Measles epicenter 3 Executive changes 15 What’s a green dot? 16 PERIODICAL RATE PUBLICATION
APRIL 2025 VOLUME 41, NUMBER 4
With new strategic plan, CEO leads effort to ‘illuminate’ Avera’s care delivery system
Photo by Stephen J. Serio
By LISA EISENHAUER
From left, Sandra Mackey, Sally Deitch and Liz Foshage chat at the Sponsor Formation Program for Catholic Health Care in Itasca, Illinois, in March. The program is one of the many offerings of CHA’s sponsorship and mission services department. Mackey is chief marketing officer of Bon Secours Mercy Health; Deitch is executive vice president, nursing and operations infrastructure at Ascension; and Foshage has recently retired from Ascension’s executive leadership team.
CHA’s sponsorship and mission services department revitalizes its programming By JULIE MINDA
In recent years, changing roles and responsibilities within CHA’s sponsorship and mission services department and the addition of new team members has brought fresh perspectives to that department’s work. When CHA released its vision statement and new strategic plan, the sponsor-
ship and mission services group had the foundation for bringing more new ideas to the fore. Members of the team say that they have been reimagining the type of programming they develop to meet the needs of members. This has resulted in new or updated offerings in the department’s focus areas, which are mission, sponsorship, ministry
formation, ethics, spiritual care and wellbeing. The department takes a cohesive, cross-disciplinary approach to its work, and it creates resources and programs that address CHA members’ needs, as identified through surveys and other forms of engagement. All the department’s activity is in service to CHA’s members and guided by its Continued on 13
CHRISTUS Children’s ‘The power of presence’ expansion is improving Son’s rare disease rocked family’s world but not their faith pediatric care access in South Texas In 2017, Chris Ostertag looked forward By NANCY FOWLER
SAN ANTONIO — Even though San Antonio is the nation’s seventh largest city, CHRISTUS Children’s assessments about six years ago indicated that families were often having to leave the metropolitan area to obtain vital pediatric specialty care for their kids. Since identifying the dearth of these services as a pressing concern, CHRISTUS Children’s has been implementing a strategic plan to grow six focus areas that it calls its pillars of excellence and to build up related multidisciplinary teams and wraparound services. In recent years, the hospital also
to the birth of his second child, imagining him sitting up, crawling and saying his first words. Ostertag and his wife, Rachel, pictured their son and his big sister chasing after each other and making mischief. “We had a full-term pregnancy,” Ostertag says. “There were no concerns.” But immediately after the birth of the son the couple named Hans at SSM Health St. Mary’s Hospital in St. Louis, doctors whisked him away for testing. Among other concerns, he had a large fontanelle or “soft spot” on his head and low-placed ears. The next day, Hans didn’t pass a hearing screening. Even so, his father hoped for the best. “He seemed healthy and happy to me,” says
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By JULIE MINDA
Chris Ostertag holds Hans, his then 3-year-old son. Hans was born with Zellweger spectrum disorder, a rare disease that caused his death at age 5.
When he moved from another system to take over the top post at Avera Health, Jim Dover says his first priority was “seeking to understand” the system. He sees the biggest mistake a leader who’s new to an organization can make to be assuming to know the place well Dover right away. “In reality, they don’t know anything,” says Dover, who became president and CEO of Avera Health in fall 2023. Dover says he took his time to acquaint himself with operations at the Sioux Falls, South Dakota-based system. Avera serves four states and has 20,000 employees, a 1,200-member medical group, 37 hospitals, 200 clinics and 40 long-term care facilities. “This year is its 25th anniversary,” Dover notes. “So, first and foremost, I wanted to understand the organization and its culture.” Once he was familiar with Avera, Dover Continued on 14
Trinity Health focuses on expanding footprint, services of PACE By VALERIE SCHREMP HAHN
Trinity Health knows it has a mission to care for frail elderly people around the country. That’s one reason its Program of All-inclusive Care for the Elderly, or PACE, is one of the nation’s largest and has the broadest geographic footprint. PACE is an option for elderly people who would be eligible for nursing home care to have access to a full continuum of health care services that allow them to live at home. People who are eligible for Medicare and Medicaid can take part in PACE. In the program, they have access to meals and light housekeeping, health care providers, transportation and day centers. The PACE program got its start in San Francisco in 1971. Trinity Health started its first PACE program in Philadelphia in the 1990s. The system now owns or manages 25 centers in 12 states that house PACE programs, with four sites opening within the last year. As of Feb. 1, there were Continued on 11