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Hospitals won a lengthy legal battle with the federal government over a federal drug pricing program, and now they’re hoping to get paid sooner than later.

Rick Pollack, president and CEO of the American Hospital Association

Last month, the Supreme Court unanimously struck down Medicare cuts to hospitals and health systems participating in 

, which offers discounts on some drugs to hospitals with a high percentage of disadvantaged patients.

The cuts went into effect in 2018 under former President Trump’s administration, and President Biden’s administration sought to continue the policy.

The case centered around $1.6 billion in annual Medicare payments. The American Hospital Association, which led the successful legal battle before the Supreme Court, has asked the government to pay that money as quickly as possible. The group sent a 

 to U.S. Health and Human Services Secretary Xavier Becerra seeking a meeting to discuss the repayment issue.

Rick Pollack, president of the hospital association, wrote in the letter that the restoration of the funds would aid hospitals that have endured 

serious financial pressures due to the COVID-19 pandemic

“Given the vital role that 340B hospitals play in serving vulnerable communities, they should be repaid the funds that have been withheld from them without delay. They also should be paid for all of the years (2018-2022) in which the Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services (CMS) illegally cut reimbursement rates,” Pollack wrote.

“We are concerned, however, that despite the Supreme Court’s conclusive decision, resolution of these issues could be bogged down in needless litigation, and that hospitals will not be appropriately compensated at a time when they are weathering significant financial challenges on many fronts.”

The hospital association said it is fears that CMS could revert to a position of budget neutrality after restoring payments, forcing health systems to repay back some funds.

If that happens, “some hospitals will be forced to pay back money spent years ago — including during the COVID-19 pandemic — because the federal government made a legal error,” Pollack wrote in the letter. “Hospitals should not have to pay for the agency’s mistakes.”

Hospitals and healthcare advocates cheered the Supreme Court decision. The AHA, Association of American Medical Colleges and America’s Essential Hospitals issued 

 after the justices released their ruling.

“This decision is a decisive victory for vulnerable communities and the hospitals on which so many patients depend,” the three groups said. “340B discounts help hospitals devote more resources to services and programs for vulnerable communities and increase access to prescription drugs for low-income patients.”

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On the face of it, a 9-0 ruling from a Supreme Court with sharp ideological difference wouldn’t be expected, but the justices ruled unanimously. 

Chad Golder, the AHA’s deputy general counsel, told 

“We felt from the beginning our position was the correct legal one,” Golder said in a phone interview. “We were thrilled at the results but not necessarily surprised.”

Golder said it’s difficult to project when hospitals could receive payments.

“Our view is it should be straightforward,” Golder said. “The Supreme Court said the cuts were illegal and the hospitals should be owed what was cut for them.”

“We are going to push as hard as we can to get prompt repayment,” Golder said.

While the justices ruled unanimously, the court did not abolish Medicare’s ability to reduce hospital payments in the 340B program. Essentially, the court found Medicare didn’t follow the proper process in reducing payments.

Under the law, Medicare must survey hospitals about the acquisition costs of drugs in the program. Since Medicare didn’t conduct such a survey before enacting the cuts in 2018, the justices said the agency couldn’t change its reimbursement rates.

Medicare did a survey of hospitals in 2020, but the hospital association contends that survey is flawed.

The survey was done early in 2020 during the emergence of the COVID-19 pandemic, “precisely when 340B hospitals were struggling to marshal critical resources to respond to the pandemic,” Pollack wrote in the letter. “Unsurprisingly, only 7% of hospitals that received the survey responded with the actual acquisition cost data.”

Medicare’s regulations state that surveys must have a large representative sample. Pollack also wrote that Medicare mistakenly said only 340B hospitals needed to respond to the survey.

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The 340B drug discount program has plenty of critics. Some critics, including patient advocacy groups, have said health systems are profiting off the program and haven’t passed enough of the discounts to patients.

