Partnership for Patients HRET Hospital Engagement Network Team

Cynosure Health is supporting the efforts of the HRET Hospital Engagement Network (HEN), a group of over 1,600 hospitals from 34 state hospital associations working together to help improve the quality, safety, and affordability of healthcare. 

 

 

Bruce Spurlock, MD Executive Director bspurlock@cynosurehealth.org	Dr. Spurlock is the Executive Director of Cynosure Health.  He works with physicians and healthcare executives to create state-of-the-art clinical and operational management systems. Dr. Spurlock is Chair of the CHART Board, a groundbreaking initiative of hospitals, purchasers, health plans and consumer groups to produce a voluntary hospital performance report in California.  He also leads large quality collaboratives in California, Washington and Florida designed to accelerate the implementation of evidence-based practices.  Currently, he is an Adjunct Associate Professor with Stanford University.  He is a nationally known speaker on health care topics ranging from health care trends to redesigning specific operational units. Prior to his consultant work, Dr. Spurlock was the executive vice president for the California Healthcare Association (CHA) where he served as CHA’s expert in physician group relations, health policy, and quality and performance measurement. He also practiced internal medicine as a senior physician with The Permanente Medical Group, Inc., for ten years, where he led patient education services and developed shared decision-making tools, clinical pathways and guidelines, RN advice center protocols and easy access ambulatory services.  During his clinical career Dr. Spurlock was an Assistant Clinical Professor for the University of California, Davis and participated on the American Hospital Association’s Quality Leadership Team.  In 1997 he was appointed by California Governor Wilson to the Managed Health Care Improvement Task Force, is published in local, state and national journals and has served as a trustee on the California Medical Association’s Board of Trustees.
Marsha Chan, PharmD, MBA, FACHE Chief Administrative Officer mchan@cynosurehealth.org	Dr. Chan is the Chief Administrative Officer for Cynosure Health.  Prior to joining Cynosure Health, she served as the Senior VP/Chief Quality Officer and the Corporate Responsibility Officer for St. Francis Medical Center in Lynwood, California.  Dr. Chan has more than 20 years of healthcare experience, with expertise in performance improvement, licensing and accreditation, corporate compliance and operations management.  In addition to her current role, Dr. Chan teaches the Quality Assurance course for the MHA program at California State University, Northridge.  Dr. Chan obtained her Doctor of Pharmacy degree from the University of California, San Francisco, School of Pharmacy and completed a post-graduate pharmacy residency at the University of California, Irvine Medical Center.  Dr. Chan earned her Master of Business Administration from the University of California, Los Angeles, Anderson School of Management.  She is board certified in healthcare management as an American College of Healthcare Executives Fellow (FACHE), is a Certified Practitioner in Healthcare Quality (CPHQ) and Certified in Healthcare Compliance (CHC).  She has served on the Board of Examiners of the Baldrige Performance Excellence Program for five years.
Jennifer Ricards, MS Project Specialist jricards@cynosurehealth.org	Ms. Ricards is a Project Specialist with Cynosure Health.  She is experienced in managing and evaluating health and social service programs.  In her previous position with Thomson Reuters, Ms. Ricards was responsible for developing and testing reporting mechanisms for pay-for-performance initiatives as well as leading recruitment activities for the Federally Qualified Health Center (FQHC) Advanced Primary Care Practice Demonstration, a national project funded by the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Innovation.  Prior to this, she managed the Southern California Safety Collaborative, a peer-to-peer learning initiative designed to improve patient safety and clinical outcomes in over 100 participating hospitals. Ms. Ricards also conducted research on health disparities and chronic diseases, mostly while employed at the VA Center for Chronic Disease Outcomes Research (CCDOR), a Health Services Research and Development (HSR&D) Center of Excellence.  She earned her M.S. in Health Services Research from the University of Minnesota, Minneapolis and her B.A. in Psychology from the University of California, Los Angeles.
