Five Questions With: Charles Reppucci

Charles Reppucci, executive director and chief operating officer with the Providence law firm Hinckley Allen & Snyder LLC, is the newly elected chairman of the Care New England board of directors. / HORNICK RIVLIN/HINCKLEY ALLEN & SNYDER LLC
Charles Reppucci, executive director and chief operating officer with the Providence law firm Hinckley Allen & Snyder LLC, is the newly elected chairman of the Care New England board of directors. / HORNICK RIVLIN/HINCKLEY ALLEN & SNYDER LLC

Charles Reppucci, executive director and chief operating officer with the Providence law firm Hinckley Allen & Snyder LLC, is the newly elected chairman of the Care New England board of directors. Reppucci talks with PBN about potential upcoming changes and challenges for Care New England.

PBN: What management and other expertise do you bring from your work at Hinckley Allen that will inform your work as chairman of the CNE board, and what do you hope to accomplish as board chairman?
REPPUCCI:
I acquired financial acumen practicing as a CPA in the 1970s and ‘80s. During the same period, I was also acquiring executive management experience in for-profit organizations. For the past 30 years at Hinckley Allen, I have been the senior non-legal executive responsible for managing the firm’s expansive operations. From a local Providence firm, Hinckley Allen now has 150 lawyers and 200 support personnel located in six offices in five Northeast states, and it has been recognized as one of the country’s top 200 law firms by the American Lawyer publication.

The rapid changes in our country’s reimbursement systems have necessitated that all providers, including Care New England, embrace the significant challenge of reducing costs and, at the same time, focusing on quality care. As the board chair, I will continue the board’s emphasis on a culture that places the patient at the center of our strategic planning and decision-making. The emphasis to provide accessible quality care offered with compassion – regardless of [the patient’s] status in life drives us as a board, a health care system and a workforce.

PBN: Is a merger between Care New England and Southcoast Health likely to happen? If so, how soon might it be completed?

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REPPUCCI: We believe the proposed affiliation of Care New England and Southcoast makes inherent good sense. We are coming together in a partnership of equals to advance our common missions of providing community-based care and improving the health of the population in our regional community. We are working now through the due diligence phase and the development of a definitive affiliation agreement, and we expect that work will be completed by mid-February. We will then proceed with the needed regulatory and other approvals, which we expect will take approximately six to 12 months, once our application has been deemed complete.

PBN: What are the major challenges that such a merger must overcome in order to occur? And are any of them related to patient care?

REPPUCCI: The challenges associated with the merger are tantamount to the challenges faced by all health care organizations in the new environment of care. We are moving from a hospital-centric model to one that is focused on community-based care and population health management. We need to rethink the paradigm of health care delivery and focus on keeping people well and out of the hospital and doing it all with better outcomes and lower costs. Fortunately, we believe Care New England and Southcoast Health are up to the task. Both of our organizations have formed Accountable Care Organizations and made population health management a priority.

PBN: What are the most pressing challenges facing the Care New England board of directors … today and in the near future?

REPPUCCI: Without question, bending the cost curve is the paramount challenge facing all health care organizations [is the most pressing challenge]. Even revered health care systems have gone through considerable cost cutting to maintain their reputations of quality care and financial stability. We are perhaps challenged locally in an even greater way because of the caps imposed on us by the Office of the Health Insurance Commissioner, which has limited commercial rate increases to 1 to 2 percent, which is even below the CPI. We are responding to this challenge at Care New England through a major series of initiatives to reduce costs, improve revenue generation and enhance our processes.

PBN: How can a large hospital system like Care New England – with so many entities serving such diverse constituencies – remain nimble, efficient and responsive to patients’ needs?

REPPUCCI: We are working to improve systemization and standardization across all of the Care New England operating units with a goal of improving our care effectiveness, cost efficiency and responsiveness to the marketplace. Yet, with as many changes present in today’s health care environment, we remain dedicated to our historic focus on patients and their families. We are pleased that this focus has been informed in recent years through formal community health needs assessments done in collaboration with the Hospital Association of Rhode Island and the Rhode Island Department of Health that have pinpointed specific health needs of our community and have guided our program priorities.

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