Physicians are increasingly taking on leadership positions at hospitals and health systems across the country. Here are 50 things to know about chief medical officers and medical directors.
CMO responsibilities
The following data is gathered from the Advisory Board's report, "What does the CMO role look like today?" with findings presented at the Chief Clinical Executive Summit based on the organization's 2016 CMO Role Survey, which included 116 CMOs.
1. Ninety-six percent of health systems have a physician executive.
2. Clinical expertise and personal relationships with fellow physicians are the two skills CMOs are most confident in when entering into the CMO role.
3. Ninety-five percent of the CMOs said they were confident they'll hit annual goals.
4. Organizations spend more than $100,000 per year on physician leadership development, targeting the up-and-coming physicians.
5. A large portion — 86 percent — of the CMOs surveyed in the Advisory Board's 2012 survey reported wanting to offload responsibilities to other leaders, most likely medical staff tasks. CMOs that are most successful focus on their top priorities, according to the report.
6. The most time-consuming responsibilities for CMOs today are:
• Patient safety and quality improvement
• Medical staff affairs
• Physician engagement
7. When thinking strategically, CMOs project their top priorities in three years will be:
• Patient safety and quality improvement
• Executive leadership such as corporate strategic planning
• Identifying and developing future physician leaders
8. Most CMOs are relatively new to their systems; 47 percent have spent just one to two years at the system. Twelve percent have been in the CMO role at their system for three to four years and 16 percent have been CMOs at their system for five to six years. Twenty percent of the CMOs surveyed were in their role for seven or more years.
9. Forty-eight percent of the CMOs who no longer practice medicine said their role is largely administrative; 11 percent of CMOs who continue to practice medicine with more than 20 percent of their time said the same.
10. The skills CMOs think are most critical for success include:
• Ability to influence others
• Communication
• Change management
CMO compensation
Cejka Executive Search in partnership with the American Association for Physician Leadership released the 10th biennial Physician Leadership Compensation Survey on Nov. 3, 2016. The survey collected data in July 2016 from 2,353 physician leaders.
11. The average compensation for physician leaders in 2016: $350,000, up 8 percent from 2013
12. The average compensation for physician leaders with emerging roles in the C-suite: $499,000, up 6 percent from 2013
13. Physician CEO/presidents average compensation: $437,000, up 7 percent from 2013
14. CMO average compensation: $388,000, up 6 percent from 2013
15. CIO/CMIO average compensation: $372,000, up 18 percent from 2013
16. The CIO/CMIO leadership role reported the greatest compensation increase because the job description is moving from implementing EMR data to ensuring the data's usability and supporting preventative care at the individual provider level. These individuals are also often responsible for risk-based accountable care at the enterprise level.
17. Physician leaders focused on clinical initiatives who serve as president of the medical staff or medical director saw a 26 percent compensation increase from 2013 to 2016.
18. Sixty-one percent of physician leaders said they have more strategic input at their hospital or health system last year than in 2013.
19. Fifty-four percent of physician leaders report having multiple or shared administrative reporting relationships; 49 percent of these physicians are administratively accountable for two or more people and 29 percent have shared direct reports.
The following data is based on MGMA's "Medical Directorship and On-Call Compensation Survey: 2011 Report" and "Medical Directorship and On-Call Compensation Survey: 2014 Report Based on 2013 Data."
20. In the 2011 survey, nonsurgical medical directors who attended meetings reported 8.6 percent higher compensation than medical directors who weren't responsible for attending meetings. Nonsurgical medical directors who attended meetings earned an average of $43,421 per year compared to $40,001 annually for medical directors who weren't responsible for attending meetings.
21. The surgical specialist medical directors who were responsible for documentation and care planning reportedly received less compensation than those who didn't; the medical directors who didn't focus on documentation and care planning received 26.5 percent more than those who did.
22. Primary care physician medical directors that didn't have documentation and care planning responsibilities received 6.3 percent less in compensation than primary care physician medical directors who did have that responsibility.
23. Primary care physician medical directors who had recruitment responsibilities reported $27,500 in average compensation for their medical directorship, compared with their counterparts without the responsibility who received $20,000.
24. The majority of survey respondents said medical director responsibilities took four to six hours weekly.
25. Medical directors who were anatomical and clinical pathologists by training reported spending the most hours per week on their medical directorships — 31 hours. Noninvasive cardiologists reported spending three hours per week on their medical directorships, the lowest of any medical director specialists.
26. Around 32.7 percent of the respondents had responsibilities tied to patient satisfaction, quality of care and patient safety. The breakdown is:
• Patient satisfaction: 66.99 percent
• CMS core measures: 61.54 percent
• Compliance: 60.58 percent
The following data is based on the Sullivan, Cotter and Associates report "Physician Compensation and Productivity Survey Report, 2015 Based on 2014 Data."
