Congratulations!

Modern Healthcare is proud to recognize and celebrate the 2014 Top 25 Minority Executives in Healthcare. Each of these esteemed honorees has demonstrated outstanding leadership, dedication and the ability to influence positive change. We are inspired by and grateful for their vision and impact on the evolution of healthcare.

ANTHONY ARMADA

CEO

Swedish Health Services

Armada, 54, has been CEO of Seattle-based Swedish Health since last November. He joined the not-for-profit system from Advocate Lutheran General Hospital in Park Ridge, Ill., where he served as president of the 624-bed academic and research hospital beginning in 2009. A past board chairman of the Institute for Diversity in Health Management, Armada appeared on Modern Healthcare’s list of the Top 25 Minority Executives in Healthcare in 2008 and 2010.

DR. KELVIN BAGGETT

Senior VP, chief clinical officer

Tenet Healthcare Corp.

Baggett, 42, first joined Dallas-based Tenet in October 2009 as chief medical officer, after serving as vice president of clinical strategy and chief operating officer for HCA’s clinical services group. During an earlier fellowship as a Robert Wood Johnson Clinical Scholar at the Johns Hopkins University School of Medicine, Baltimore, Baggett’s work focused on improving safety, quality and service. It’s Baggett’s second consecutive time on the biennial Top 25 Minority Executives in Healthcare roster.

DR. GEORGES BENJAMIN

Executive director

American Public Health Association

Benjamin, 61, has been at the helm of the American Public Health Association, Washington, since 2002. Prior to APHA, Benjamin served as Maryland’s secretary of health, where he oversaw expansion of the state’s Medicaid program. A board-certified internal medicine physician, Benjamin began his career in the Army, eventually serving as chief of emergency medicine at Walter Reed Army Medical Center. Benjamin has appeared on both Modern Healthcare’s lists of 100 Most Influential People in Healthcare and 50 Most Influential Physician Executives for multiple years.

RUTH BRINKLEY

President and CEO

KentuckyOne Health

Brinkley heads Louisville-based KentuckyOne Health, a system that is the product of the 2012 merger of Jewish Hospital & St. Mary’s HealthCare and St. Joseph Health System. She also serves as senior vice president of operations at Catholic Health Initiatives. When Brinkley, 62, was last named to Modern Healthcare’s Top 25 Minority Executives in Healthcare list in 2010, she was president and CEO of Cardondelet Health Network in Tucson, Ariz., as well as West Ministry market leader for its parent, Ascension Health.

DR. GEORGE BROWN

President and CEO

Legacy Health

Since 2008, Brown, 66, has led Legacy Health, a five-hospital system based in Portland, Ore. Brown also chairs Health Share of Oregon, which provides care for 140,000 low-income residents and is an outgrowth of Tri-County Medicaid Collaborative, of which Brown was a founding member. Its purpose is to serve local Medicaid patients through coordinated care. Brown is a gastroenterologist who began his medical career in the military where he served in commanding officer roles before retiring from active military service in 1999.

RICHARD CORDOVA

President and CEO

Children’s Hospital Los Angeles

Cordova, 64, has been an honoree in Modern Healthcare’s Top 25 Minority Executives in Healthcare recognition program in 2006, 2008 and 2010. He has served as governor of the American College of Healthcare Executives since 2011 and has recently been named chairman-elect. Before Cordova joined Children’s Hospital in 2005, he served as chief operating officer and then president of the Southern California region of Kaiser Permanente Health Plan and Hospitals, which is responsible for 11 hospitals and a 3 million-member health plan.

LLOYD DEAN

President and CEO

Dignity Health

Dean, 63, has led San Francisco-based Dignity Health since 2000, when it was still known as Catholic Healthcare West. The name change was part of a long-term growth strategy that led to a restructuring of the system’s governing board. Before Dean arrived, the system suffered losses of more than $800 million between 1997 and 2000. He is credited with returning the organization to profitability four years later. Dean has been named to Modern Healthcare’s biennial list of the Top 25 Minority Executives in Healthcare all five times.

PAUL DIAZ

CEO

Kindred Healthcare

Diaz, 52, has served as CEO of Louisville, Ky.-based Kindred since 2004. The post-acute-care provider has annual revenue of about $5 billion with 63,000 employees across 47 states and merged with RehabCare in 2011, which it purchased for $900 million. An accounting and finance graduate, Diaz also holds a law degree from Georgetown University and has established a scholarship to help and promote ethnic diversity. It’s the fourth time Diaz has been named to the biennial list of the Top 25 Minority Executives in Healthcare.