Some argue the program has grown far beyond its intended purpose of aiding the hospitals and health systems that treat a higher number of patients with lower incomes and patients from underserved communities. The program has grown from $9 billion in 2014 to $38 billion in 2020.

Ted Okon, executive director of the Community Oncology Alliance, talked about the Supreme Court ruling in an interview with 

“There's a lot of misinformation about this Supreme Court decision on Medicare reimbursement for 340B hospitals,” Okon said. “The fact of the matter is this was a very narrow rule by the Supreme Court.”

The justices referred the case back to a lower federal court. “It's in the lower courts hands as to how to unscramble this egg. I mean, it's just a real mess,” Okon said.

If Republicans regain control of the U.S. House of Representatives next year, which some political analysts say is very plausible, lawmakers are likely to take a closer look at the 340B program, he said.

Hospitals in the 340B program have faced another challenge over the last year as pharmaceutical companies reduce their discounts in the program. 

More than a dozen major pharmaceutical companies, including Johnson & Johnson, AstraZeneca, Merck, and Pfizer, have said they are restricting some discounts.

As drug companies roll back those discounts, 

some hospitals say it’s adding to their formidable financial difficulties

. Some larger hospitals expect to lose more than $2 million annually due to the reduced discounts, according to a May survey by 340B Health, an advocacy group representing hospitals participating in the program.

The federal government has taken legal actions against the pharmaceutical companies for rolling back the discounts, with mixed results. Hospitals are hoping those policies are reversed, Golder said.

Golder pointed to language in the Supreme Court opinion as recognition of the program’s importance. Toward the end of the opinion, Justice Brett Kavanaugh wrote, “340B hospitals perform valuable services for low-income and rural communities but have to rely on limited federal funding for support.”

“We think that is a strong sign that this is a program that serves its functions well,” Golder said.

Hospitals also see urgency in resolving the payments due to the financial headwinds they've been battling.

"The 340B hospitals are also hospitals that have faced unprecedented challenges from COVID and other financial and economic factors," Golder said.

The ruling in the 340B case came before the court’s landmark ruling that struck down abortion rights. As roughly half the states prepare to prohibit abortion, 

healthcare groups say that decision threatens the health of patients

 and could worsen disparities among disadvantaged groups.

Articles

The high court ruled that Medicare improperly reduced reimbursements in the federal drug discount program. Hospitals are pushing the government to cough up the money.

After Supreme Court win, hospitals press for 340B payments ‘without delay’

The Mayo Clinic is working with Sheba Medical Center in Israel to help support startup healthcare companies, with hopes of yielding medical breakthroughs.

The two healthcare institutions signed an agreement this week to help develop new healthcare technologies. Both health organizations have recently developed their own programs to help startup companies.

The systems said in a news release the partnership will initially focus on startup companies from those programs: the Mayo Clinic Platform Accelerate and Sheba’s ARC Innovation Center.

John Halamka, president of Mayo Clinic Platform, said the agreement will help foster technologies that can improve healthcare. In a video accompanying the announcement, Halamka outlined what the partnership will bring in a world beyond the COVID-19 pandemic.

“We’re going to see more machine learning, more technologies to help our patients worldwide,” Halamka said. “But we need enormous amounts of experience. The patient data of the past will inform patient care in the future. Mayo and Sheba collaborating will create technologies and innovations greater than the sum of the parts.”

Halamka discusses the partnership in detail in this video by Mayo Clinic News Network. (The story continues after the video.)

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Eyal Zimlichman, chief information and transformation officer at ARC Innovation Center, said in a news release the organizations “are committed to transform health on a global scale.”

“This collaboration will allow us to accelerate development and large-scale implementation of cutting-edge technologies,” Zimlichman said. “And at the end of the day, this work will provide value to patients, families and communities. We look forward to the journey ahead.”

The partnership is going to be very focused on health equity to make sure the new technologies developed can be utilized widely, Halamka said.

