Between various stints, Shannon, a native of west suburban La Grange, Ill., has been with the county system for about 15 years. He came back to Cook County in 2013 after serving as the chief medical officer of the Parkland Health & Hospital System in Dallas.
Parkland in recent years had a near-death experience. Starting in 2008, the safety net hospital, best known for treating the mortally wounded President John F. Kennedy, faced a series of state and federal investigations into its clinical and financial practices. Those probes culminated in 2011 when the CMS, in a rare move, threatened to exclude the hospital from Medicare and Medicaid, putting at risk nearly $500 million a year in payments. But in August 2013, after more than two years of intensive corrective action by executive leadership and the board of managers, the CMS removed the 769-bed hospital from probation and said it was in substantial compliance with federal conditions of participation.
As interim CEO, Shannon already is well familiar with Raju's signature initiative. CountyCare is a new managed-care Medicaid program that expanded insurance coverage. On July 1, CountyCare ends its trial run and becomes an official Medicaid entity under the state Department of Healthcare and Family Services.
The system also is getting into the health insurance business, organizing to sell plans in the fall on the state's insurance exchange, created under Obamacare.
Earlier this year, Cook County Health Board Chairman David Carvalho said the new CEO will continue what Raju started.
The county health network includes John H. Stroger Jr. Hospital on the Near West Side, Provident Hospital on the South Side and a network of clinics. The system, which had $1 billion in 2013 total revenue, treats a large portion of uninsured and low-income patients.
A native of west suburban LaGrange Park, Ill., Shannon is the son of a nurse and a plastic film salesman and the eighth of 12 children. After studying biology at Spring Hill College in Mobile, Ala., he earned a medical degree at Rush Medical College on Chicago's Near West Side. He then completed an internship and residency in internal medicine at the University of Texas and a pulmonary and critical care medicine fellowship at the University of Michigan.
"Cook County health system names new CEO" originally appeared on the website of Crain's Chicago Business.