Pat Teske, RN, MHA Improvement Advisor pteske@cynosurehealth.org	Ms. Teske is an Improvement Advisor with Cynosure Health.  She specializes in quality improvement, patient safety, licensure and accreditation for hospitals, health systems and regional collaboratives.  As an independent contractor she supported BEACON, the Bay Area Patient Safety Collaborative, as well as other state and local collaboratives.  In addition, she has facilitated preparation for Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services and Joint Commission surveys, developed policies and plans, as well as implemented systems and databases.  Ms. Teske is a requested public speaker at state and local conferences and has developed and offered numerous educational programs.  Prior to working as a consultant, Ms. Teske served as vice president of Quality Improvement and Care Management for Catholic Healthcare West, Pasadena.  Before that she held senior level positions at Northridge Hospital Medical Center, Northridge, and Thompson Memorial Medical Center, Burbank. She earned her Master’s in Health Administration from the University of La Verne, and her Bachelor of Science in Nursing from the University of Virginia, Charlottesville.  She is a former Certified Professional in Healthcare Quality (CPHQ) and a Certified Medical Staff Coordinator (CMSC).
Barbara DeBaun, RN, MSN, CIC Improvement Advisor bdebaun@cynosurehealth.org	Ms. DeBaun is an Improvement Advisor with Cynosure Health with primary responsibility for the Bay Area Beyond SCIP Clinical Impact Interest Group. She has over 30 years of experience in the field of infection prevention and quality improvement.  Previously, she was an Improvement Advisor for BEACON, the Bay Area Patient Safety Collaborative, and was the Director of Patient Safety and Infection Control at California Pacific Medical Center in San Francisco.   She is currently adjunct faculty at Dominican University of California.  Ms. DeBaun is a certified Infection Control Practitioner and holds a Bachelor’s egree in nursing from Pace University in New York and a Master of Science Degree in Nursing from San Francisco State University. Barbara currently serves as the chair of the 2012 APIC Annual Conference Committee and is a member of the APIC Education Committee and the APIC Practice Guidance Council.  She is the APIC liaison to the CDC’s Hospital Infection Control Practices Advisory Committee (HICPAC).  She has lectured nationally and internationally on a variety of patient safety and infection control topics and has published over a dozen articles and several book chapters.  In 2008, she was selected as Infection Control Today’s Educator of the Year.
Cheryl Ruble, RN, MS, CNS Improvement Advisor cruble@cynosurehealth.org	Ms. Ruble is an Improvement Advisor with Cynosure Health.  She has extensive critical care experience as a staff nurse in university and community hospital intensive care units, as a critical care flight nurse, and in a level one trauma emergency room.  She has been a Critical Care/Trauma Clinical Nurse Specialist for over 20 years with responsibilities in cardiothoracic surgery and general critical care populations.  She has published research on evidenced-based practice councils as a potential path to staff nurse empowerment and leadership growth. Cheryl was the past Director of Clinical Transformation at Mills-Peninsula Health Services where she lead a group of staff nurses to implement evidenced-based nursing practices, reduce hospital acquired conditions, reduced mortality, and improved patient safety. She was also involved in a multisite hospital collaborative to reduce hospital acquired conditions and mortality.  Cheryl earned her M.S. in Critical Care/Trauma Nursing, with a minor in Education, from the University of California, San Francisco.  She earned her undergraduate degree in Nursing from Cedarville University, Ohio.
