Lisa Keane has been named president and COO of Wayne State University Physician Group, Dr. Jack Sobel, dean of Wayne State University School of Medicine, announced Monday.
Sobel said the experience of Keane, 52, who was executive vice president and COO of Chicago-based Northwestern Medical Faculty Foundation from 2005 to 2011, is critical to Wayne State's financial turnaround efforts.
“Lisa's extensive leadership experience with prominent academic physician practice groups is essential to addressing the issues confronting (Wayne State medical school operations),” said Sobel in a statement. “She also will play a valuable role as dean of clinical affairs as we begin to reassess our contractual relationships with our hospital partners.”
A key contract that is expiring in March is with Detroit Medical Center, Wayne State's main teaching hospital system. Officials for Wayne State said it is critical that the medical school increase payments for services rendered from DMC, which has been cut by more than half over the past eight years to less than $50 million.
In fiscal 2015 ending Sept. 30, Wayne State's medical school reported a loss of $29 million that the university has been helping to cover. Of those losses, the medical group lost $9 million.
On top of the financial problems last year were a dozen accreditation violations cited by the Chicago-based Liaison Committee for Medical Education against the 1,200-student medical school.
In October, LCME notified Wayne State that it had made sufficient progress to lift its accreditation probation status. Instead, the Detroit-based medical school has been placed on the less punitive “accreditation with warning.”
While Keane's job is a new position, she effectively replaces Nicole Mascia, UPG's former chief of corporate affairs and COO who resigned in November.
As expected with the appointment of Keane, Omar Khan, M.D., has resigned as CEO of UPG and Mark Juzych, M.D., has resigned as the group's chief medical officer.
“Despite their demanding roles as department chairs, Drs. Khan and Juzych both volunteered their leadership talents to help steer WSUPG during a challenging period,” Sobel said in a statement.
At Northwestern, Keane's primary responsibilities included directing business and operations, developing strategies that supported the mission and growth of the enterprise, and developing operational and financial plans, tactics and organizational structures that allowed those strategies to be executed and business objectives to be realized, Wayne State officials said.
She oversaw finance, budgets and planning, revenue cycle operations; managed care contracting, human resources and general administration.
From 2011 to 2014, Keane also served in various executive vice president roles at the University of Chicago Medicine.
Keane also has served as a consultant on physician compensation to other medical schools and the Association of American Medical Colleges.