DR. VICTOR DZAU

President

Institute of Medicine

Dzau began his six-year term as president of the Institute of Medicine on July 1, 2014. Previously, he served as chancellor of health affairs at Duke University, Durham, N.C., and was president and CEO of the university’s health system. He also was the James B. Duke professor of medicine. Dzau is known for his pioneering work in gene therapy for vascular disease, research that has contributed to the development of cardiovascular drugs that are now used worldwide to treat high blood pressure and congestive heart failure. It is Dzau’s first time on the biennial list of the Top 25 Minority Executives in Healthcare.

KENNETH FRAZIER

Chairman and CEO

Merck & Co.

Since 2011, Frazier has served in the top leadership role at the Whitehouse Station, N.J.based drugmaker. Frazier, 59, first joined the pharmaceutical giant in 1992 as vice president, general counsel and secretary of the Astra/Merck group. A Harvard Law School graduate, Frazier was elected and promoted to numerous positions within the company before becoming president and finally chair and chief executive three years ago. Before joining Merck, Frazier was a partner with a Philadelphia law firm.

DR. SAM HO

Executive VP and chief medical officer

UnitedHealthcare

In his roles at commercial insurer UnitedHealth Group, Ho, 63, is helping the organization lead the way in accountable care expansion. Last year, UnitedHealth announced it would commit $50 billion annually to contract with doctors and hospitals based on quality and cost-efficiency measures. Ho, a family medicine physician, joined PacifiCare of California in 1994 as vice president. Eleven years later, UnitedHealth Group acquired PacifiCare Health Systems.

KEVIN LOFTON

President and CEO

Catholic Health Initiatives

Lofton, 59, has led the Englewood, Colo.-based health system since 2003. He first joined CHI in 1998 as president of its former Southeast Region. The system includes 89 hospitals across 18 states, reports annual revenue of nearly $11 billion, a $4 billion increase under Lofton’s watch. In the past fiscal year, CHI also gave $762 million in charity care. Lofton has appeared on all five of Modern Healthcare’s biennial lists of the Top 25 Minority Executives in Healthcare.

DAVID LOPEZ

President and CEO

Harris Health System

After a year as interim president and CEO of the Harris County Hospital District, now known as Harris Health System, Lopez was named to the permanent executive role at the Houston-based organization in 2005. Lopez, 61, initially joined the three-hospital system in 2000 as executive vice president and COO after more than 20 years in other healthcare administrative and executive roles. This is the third time he has been named to Modern Healthcare’s biennial list of the Top 25 Minority Executives in Healthcare.

DR. RISA LAVIZZO-MOUREY

President and CEO

Robert Wood Johnson Foundation

Lavizzo-Mourey, 59, has spent the past decade as chief executive of the Robert Wood Johnson Foundation, a health policy and healthcare-focused philanthropic organization that distributes about $400 million in grants and contracts. Lavizzo-Mourey has more than three decades of experience including as a practicing physician, healthcare policy leader, professor and not-for-profit executive. Lavizzo-Mourey last year was also named to Modern Healthcare’s biennial list of the Top 25 Women in Healthcare.

PATRICIA MARYLAND

President of healthcare operations, COO

Ascension Health

Maryland was promoted last July to president of healthcare operations and COO of St. Louis-based Ascension Health, the nation’s largest Catholic health system. At that time, she was serving as Michigan Ministry market leader for Ascension, and president and CEO of Ascension’s St. John Providence Health System, Detroit. Maryland holds a doctorate in public health and continues to serve as ministry market leader for Michigan.

DR. ANA PUJOLS-MCKEE

Executive VP and chief medical officer

Joint Commission

Pujols-McKee became executive vice president and chief medical officer of the Oakbrook Terrace, Ill. Joint Commission in 2011 where she develops and oversees policies and strategies to promote patient safety and healthcare quality improvement. Prior to 2011, she served as CMO and associate executive director of Penn Presbyterian Medical Center in Philadelphia and is board certified in internal medicine.

DR. RAM RAJU

President and CEO

New York City Health and Hospitals Corp.

Raju, 62, began his healthcare career as a pediatric cardiothoracic surgeon in New York. After moving into public health administration, he became CEO of the Cook County Health & Hospitals System in 2011. He helped the county obtain a federal waiver for adults newly eligible for Medicaid under the Affordable Care Act, giving an additional 75,000 residents access to primary and specialty care. He was recently appointed president and CEO of the New York City Health and Hospitals Corp.