“We’re going to deliver fair, equitable, unbiased and useful technology, and that’s hard,” he said in the video. “Because it may very well be that a technology is developed in a geography where it works fabulously in one place for one kind of patient, but how do you make it work globally? And the Sheba-Mayo collaboration is about global impact.”

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The two systems signed the agreement this week at the Sixth Mayo-Sheba Annual Cardiovascular Symposium on the Sheba Medical Center campus in Tel Aviv.

The Mayo Clinic and Sheba have collaborated since 2016, with cardiology and nephrology experts working together and sharing information to improve patient care.

Halamka said the “cultural alignment” of the two institutions is a critical ingredient of the collaboration and why he has high expectations for the partnership. “When I look at the values of Mayo Clinic and the values of Sheba, I believe these two organizations are the most culturally aligned of any international partnership,” he said.

Halamka joined the Mayo Clinic more than two years ago after working as chief information officer at the Beth Israel Deaconess Medical Center. He said he has seen the value of collaborations that help generate new ideas.

“It’s these joint ventures, collaborations and partnerships that bring us to new heights,” he said Halamka said in the video. “This is the first international collaboration between two organizations to scale. We really think this is going to be a game-changer.”

Both the Mayo Clinic and Sheba Medical Center have earned worldwide recognition. Both institutions earned spots in the top 10 in Newsweek’s ranking of the world’s best hospitals. Mayo topped the list, and Sheba ranked 10th.

The two organizations announced a partnership aimed to develop cutting-edge innovations that can improve healthcare around the globe. 

Mayo Clinic, Sheba Medical Center team up on healthcare technology

In a short time, virtually all abortions will be outlawed in the state of Texas.

Even now, abortion access is very limited. A court ruling last week temporarily restored a state law allowing women to obtain an abortion up until six weeks of pregnancy, a time when some women aren’t aware they’re pregnant.

In about two months at most, a more restrictive law will be in effect, 

 reports. The law will prohibit abortion in virtually all cases, except to save the life of the mother or to prevent a serious health complication.

Healthcare organizations, in Texas and around the country, largely denounced the U.S. Supreme Court ruling

 that found there’s no constitutional right to an abortion.

Gary Floyd, president of the Texas Medical Association, 

 last week, Floyd said, “We don’t need the government or third parties in our exam rooms.”

Floyd said the association is still working to analyze the impact of the law and what physicians can do. “We’re going to help our doctors try to take care of their patients,” he said.

“We’re trying to analyze what laws are going to be on the books,” he said. “We’re going to obey the state law.”

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The Texas state capitol building in Austin.

Under the law as written, patients won’t be prosecuted for obtaining an abortion. However, doctors who perform abortions illegally could face a sentence of life in prison. 

Five Texas district attorneys, representing some of the state’s largest cities, have signed 

 from around the nation saying they won’t pursue criminal charges for those who provide abortion care.

The Texas law allows doctors to perform an abortion to save a patient or if there’s a “substantial impairment of major bodily function.”

When asked for more specifics about what type of health crisis would allow a doctor to perform an abortion without the prospect of facing criminal charges, Floyd said doctors and health systems will have to make that determination.

“I think it’s going to have to be left up to the physicians’ best medical judgment. That is left in discussions in options with the patients,” Floyd said.

“It’s going to require a lot of dialogue between our organization and lawmakers to not delay needed care for patients,” he added. “That’s what you fear in cases like this, that needed care might be delayed, and if delayed could cause more problems.”

As the medical association has a better grasp of the scope of the law, the organization will be working to educate doctors, Floyd said.

“Our physicians are law-abiding citizens,” he said. “They want to stay in practice. They’re going to obey the laws.”

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The Texas Association of Obstetricians and Gynecologists

 issued a statement saying it recognizes that “thoughtful members hold a variety of positions with respect to abortion ethics.” But the group said it “strongly opposes any measures that interfere with the patient-physician relationship, especially under the threat of felony.”

