08 | GBMC HEALTHCARE SYSTEM IN BALTIMORE
MAKING THE TRANSITION FROM PRACTICE TO LEADERSHIP During his early years of training and work, Chessare had the chance to study under mentors who were ahead of their time in applying evidencebased care techniques and in implementing quality improvement. He eventually left regular practice to focus full-time on administration, working to redesign care at Albany Medical Center, then becoming chief medical officer at Boston Medical Center. “My time at Boston was great,” he said. “I was part of a small group of leaders who were committed to redesigning care and making care for poorer people just as high quality as for those of higher means.” In 2005, he became president of Caritas Christi Health Care System’s Caritas Norwood Hospital in Boston, Mass., and joined GBMC in June 2010. GBMC is a 300-bed acute-care not-for-profit hospital. The GBMC system also includes Greater Baltimore Health Alliance, a group of more than 200 multispecialty physicians in locations throughout the region, and Gilchrist Hospice Care.
BRINGING REFORM TO PATIENTS AND PHYSICIANS
This was when the Greater Baltimore Health Alliance was born. “We decided to make the hospital become a cost center and build a primary-care company that
When Chessare came to GBMC, the board was
could coordinate care and fight to keep people
nervous because many standalone hospitals were
out of the hospital, but still take advantage of our
folding or having to join with larger organizations.
wonderful hospital when needed,” he said. “We had
The current U.S. healthcare system doesn’t offer
no future as a standalone hospital, but we had a
much support for smaller hospitals to remain
phenomenal future if we could become a commu-
independent, and Chessare was not content with
nity-based health system.”
that future. “I started educating the board about the need
By system, Chessare refers more to the patient experiencing a system designed to keep him or her
for reform, not in terms of the Affordable Care Act,
healthy. He is frustrated with the country’s health-
but about the absurdity of the status quo,” he said.
care infrastructure being designed to provide many
“The board started embracing the need to redesign
services without reflecting on the coordination of
a better system, and we developed our vision state-
the patient’s care and trying to prevent hospitaliza-
ment.”
tions. The lack of coordination may benefit inves-
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