27. Medical directors in surgical care received an average medical quality incentive payment of $16,961.
28. Hospital-based care medical directors received an average quality incentive bonus of $15,596.
29. Medical directors in medical care received an average quality incentive payment of $13,495.
30. Medical directors in specialty care received an average of quality incentive bonus $11,579.
Top CMO characteristics
The following data was gathered from Integrated Healthcare Strategies' "Sharing Insights, Discussing Trends: What Makes a Chief Medical Officer Effective?" The report is based on a national panel of CEOs and CMOs who ranked 25 leadership behaviors. The participants answered the importance of each characteristic for success, with 10 being "extremely important" and 0 being "not at all Important."
31. Importance of behavioral characteristics:
• Ranked No. 1: Passionate about patient safety and quality
• Ranked No. 2: Good problem-solving skills
• Ranked No. 3: Committed to the organization's mission and values
• Ranked No. 4: Inspires respect from peers and staff
• Ranked No. 5: Good listening skills
32. The qualities CEOs say are most important for CMOs:
• Ranked No. 1: Passionate about patient safety and quality
• Ranked No. 2: Encourages teamwork and collaboration among physicians
• Ranked No. 3: Committed to the organization's mission and values
• Ranked No. 4: Committed to evidence-based medicine
• Ranked No. 5: Able to lead standardization of care processes
33. The qualities CMOs think are most important for their position:
• Ranked No. 1: Good problem-solving skills
• Ranked No. 2: Passionate about patient safety and quality
• Ranked No. 3: Inspires respect by peers and staff
• Ranked No. 4: Good listening skills
• Ranked No. 5: Strong advocate for patients
34. CMO success depends on their ability to be "transformative" as research shows transformational leaders can cultivate an engaged workforce that would lead to "outstanding business performance and operational success," according to the Integrated Healthcare Strategies report.
The following data is gathered from the Association of Medical Directors of Information Systems' "Compensation Survey Physician Executives in Information Technology" conducted in partnership with Witt/Kieffer. The survey includes responses from 248 physician leaders and was released in February 2015.
35. Thirty-two percent of physician leader respondents reported having clinical informatics board certification and 30.2 percent reported having formal informatics training.
36. The percentage of physician leaders' income derived from clinical work is:
• 0 to 5 percent of income: 57.9 percent
• 6 to 20 percent of income: 19.9 percent
• 21 percent of income: 22.2 percent
37. Almost all — 90.1 percent — of the physician leaders said they are leading optimization of clinical systems at their organization.
38. Fifty-five percent of the physician leaders report being a member of the hospital or health system's executive leadership.
Recent CMO appointments
Here are 12 CMOs who were appointed to their position since August 2016.
39. Saint Agnes Healthcare in Baltimore, part of St. Louis-based Ascension, named Nancy Hammond, MD, CMO in February.
40. Chicago-based Swedish Covenant Hospital named Bruce McNulty, MD, vice president and CMO in January. He was previously chairman of emergency medicine, president of Swedish Emergency Associates and a board member for Swedish Covenant Hospital.
41. Indianapolis-based Eskenazi Health Center named Kenneth Klotz, MD, CMO in January after he served as the chief physician executive at Eskenazi Health West 38th Street for three years.
42. Simi Valley (Calif.) Hospital named John Dingilian, MD, the full time CMO in January after having served in the role part time since 2012.
43. NYC Health + Hospitals/Lincoln named Anita Soni, MD, CMO in January. She previously served as the hospital's CMO from 2007 to 2009 and was in the interim CMO role over the past two years.
44. TriStar Hendersonville (Tenn.) Medical Center named Brett Branson, MD, CMO in January. He will continue as an OBGYN at TriStar Medical Group Bluegrass OB/GYN in addition to his new role.
45. OSF Saint Anthony's Health Center in Alton, Ill., named Dennis Sands, MD, vice president and CMO in October. He was previously medical director of the women and children's clinical services unit at Froedtert & the Medical College of Wisconsin, Community Memorial Hospital in Menomonee Falls, Wis.
46. Henry Mayo Newhall (Calif.) Hospital named Kingman Ho, MD, vice president of professional services and CMO in October. In that role, he became the primary liaison between the hospital leadership and medical staff.
47. In October 2016, Methodist Dallas Medical Center named Les Cler, MD, CMO after he spent six years as an internal medicine physician with Methodist Health System, including two years as Methodist Mansfield Medical Center's physician advisor.
48. TriHealth in Cincinnati appointed Michael A. Bain, MD, its first chief medical informatics officer in September.
49. Massachusetts General Hospital in Boston named O'Neil Britton, MD, senior vice president and CMO effective Sept. 15. Dr. Britton was previously the chief health information officer at Boston-based Partners HealthCare and executive director of Partners eCare.
50. Penn State Health Milton S. Hershey Medical Center named Thomas Tracy Jr., MD, CMO in June and he assumed his new responsibilities in August. He previously spent 19 years in leadership roles at Brown University's Warren Alpert Medical School and Lifespan health system, both in Providence, R.I.