“We are gravely concerned that recent state laws and now the reversal of Roe v. Wade will have unintended consequences that will potentially increase maternal risk and further worsen health disparities among our society,” the ob/gyn group said. “We also believe the best way to decrease unintended pregnancy is through prevention, including improved access to contraception.”

The group said it hopes to work with policymakers to create or revise laws relating to reproductive healthcare.

John Hawkins, president and CEO of the Texas Hospital Association, said in a statement after the Supreme Court ruling that hospitals will “stay abreast of the new laws and work with their patients to promote the healthiest outcomes.”

“As hospitals, we are committed to protecting patient health, first and foremost, as well as the availability of equitable access to safe health care services,” Hawkins said. Most abortions in Texas don’t occur in hospitals.

While the medical association criticized the ruling for interfering with the physician-patient relationship, Floyd said the Supreme Court ruling has elicited a mix of opinions from doctors. 

“We have physicians on both sides,” he said. “Some are elated and some are devastated.”

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When asked about the impact of the ruling possibly deterring some doctors from practicing in Texas or dissuading some students from attending medical schools in Texas, Floyd said that’s difficult to predict.

“I just don’t know,” Floyd said. “Most medical students will go where they get in, knowing the lay of the land.”

“Whether a person would decide to not come here or practice here, based on the restrictions to reproductive healthcare, I don’t know,” Floyd said. “Time will tell. Is that a concern? It could be a concern. We’ll just have to wait and see.”

Texas is well-known for being a conservative state, so Floyd said he would hope doctors coming to the state would be aware of that fact.

In light of the Supreme Court ruling, Floyd said he’s concerned that patients won’t go to their doctors.

“Where patients should start if they have concerns or need to be cared for, they need to start with their physician,” Floyd said. “They should not be impeded from consulting a physician.

“Our physicians are there to discuss their needs,” he said. “We support our physicians using their best medical judgment to deliver care in a timely manner.”

Gary Floyd, the head of the Texas Medical Association, said his group aims to do all it can to support doctors. The organization is still analyzing what doctors can do under the state’s law.

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Patients with E-cigarette or vaping associated lung injury (EVALI) commonly have significant long-term respiratory disability, cognitive impairment, symptoms of depression, anxiety, post-traumatic stress and persistent vaping, researchers have found.

Annals of the American Thoracic Society. 

The Food and Drug Administration last week 

One-year outcomes of 73 patients with EVALI were assessed to measure cognitive function, depression, anxiety, respiratory disability, COVID-19 infection, pulmonary function, and vaping behaviors.

Smoking rates drop among those with depression, substance use 

The patients studied were treated at the Intermountain Healthcare or University of Utah Health and completed a 12-month follow up between July 20, 2020, and Aug. 15, 2020. The majority of patients were male with a mean age of 31.1.

At the 12-month follow-up, researchers found that 48% of patients had respiratory limitations, 59% of patients had anxiety and/or depression, 62% of patients had post-traumatic stress and 6.4% of patients reported a COVID-19 infection.

Patients also reported personal impacts of vaping injuries via the Behavioral Risk Factor Surveillance Survey questions.

Survey responses indicated that 13% of patients were unable to work, 54% were still paying off healthcare bills, 24% experienced significant shortness of breath and 44% reported difficulty concentrating, remembering or making decisions due to a physical, mental or emotional condition.

Denitza Blagev, M.D., the principal investigator of the study, 

 about the long-term residual effects at the American Thoracic Society Meeting in San Francisco in May.

“Considering that most patients enrolled in this trial were young and did not have any significant co-morbidities at the time of their diagnosis, it’s really concerning,” Blagev said.

Despite the continued health impacts, 62% of patients continued to vape or smoke.

However, younger age was associated with reduced vaping behavior post-EVALI. Dr. Blagev suggests that this points to the importance of targeted outreach for young people who continue to vape.