Denise Remus, PhD, RN Improvement Advisor dremus@cynosurehealth.org	Dr. Denise Remus is an Improvement Advisor with Cynosure Health.  With more than 30 years of healthcare experience, she is an expert in healthcare quality measurement and improvement, pay for performance, and risk and severity adjustment.  She previously served as the Chief Quality Officer for BayCare Health System, the largest community-based health system in the Tampa Bay region, where she was responsible for overseeing BayCare’s quality, performance improvement, and patient safety initiatives.  Dr. Remus’ other roles include Vice President of Clinical Informatics for Premier, Inc. and Senior Research Scientist for Quality Indicators at the Agency for Healthcare Research and Quality (AHRQ), an arm of the United States Department of Health and Human Services.  She has served on numerous national committees and technical advisory panels for organizations such as the National Quality Forum, the Medicare Payment Advisory Commission (MedPAC), Alliance for Cardiac Care Excellence, American Nurses Association, Robert Wood Johnson Foundation, and the National Association of Health Data Organizations.  Dr. Remus received her bachelors of nursing from the College of St. Scholastica in Minnesota and her masters and doctorate degrees in nursing from the University of Minnesota, with an emphasis in gerontology and ethics.  Dr. Remus began her career as a commissioned officer and nurse in the United States Air Force.
Kim Werkmeister, RN, BA Improvement Advisor kwerkmeister@cynosurehealth.org	Ms. Werkmeister is an Improvement Advisor with Cynosure Health, with almost 20 years’ experience in hospital-based healthcare. She has worked with hospitals across California on a variety of topics including improved patient outcomes/implementation of best practices, setting up Quality/Risk programs, and preparation for and response to licensing and accreditation activities.  Kim is a Registered Nurse and graduated with a Bachelor of Arts degree from California State University Fullerton. She is a Certified Professional in Healthcare Quality (CPHQ), a member of the American Society for Healthcare Risk Management and the California Association for Healthcare Quality. She was formerly a Director of Quality and Risk Management at two Southern California hospitals where her role included oversight of all of the performance improvement, peer review, risk management, patient safety, infection control, case management and regulatory/compliance/licensing activities for each hospital.
Lance Lang, MD, FAAFP Physician Advisor llang@cynosurehealth.org	Dr. Lang serves is a Physician Advisor for Cynosure Health.  He supports the CMS Partnership for Patients initiative under the Heath Research and Education Trust, an affiliate of the American Hospital Association.  In addition to this work, Dr. Lang serves as Clinical Director of the California Quality Collaborative for the Pacific Business Group on Health, and as the Medical Director for the Health Services Coalition in Las Vegas.  His background is in quality improvement, with an emphasis on shared decision making as a core element of patient-centered care.  Dr. Lang has experience with healthcare delivery system transformations, including patient-centered medical home, ambulatory intensive care units (ICUs), and accountable care organization (ACO) development.  Previously, Dr. Lang served as National Vice President and Clinical Quality Officer for Health Net, Inc and was Vice President and National Director of Clinical Computing at The Permanente Company.  Dr. Lang has 20 years of clinical and leadership experience with Group Health Cooperative of Puget Sound. During this time, Dr. Lang assisted Dr. Ed Wagner in the implementation of the Chronic Care Model, including a real time chronic disease registry and the advanced access appointment system.  Dr. Lang is certified by the American Board of Family Practice and earned added qualification in Geriatrics.  He attended Pomona College, the University of Connecticut Medical School, and received Family Medicine training at Duke University.
Steven Tremain, MD Physician Advisor stremain@cynosurehealth.org	Dr. Tremain is a Physician Advisor with Cynosure Health.  He has championed quality and safety in various leadership positions over 27 years.  Steve retired as CMO in December, 2009 from Contra Costa Health Services following over 31 years of service, 23 of which were in leadership roles. In addition Dr. Tremain served as CMIO and is a Certified Professional in EMR’s.  Dr. Tremain was recently Physician Lead for both the Anthem Blue Cross Patient Safety First initiatives in California’s Central Valley and for the Public Hospital Improvement Project in California.   In addition he has performed hospital specific consultations in California and Florida.  A graduate of the UCLA School of Medicine, he is board certified in Family Medicine and is a Certified Physician Executive. He is a Fellow of the American Academy of Physician Executives and a member of the College of Healthcare Information Management Executives.