by
Diana Bradley, Staff Writer | October 26, 2012
From the October 2012 issue of HealthCare Business News magazine
Although Chantal Weinhold has been in her current role for three years, her full time with North Shore LIJ Health System spans three decades. She took some time to speak with DOTmed Business News about some of the high points during that time and plans for the future.
DMBN: What have been some of the highlights during your time with the hospital?
CW: The highlights have been the ability to develop a phenomenal leadership team here and to make significant changes in the way we provide care. We have been able to improve health care delivery, focusing a lot on hospitality as the branding for LIJ, providing an environment where our employees respect each other and as a result are able to extend that caring attitude toward patients.
We have also become extremely efficient in how we do the business of health care. This is due to the fact that we have been under construction for over three years. Despite this, we have not seen a drop in our patient volume; in fact, volume has increased at a time when everything was very disrupted. So we were forced to learn how to be conscious of our expenses and attend to our patients as quickly as we possibly could, because of the increasing demand on our ED and inpatient arena.
Further to this, we hired an industrial engineer a year ago. We felt that bringing people outside of the industry, like industrial engineers, into health care would be a great way to have a different perspective on what we could improve.
DMBN: What are some of your personal goals as executive director?
CW: My personal goal is to help transition LIJ and be part of the health system, really positioning us for what the future of health care will require. We are going into a challenging time for health care delivery in general. I want us to be extremely successful and to continue to provide the highest level of quality care we possibly can to our region and be at the forefront of the shift in a positive and sustainable delivery of health care.
DMBN: Do you interact with CEOs or executive directors from other hospitals/health care facilities? If so, how has that benefited you?
CW: We have 15 facilities here, so we interact a lot amongst ourselves. But also, we have a group of five individuals enrolled in the Dartmouth Masters Program for health care delivery sciences. We have interacted with other executive directors who also have supported and sponsored individuals from their facilities to be there. A lot of the work there is geared towards trying to understand future leaders’ ability to be able to drive health care in the right direction. Along with interacting with CEOs of large health systems and many types of health care delivery entities, we also interact with CEOs of insurance companies, and it’s really fascinating. On a national basis, we get out to some national meetings and have an opportunity to interact there as well.
DMBN: Does your hospital have any big announcements or developments on the horizon?
CW: Our new bed tower has been our biggest change; we have made a significant commitment to a large number of single beds as we move forward. On the horizon, it’s really just a matter of refining and continuing to build our brand.