DR. PREM REDDY Chairman, president and CEO Prime Healthcare Services

In 2001, Reddy, a board-certified internist and cardiologist, founded Prime Healthcare Services, a privately held for-profit company in Ontario, Calif., that operates 20 acute-care hospitals in California, Nevada, Pennsylvania and Texas. In 1994, Reddy built Desert Valley Hospital in Victorville, Calif., which he sold and then reacquired to become one of Prime’s first hospitals. Reddy, 65, is committed to charity through the Prime Healthcare Services Foundation and the Dr. Prem Reddy Family Foundation.

DR. YVETTE ROUBIDEAUX

Acting director U.S.

Indian Health Service

Roubideaux, 51, a member of the Rosebud Sioux tribe in South Dakota, is in her second four-year term leading the Indian Health Service, the principal federal healthcare provider and advocate for 2.2 million American Indians and Alaska Natives across 566 tribes. Roubideaux, a primary-care physician, leads initiatives to address diabetes and other health issues in the communities, and has directed university programs to attract these populations into health professions.

ERIC SHINSEKI

Former Secretary

U.S. Veterans Affairs Department

Shinseki, a retired four-star U.S. Army general, served as the seventh secretary of the Veterans Affairs Department from 2009 to May 2014. The VA operates the country’s largest integrated healthcare system of 135 hospitals and hundreds of other facilities serving nearly 9 million veterans each year. Before retiring from active duty in 2003, Shinseki served as the Army’s chief of staff during Operations Enduring Freedom and Iraqi Freedom.

DR. BRUCE SIEGEL

President and CEO

America’s Essential Hospitals

Since 2010, Siegel has served as president and CEO of America’s Essential Hospitals, Washington, formerly the National Association of Public Hospitals and Health Systems. The organization represents more than 200 hospitals and health systems that provide care to low-income, uninsured and vulnerable populations. Siegel, 53, previously served as director of the Center for Health Care Quality and professor of health policy at George Washington University’s School of Public Health and Health Services. This is the first time Siegel has been selected for Modern Healthcare’s biennial Top 25 Minority Executives in Healthcare recognition.

DR. PATRICK SOON-SHIONG

Chairman

Chan Soon-Shiong Family Foundation

Soon-Shiong, a surgeon, medical researcher and entrepreneur, is founder and chairman of the Chan Soon-Shiong Family Foundation, which funds healthrelated research and projects. He also serves as chairman and CEO of the foundation’s Institute for Advanced Health and the Healthcare Transformation Institute. Soon-Shiong founded the National Coalition for Health Integration to create a national health network for securely sharing biomedical information, as well as NantHealth, the developer of a cloud-based clinical operating system.

BERNARD J. TYSON

Chairman and CEO

Kaiser Permanente

Tyson, 55, was named CEO of Oakland, Calif.-based Kaiser Permanente in July 2013. Six months later, in January, he assumed the role of chairman. From 2010 to 2013, as president and COO, Tyson oversaw the opening of 14 hospitals. Kaiser now includes 32 hospitals, 9.1 million health plan members, 175,000 employees and 17,000 physicians. Tyson has advocated for the use of aggregated data from members’ electronic health records to help eliminate healthcare disparities, while determining the most effective treatments for the best clinical outcomes.

DR. ROBERT WAH

Chief medical officer

Computer Sciences Corp.

Since 2007, Wah has served as vice president and CMO at healthcare information technology company Computer Sciences Corp. in Falls Church, Va. In June, he became president of the American Medical Association. Wah, 56, is a reproductive endocrinologist and OB-GYN. He has served on the faculty at Harvard Medical School, Boston; the University of California, San Diego; and the Uniformed Services University of the Health Sciences, Bethesda, Md. Wah now practices and teaches at Walter Reed National Military Center.

EUGENE WOODS

Executive VP and COO

Christus Health

Woods, 49, has been executive vice president and COO for Irving, Texas-based Christus for three years. Woods joined 16-hospital Christus from Catholic Health Initiatives’ Lexington, Ky.-based regional organization, St. Joseph Health System. He became CEO of St. Joseph in 2007 after leading the integration of seven Kentucky hospitals into the regional group. Before joining CHI, Woods was COO at the Washington (D.C.) Hospital Center, a teaching hospital with nearly 800 beds.