Make communities better – that’s the goal that Atrium Health, now part of Advocate Health, ascribes to, and its ongoing commitment to make health care more affordable and more accessible to more people is delivering on that promise.
At the fourth-quarter meeting of the Atrium Health Board of Commissioners Tuesday, Dec. 3, Advocate Health CEO Gene Woods marked two years since Atrium Health combined with Advocate Aurora Health to form the new organization. He said that now more than ever, that combination is about making each of our communities better and healthier.
“When we came together, we made certain pledges to be better together for our communities and our patients,” Woods said, “and we’ll do it ‘for all’ – no matter where you come from; what you look like; what your background is.”
A Closer Look: Advocate Health’s Pledges in Progress
“The most important question we will ask ourselves,” Woods explained, “is ‘How are our patients and communities better?’”
He then walked the board through the progress made on each of Advocate Health’s six pledges:
- Elevate clinical preeminence and safety: Advocate Health has decreased mortality rates by 14% in just two years and quadrupled the number of hospitals earning an “A” in Leapfrog’spatient safety ratings.
- Advance learning and discovery: To date, Advocate Health has $440 million invested in research funding and established one institutional review board, expediting the organization’s ability to get needed clinical trials to its patients.
- Build a next generation workforce:The organization has added 14,000 new teammates in just 24 months, including hiring permanent nurses and clinicians from contract roles, as well as creating new jobs. In fact, the organization has cut its contract labor use in half compared to this time last year.
- Improve affordability: Woods told the board Advocate Health forgave 11,500 liens as part of its multi-year initiative to overhaul the system’s approach to relieving medical debt.
- Advance health equity: Advocate Health has screened 1.6 million patients for social determinants of health when they come to the hospital or seek care, Woods shared. That includes asking patients questions about things like food insecurity and transportation and are working to create a database to better connect those in need with the right resources.
- Lead environmental sustainability: Advocate Health hasrecycled 12,000 tons of waste material this year. Or, as Woods quipped, “That’s 4,000 cars taken off the street for a year.”
Later this year, the system will open the first carbon-neutral medical school in the nation with the opening of Wake Forest University School of Medicine’s Charlotte campus in “The Pearl” innovation district.
National Leaders in Elimination of Medical Debt
“When we say better health care for all, we certainly mean it,” Ken Haynes, president of Advocate Health’s Southeast Region, told the board.
In September, Advocate Health announced it would cancel all judgment liens previously placed on homes and real estate as part of its efforts to collect unpaid medical bills. It’s also forgiving the outstanding debts associated with those liens.
“We have led the way in this space and want to continue to do so in order to eliminate financial barriers to care,” Haynes said.
It’s all part of a multi-year initiative to overhaul the system’s approach to medical debt, including an announcement in 2022 that it would no longer file lawsuits nor seek liens or judgments as part of collection efforts. By alleviating financial burdens, Advocate Health is helping individuals and families focus on recovery and well-being.
Across its system, Advocate Health has also stopped reporting delinquent medical debt to credit agencies, expanded its automatic financial assistance program for low-income and uninsured patients and increased its charity care threshold to 300% of the federal poverty level.
Looking Ahead
While Woods celebrated the organization’s current progress, he also looked ahead to the future.
“We believe care in the home will continue to be a very important thing,” he said. “We’re the largest provider of hospital at home in the nation and we’re really focusing on that.”
The bottom line: As the nation’s third-largest nonprofit health system, Advocate Health is doing more, better and faster than anyone else.
Update on The Pearl
The vision and accomplishments laid out by Woods will be put into action with the opening of The Pearl innovation district in June 2025. The Pearl will bring thousands of the world’s best physicians to Charlotte each year to learn advanced surgical techniques at IRCAD North America. A subsidiary of Atrium Health, IRCAD NA will be a destination global surgical training center, something Woods said wouldn’t have been possible without the full weight of the Advocate Health name.
The facility will feature state-of-the-art technologies – including advanced robotics and AI – as the system and IRCAD partner with the medical device companies, seeking ways to improve care and implement new ways of treating disease, as well as creating jobs locally.
Haynes told the board how Advocate Health is partnering with industry and community leaders to tackle some of the key issues around health equity and environmental sustainability, as well as creative ways to connect The Pearl to STEM and be an educational pipeline across middle and high schools, HBCUs and more.
Woods told the board the successes and synergies Advocate Health has achieved have the organization on its way to a projected $1 billion dollars in savings – a huge accomplishment in itself, but one that’s met with a bigger and more important question.
