The Wayne State University Physician Group and the Wayne State University School of Medicine have named an experienced health care leader to oversee the practice group and the school’s relationships with clinical partners.
Lisa Keane is the new president and chief operating officer of the Wayne State University Physician Group. She also will serve as vice dean of Clinical Affairs for the Wayne State University School of Medicine. Her appointment is effective Jan. 4.
Jack D. Sobel, M.D., dean of the School of Medicine and vice chair of the WSUPG Board of Directors, announced Keane’s appointment Jan. 4.
“I believe that Lisa’s extensive leadership experience with prominent academic physician practice groups is essential to addressing the issues confronting the Wayne State University Physician Group, the Fund for Medical Research and Education, and our School of Medicine,” Dean Sobel said. “Lisa’s experience and business acumen are essential to leading our turnaround plan and charting the future success of the Wayne State University Physician Group and the Wayne State University School of Medicine.”
“The Wayne State University Physician Group is a key academic physician group in southeast Michigan, and as such, has an integral role to play in shaping health care in the state,” Keane said. “I am excited to lead this organization and to help forge its new future. We have much work to do, but I am confident we will build a creative team to blaze that path.”
As executive vice president and chief operating officer of the Northwestern Medical Faculty Foundation, in Chicago, from 2005 to 2011, Keane led a multi-specialty group practice comprised of more than 700 faculty physicians and 1,300 health professionals and administrative staff, with total operating revenue exceeding $550 million. The NMFF, like WSUPG, was an independent, not-for-profit corporation whose mission was to provide patient care services and support the research and educational initiatives of Northwestern University’s Feinberg School of Medicine. As the senior non-physician executive of the NMFF, her primary responsibilities included directing business and operations, developing strategies that supported the mission and growth of the enterprise, and developing operational and financial plans, tactics and organizational structures that allowed those strategies to be executed and business objectives to be realized. She oversaw finance, budgets and planning; revenue cycle operations; managed care contracting; human resources; and general administration. Her additional responsibilities included administrative oversight of the Robert H. Lurie Comprehensive Cancer Center, the Bluhm Cardiovascular Institute, the Pelvic Health Center and the Primary Care Medical Practice. She also was responsible for integrated financial planning and funds flow initiatives.
While leading NMFF, Keane developed and implemented a new financial framework for the practice plan, including a creative margin target approach incorporating key performance indicators, new cost allocation methodologies, group practice capital and strategic investment pools, and performance dashboard reporting. That framework promoted sustainable earnings intended for reinvestment in clinical departments and the medical school. She established a departmental review process as a mechanism for identifying performance improvement opportunities and addressing compliance with financial performance targets, in addition to designing a faculty effort reporting tool and implementing related reports and processes, including crucial clinical productivity benchmarking, compensation and productivity profiles, and recommendations for improving alignment.
Keane also served as executive vice president and chief strategy officer from 2013 to 2014, and as executive vice president of Clinical Practice and Business Development from 2011 to 2013, for the University of Chicago Medicine. Those roles, respectively, saw her develop affiliations, collaborations and relationships supporting growth of the clinical enterprise and leading the University of Chicago Health Plan, which served 11,000 members. She was the senior non-physician executive for the faculty practice plan and established patient-focused service standards.
As chief operating officer for Brigham and Women’s Physician Organization from 2001 to 2005, Keane oversaw the integration of 16 clinical departments into the organization, launched the Ideal Patient Experience program to improve patient service and operations in ambulatory practices and capitalized on the integration of practice activities with centralized registration and referral activities. She designed a template for departmental reviews and a physician compensation benchmarking and review process.
She has served as a consultant on physician compensation to the Association of American Medical Colleges. She chaired the Group on Faculty Practice, served on the GFP’s steering committee and served as a member of the “Advancing the Academic Health System for the Future 2013” advisory panel. She also served as president, vice president and treasurer of the Academic Practice Plan Directors group, a consortium of 45 of the nation’s centralized faculty practice plans.
From 1988 to 1997, Keane progressed through a number of positions in the Department of Pediatrics for the University of Pennsylvania School of Medicine and the Children’s Hospital of Philadelphia, ultimately serving as the department administrator. In that role, her primary responsibilities included administrative and financial management of the department, including oversight of patient financial services, reimbursement and coding, managed care contracting, practice management, accounting and financial services, information systems, medical malpractice, and legal and tax issues. Working with the department chair, she developed and implemented the faculty practice plan organization, developed and implemented a billing compliance program, developed a comprehensive budget tool and process to enhance financial management oversight, and redesigned the department’s administrative structure to leverage talent and achieve savings.
A magna cum laude graduate of Elizabethtown College in Pennsylvania, Keane received her master’s degree in accounting from Widner University in Chester, Pa.