And then, again, continuing to strengthen our future by bringing in new talent, bringing in new and young physicians as our physicians who've been with us for decades are aging out and wanting to retire to continue to invest in that next generation of practitioners to be a part of our system.

Host: That's great. That all sounds like a great plan. You did answer a part of this, but let's just expand a little bit about the future of Community Memorial. How do you hope to leverage technology and innovation to improve patient care and enhance efficiency and attract and retain top talent?

Dr. Alison Shuman: So, I think getting EPIC is going to be a huge part of that. EPIC is a really highly rated electronic health record, and we've had good electronic health records at Community Memorial for many years, but there's been some issues with So we have a lot of the hospital using different systems, and this will allow us to integrate our inpatient, our outpatient, our emergency room, and again, with other hospitals outside of our system.

Other technologies, obviously, we have an amazing robotic surgical program that we continue to invest in. Within our cath labs and our neurosurgical labs, we have invested in new technology with our biplane. And so, there's been a lot of work on using our capital to reinvest in our programs to be able to have the highest level electronic health record as well as medical technology equipment for us to use for our patients in our system.

Host: Has the current Chief of Staff, Dr. Chris Johnson, shared any words of advice for you as you take on this new role?

Dr. Alison Shuman: Yes, absolutely. Yeah, we actually made sure all of us were passing from our position down to the person coming up to our spot, you know, our words of advice and what to expect. And what he said was, "Use your team. You have a great team around you. Don't be an island. Reach out when you need help." And I do, I have an amazing team. Dr. Johnson stays on as our past chief of staff. We have Neil Canby, who's taking over my role as Vice Chief of Staff, and he has been an excellent support in the Secretary Treasurer role of these past couple years. We're bringing Dr. Mike Salopore in as our Secretary Treasurer, and these are all doctors I've worked with through my tenure here over the past, gosh, I guess now it's going to be 17 years. So, we have a great personal relationship and a great working relationship, and I know that I can count on them to help me navigate when I need that help. And again, we have an amazing administration as well working with Mr. Dzeblick, the rest of the administration, and our chief medical officers, who have also been my colleagues in the medical staff for many years. Deb Carlson and Lamar Bushnell, and now Dr. Streeter, who's come on, they've been amazing, and I know that I will use that support through my years.

Obviously, I know I'm going to run into things that I haven't seen, as we all do when we're taking on new roles, and I know that I have the support, the experience, and those people around me that I can turn to them and get their advice, and that will be invaluable to me.

Host: So, what's the one thing, just one thing that Dr. Johnson told you that kind of stuck with you, advice-wise?

Dr. Alison Shuman: I think it was that. I think it was just kind of delegate. Don't take on everything yourself. Use your team. So I think that is the biggest thing. It's easy in leadership to try to be the pinnacle and the one doing everything. And that's not how any ship works best, right? We all work well together. And so, that to me is the piece of advice that I will most take to heart.

Host: That's a great piece of advice. I wish I had a team, Dr. Shuman. I would definitely delegate if I had a team. So, yeah, use that for sure. Thank you so much for sharing your insight into this very important new role. And again, congratulations.

Dr. Alison Shuman: Thank you so much, and thank you so much for having me. I really appreciate it.

Host: Again, that's Dr. Alison Shuman. To find out more, please visit mycmh. org. And if you found this podcast helpful, please share it on your social channels and check out our entire podcast library for topics of interest to you. I'm Maggie McKay. Thanks for listening to Wise and Well presented by Community Memorial Healthcare.