STORIES

Hopkins' chief-to-be reassures

By Carol Gentry
7/22/2010 © Health News Florida

The Johns Hopkins professor in line to become physician-in-chief at All Children’s Hospital if the merger announced Wednesday is signed says the physicians who treat patients and do clinical research there should not be affected.

“It’s an incredible clinical enterprise, excellent in research as well,” said Dr. Jonathan Ellen, vice chair of pediatrics at Johns Hopkins University School of Medicine and chair of pediatrics at one of the school’s affiliated hospitals in Baltimore.

All Children’s Hospital has “very dedicated doctors” and the town-gown partnership “works really well,” Ellen said. “The concept that we’d walk in and change that for the sake of change would not be prudent.

“There’s no intention to disturb the status quo at all. I mean that completely.”

In the interview, Ellen said he anticipated that the University of South Florida’s teaching program at All Children’s would end in three to five years to be replaced by a new one created by Johns Hopkins -- a supposition that contradicted a release from USF that said its educational program at All Children’s, which includes medical students, residents and clinical faculty appointments, would not be affected.

After Health News Florida questioned the contradiction, Dr. Ellen said in an e-mail that he had not been part of the discussion between the deans and his speculation may have been hasty.

“USF has much to say in how our future relationship moves forward educationally,” the e-mail said, “and those discussions have not yet occurred.”

All Children’s Hospital and Johns Hopkins “remain positive in our ability to find areas of potential collaboration” with USF, he wrote.

The confusion may be inevitable in a surprise announcement of this magnitude. One of the country’s top teaching hospitals announced this week a letter of intent to acquire the independent children’s hospital in St. Petersburg, which has a brand new 259-bed campus.

While no cash will change hands, Johns Hopkins has agreed to be financially responsible for All Children’s debt. According to a St. Petersburg Times report  today, that debt is $240 million. The hospital has about $200 million in cash, the report said.

Dr. Ellen said he has visited the hospital several times in the past year, meeting many of the physicians as well as administrators. It was an impressive group, he said.

“The real story is there is no pre-conceived ideas about how (the merger) could be,” Ellen said. “Early on, that was agreement. We didn’t say there’s one way or the highway.

“We have certain goals, to create new kind of residency. ..We’re looking for new ways to train residents that are more tailored to particular outcomes (if doctors in training plan to go into academic research vs. primary care).

“Having the same cookie-cutter approach to all of them may be inefficient and not the best way to train people,” he said. “So there is a push from the American Academy of Pediatrics …to create new models of residency training…People don’t know what the new models are, but they want to play with them…

“This will blend together over time,” he said. “I don’t think anyone has a simple answer. You would never walk in and say, ‘We’re going to change all the doctors, or we’re going to change the relationship with USF, because what they’ve got is working well.”

When academic institutions join hospitals, it can cause fear of immediate change, he said. But there won’t be immediate change at All Children’s, he said. “I don’t know what the time horizon will be,” he said.

It will take several months to complete the acquisition, outlined Tuesday by Johns Hopkins and All Children’s in a “letter of intent.”

Assuming it goes through, Dr. Ellen, deputy division chief at Johns Hopkins Bayview Medical Center in Baltimore, will become the interim vice dean and physician-in-chief at All Children’s for 18 months. Later there will be a decision whether to bring in someone else.

He will not be replacing anyone on staff, since All Children’s doesn’t have a “physician-in-chief” now. Ellen’s arrival will have no effect on the status of the medical staff chief, orthopedist Greg Hahn, who has a private practice.

“We’re not changing their management,” Ellen said. “I’m there to help and bring in these other academic pieces.”

A bio of Dr. Ellen on the Johns Hopkins Web site says he is the recipient of many awards and grants from CDC and National Institutes of Health. 

--Carol Gentry, Editor, can be reached at 727-410-3266 or by e-mail.