Roger D. Mitty is the president and chief operating officer of Care New England Medical Group, a patient-centered organization that is part of Care New England Health System. He discusses his new role, the challenges the medical group is facing, and future areas of growth.
PBN: Your most recent role was at a medical group in Dallas, Texas. What brought you to Rhode Island and to Care New England Medical Group?
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MITTY: I’m a New Yorker originally and my wife and I raised our children in a suburb outside of Boston. I commuted between Dallas and Boston for the past couple of years in my previous role but knew I wanted to come back east. My wife is on the faculty of Brown’s Warren Alpert School of Medicine and, in fact, my oldest daughter attended Brown [University] as an undergraduate, so we have ties to the area and are delighted to be back.
PBN: What are top your priorities as the new president and COO for Care New England Medical Group?
MITTY: The first priority for any medical group – or health care system in general – is to take great care of patients. Every step of the patient’s care, from the phone call (or internet encounter) where they schedule their appointment, to the actual visit with the physician or advanced care provider, to the checkout process at the end of the visit has to be seamless and handled in a way that the patient feels positive about their experience.
Another priority is that we want our physicians and advanced practice clinicians to feel that they are a part of something great – and they are. Not only are they affiliated with nationally recognized hospitals in women’s health and behavioral health, as well as a top-notch community hospital, but many of them have significant teaching and research missions under the aegis of Brown.
Finally, being at the vanguard of value-based care, which concentrates on the health of populations as a whole, is a major priority as well.
PBN: What are some of the main challenges when operating a large network of providers while trying to keep the focus on patient care?
MITTY: A well-run medical group takes the “noise” out of practicing medicine; we handle the operations such as billing, human resources, contracting, etc., and let the clinicians concentrate on taking care of patients. This requires having the right people, processes and technology in place so that the practice of medicine can be as seamless as possible.
PBN: Has the medical group’s network been affected by the workforce shortage we’ve been seeing nationwide, especially in the health care sector and in primary care? If yes, what are some steps the group is taking to address this?
MITTY: Yes, we most certainly have been affected, but I’m very pleased to see that the team has been making great strides to close the gaps. One strategy that we have used has been to reach out to local schools that are training medical assistants, not only to try and recruit their graduates but also to potentially function as a training site for their students, which hopefully would lead to some of them choosing to work with us after they have graduated.
PBN: What are some areas where you’d like to see the medical group grow and expand?
MITTY: I can’t understate the importance of primary care. We know that there is a shortage of primary care providers across the country, as well as here in Rhode Island. We are fortunate to have a robust group of primary care physicians and advanced practitioners, but we need to continue to grow that group to serve our community here.
Surgical services are another area of planned growth; we will continue to grow upon an already great cadre of surgeons at Kent Hospital so that we can offer a complete breadth of surgical specialties.
Claudia Chiappa is a PBN staff writer. You may contact her at Chiappa@PBN.com.