Preliminary data from the National Youth Tobacco Survey released by the U.S. Center for Disease Control shows electronic cigarette use among teens continues to rise. 

Roughly five million teens report vaping within the past month, including 11.3% of high school students and 2.8% of middle school students.

Dr. Blagev encourages intervention by raising awareness and implementing policies to reduce vaping among young people, with a focus on mental health issues.

Campaigns should include education on the dangers of tobacco use, vaping and the continued impact of vaping injuries, despite the removal of vitamin-E acetate, an additive associated with lung injuries, from vaping products.

Patients with E-cigarette or vaping associated lung injury found to have a high risk of developing chronic issues that persist for a year or more.

Vaping injuries raise risk of respiratory problems and other issues, study finds

Life expectancy among Americans increased over a 20-year span, but a new study still shows troubling gaps among members of some racial groups.

Gains in life expectancy slowed more recently, according to the study published June 16 in 

. Researchers at the University of Washington’s School of Medicine worked with researchers from the National Institutes of Health on the study, which examined life expectancy nationally and at the county level.

From 2000-2019, the overall life expectancy of Americans rose by 2.3 years, the study found. Most of the progress came before 2010.

The study focused on the years before the emergence of the COVID-19 pandemic. However, early studies of 2020, the first year of the pandemic, show drops in lifespan, among many Americans.

U.S. lifespan fell nearly 2 years due to COVID-19 pandemic

While federal officials have focused on reducing healthcare disparities among disadvantaged groups, the study found bigger gains among members of minority groups. Between 2020 and 2019, Black Americans saw the largest increase in life expectancy (3.9 years). Asian-Americans saw an increase of 2.9 years, and the lifespan in the Latino population rose by 2.7 years.

White Americans lagged the other groups, with a gain in life expectancy of 1.7 years. The study found no difference in the lifespan of the American Indian/Alaska Native population.

Still, Black Americans continue to have a shorter lifespan than most other Americans, the study found. In 2019, the life expectancy among Black Americans was 75.3 years. By comparison, white Americans had a typical lifespan of 78.9 years in 2019.

In 2019, the longest lifespan was found in the Asian population (85.7 years), followed by the Latino population (82.2).

The American Indian/Alaska Native population had the shortest lifespan (73.1 years), the study found. In most counties, life expectancy in this group dropped.

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Eliseo J. Pérez-Stable, M.D., director of the National Institute on Minority Health and Health Disparities, a division of the NIH, was a co-author of the study. He said in a statement that the differences in lifespan raise “significant questions.”

“Why is life expectancy worse for some and better for others? The novel details in this study provide us the opportunity to evaluate the impact of social and structural determinants on health outcomes in unprecedented ways,” Pérez-Stable said. “This in turn allows us to better identify responsive and enduring interventions for local communities.”

In 2019, the estimated life expectancy among all Americans was below 65 years in some counties and over 90 years in others. That year, the gap in the American Indian/Alaska Native population was especially noteworthy, ranging from under 59 to over 93 years.

Between 2010 and 2019, virtually all racial groups nationwide saw only small increases in life expectancy. During that span, however, almost 60% of U.S. counties experienced a dip in lifespans.

From 2000 to 2019, 88% of the nation’s counties saw a rise in life expectancy, but most of the increases came between 2000 to 2010.

The COVID-19 pandemic may have wiped away some or all of the gains in life expectancy, researchers say. Early studies indicate a reduced lifespan among most Americans, with bigger declines seen among Black and Latino Americans.

Laura Dwyer-Lindgren, the study’s lead author and assistant professor of health metrics at the University of Washington’s School of Medicine, said the COVID-19 pandemic likely exacerbated disparities in healthcare outcomes.

“The pandemic exposed stressors and weaknesses in local and national systems that continuously put our most vulnerable populations at risk,” Dwyer-Lindgren said in a statement accompanying the study.

Some members of minority groups had increases in life expectancy, but wide differences are seen among Americans. The COVID-19 pandemic may have erased those gains.

Many Americans are living longer, but gaps are seen in some groups

Inga Shugalo is a Healthcare Industry Analyst at Itransition, a custom software development company headquartered in Denver, Colorado. She focuses on Healthcare IT, highlighting the industry challenges and technology solutions that tackle them.

“If you can’t measure it, you can’t improve it.”

Simple as it may sound, this phrase is the key to efficacy in any business, and healthcare is no different. The continued effort to advance quality and address patient-specific needs stands at the heart of value-based medical services.

Still, achieving the highest standards requires knowledge. While doctors are experts in treatment, it is patients who know best what service they expect from a practice or hospital. And they’re very keen to share their experiences.

Positive word-of-mouth is one of the primary factors influencing patients’ decision about the choice of a physician. Sometimes it appeals to the patient community stronger than previous success in treatment or timely return of lab results. It means that in order to thrive, healthcare providers need to pay attention to patient experience and satisfaction. But how to measure them?

Traditionally, healthcare businesses have measured patient satisfaction using printed surveys and phone interviews. Easy to implement, affordable, and accessible, these methods played an important role in gathering patient feedback. However, the shift towards value-based medicine has exposed their shortcomings.

. Manually typing in the findings of patient calls and surveys adds to the heavy workload of healthcare workers in the already busy medical care setting. Besides, human data entry is extremely error-prone.

. There’s only a limited number of calls and surveys healthcare employees can take to gather feedback. In addition, many patients may find these methods of gauging their experience too personal or intimidating, resulting in their refusal to participate.

. Traditional methods of measuring patient experience may work fine for collecting data for smaller medical facilities that don’t have a large patient base. But interpreting that data is a whole different story. Manual data analysis is an extremely time-consuming task that often requires an expert approach. And without it, the entire process of requesting patient feedback is worthless.

The answer to these limitations lies in technology. Modern automated solutions help measure the patient experience efficiently, gain essential insight into what patients think, and allow providers to act on it, regardless of the volume of patient data collected.

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CRM (Customer Relationship Management) systems are used in virtually any modern industry that involves interactions between a business and customers. They rely on data from disparate sources and communication channels to provide detailed information about the client base. By integrating and structuring data, CRM solutions allow businesses to learn more about their customers without added effort.

Medical businesses make use of vast amounts of data spread between various management tools. For them, 

 allows fully leveraging the wealth of patient records from patient portals, hospital information systems, EHRs, scheduling tools, and many other sources. The information is merged in one place, facilitating data access and sharing, all in compliance with HIPAA regulations.

Once CRM has gathered all the records, it creates a unique profile for each patient. The profile stores various parameters, such as patient activity, past and future appointments, demographics, and medical history.

Based on that information, a provider can easily group and categorize patients and adjust their services accordingly. For example, different communication channels can be used for different patient segments — seniors may prefer calls, while the younger client base would rather opt for app notifications.

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Data collection is essential for any modern healthcare provider that wants to enhance services based on patients’ input. But data overload often becomes too much to handle for many hospital managers. When there’s too much information to process, valuable input from patients may easily go unnoticed. It’s particularly problematic when patients’ complaints slip through the cracks due to excessive data volumes.

AI and machine learning help providers efficiently deal with large-scale data collection. These technologies provide assistance when medical staff can’t process all the feedback the practice is receiving. They not only deal well with large volumes of data — they thrive on it, getting more knowledgeable and relevant with each byte.

The learning capabilities of AI allow it to act preemptively rather than reactively. For instance, AI software can learn to predict which patients are at an increased risk of developing a chronic disease. The model considers not only the medical records but also the unique socioeconomic background of each patient. 

Such an approach is key in fighting illnesses like diabetes or cancer. Allowing patients and providers to act early translates into time and money savings — and patient delight.

AI finds another use in physician assessment. By factoring in patient outcomes, complaints, and praises, data analytics give hospital managers a clear overview of each professional’s performance. This is done in real-time, enabling day-to-day evaluation and prompt reaction.

A personal connection between patients and providers is undeniably important, and at the same time hard to establish — particularly in times of social distancing and a growing demand for a personalized experience. Even though chatbots still cannot replace human agents, they are getting increasingly better at mimicking human conversations and interactions in some contexts, such as providing quick feedback to patients.

A well-programmed chatbot can contribute to measuring patient experience in different ways. Diagnostic chatbots are tasked with identifying possible illnesses on the go by asking the patient about their symptoms. At the same time, they can upload this information to the patient’s profile to enhance analytics and streamline future processes, such as admission.

Additionally, a chatbot can ask the patient to rate or comment on the service quality in the facility. This feedback is easy to store since it’s digital and automatically saved after the session. Even better, it takes only a couple of seconds to collect, so that clinicians can get more input and, effectively, a more complete image of patient sentiment.

As quality and excellence are becoming the main focus of today’s medicine, providers must know their patients’ worries and expectations in order to succeed. In the future, keeping up with the needs of the modern patient will be possible only with modern technologies.

Inga Shugalo is a healthcare industry analyst at Itransition, a custom software development company headquartered in Denver, Colorado. She focuses on healthcare IT, highlighting the industry challenges and technology solutions that tackle them.

Automated solutions help measure the patient experience efficiently, gain essential insight into what patients think, and allow providers to act on that knowledge.

Measuring patient experience: Evaluating healthcare quality with modern tech | Inga Shugalo

Selwyn M. Vickers has been named the next president and chief executive officer of Memorial Sloan Kettering Cancer Center.

He will succeed Craig B. Thompson, who said earlier this year that he plans to step down. The transition will occur in September 2022, the organization said.

Vickers, 62, is an academic health system leader and a  well-known pancreatic cancer surgeon and researcher. 

He joins Memorial Sloan Kettering from the University of Alabama at Birmingham, where he serves as senior vice president for medicine and dean of the Heersink School of Medicine. He is also the CEO of both the UAB Health System and the UAB/Ascension St. Vincent’s Alliance.

“Dr. Vickers is an extraordinary surgeon-scientist with a proven track record of success in leading complex academic medical centers, building innovative academic and research programs, and strengthening clinical care. Throughout his career, he has demonstrated a passion for unlocking treatments and cures for cancer,” said Scott M. Stuart, Chair of the Memorial Sloan Kettering Cancer Center Boards of Trustees and Governing Trustees. “Dr. Vickers is a charismatic and compassionate leader who is uniquely qualified to shepherd this great organization into the future.”

At UAB, Vickers leads a statewide network of hospitals and a $5.8 billion health system that includes the eighth largest hospital in the nation, and a research enterprise of more than $350 million in federal funding, Memorial Sloan Kettering said.

Vickers said he’s “honored” to have the opportunity to lead Memorial Sloan Kettering.

“For 135 years, MSK has set the standard for excellence in caring for patients and finding new treatments and cures for cancer, and it is arguably the world’s preeminent center for the training of the next generation of scientific and physician leaders,” Vickers said in a statement.

“The basic science programs of the Sloan Kettering Institute have led the world in cancer discovery science and translational research, and I am confident that MSK is on the path to tackle one of the world’s greatest threats to life, cancer.”

Cleveland Clinic chooses new cancer center leader

Alex A. Adjei has been named as the new chair of Cleveland Clinic Taussig Cancer Institute.

Adjei will take the post in July. He succeeds Jame Abraham, M.D., who has served as interim chair of Taussig Cancer Institute since May 2021.

In other news, Cleveland Clinic names a new cancer center director, Sentara Healthcare chooses a new president, and other leaders take new roles.