After four years as president and CEO of the Greensboro, N.C.-based health system, Dr. Mary Jo Cagle is stepping down due to family health concerns. Her last day will be May 31, and Bernard “Bernie” Sherry, the interim COO, will take over as interim CEO.

In a recent interview,Dr.Cagle discussed the leadership strategies and cultural shifts that significantly improved patient access and outcomes during her time in charge.

Community collaboration and Representation

Dr. Cagle emphasized the importance of community collaboration and ensuring the leadership team reflects the demographics of the area. The nonprofit system, with approximately 13,000 employees and over 150 locations including five hospitals, has actively sought input from community members.

“And that’s not just ethnically,” Dr. Cagle said. “That is, that there’s female representation.Part of our market share is rural, so we want rural leadership represented. And,of course,there is the ethnic element as well. We feel like we represent our community best when the leadership,[including the board]is representative of our community.”

She noted the importance of including the voices of both the community and front-line workers when developing strategies.

“Not just consultants and governance sitting in a room developing strategies,but really being collaborative in developing those strategies,and in doing so,we have created an institution that has deep support of the communities that we serve,” Dr. Cagle said.

“it’s been an opportunity to show other women in the organization, in our state, what’s possible.”

Health Equity Initiatives

One key example of this collaboration is the pursuit of health equity, supported by the community with a broad definition encompassing geographic, demographic, and socioeconomic factors.

“This is not a political statement here,” she said. “This is a health statement, as if we look at our data here, we certainly know that we are a historically and nationally unhealthy community, and our goal is to increase the health of our entire community.So,in our northern area of service,it’s a very rural community with average age being much higher,and so we got an elderly rural community that had a problem with access.”

Dr. cagle explained that strategies vary by community. In the northern rural areas, the focus is on access for the elderly, while in the ethnically diverse Guilford County, the focus is on building trust in underserved communities. These partnerships extend to businesses,school boards,cities,and counties.

Strategic Partnerships and Future Innovations

Dr. Cagle played a key role in the decision for the system to join Risant Health, part of Kaiser Permanente. This provides access to a value-based platform aimed at advancing health-focused care.

When evaluating partnerships,Dr. Cagle emphasized a structured due diligence process, physician involvement, and a calculated evaluation approach.

“One of the big, crucial things we learned – and that was very important to our board – was to sit down and clearly delineate what we must have in any partnership,” Dr. Cagle said. “And we talked about values and culture, but deeper than that, what were the characteristics in the culture that had to be honored? Nobody’s going to match your culture or your values exactly, but what were the things we were going to look for? We [considered] the must-haves that would tell us we could move forward, and what were the things that, if we saw them, would be a red flag or even a stop sign? We delineated those things – the things we were going to be looking for during our due diligence.”

She stressed the importance of physician involvement in significant decisions like the Risant deal.

Looking ahead, Dr. cagle highlighted the importance of proactive wellness care and data-driven care, particularly initiatives focused on value-based care and lowering costs.

“If we’re really going to get to value-based care and lowering the cost of care, we’re all going to have to move much further upstream, keeping populations healthy, and I think we’re going to have to look at food as medicine,” Dr. Cagle said. “As an example, how to choose food, how to prepare food and what a healthy diet looks like. Helping people – certainly with certain disease states – to choose and know what diets to eat, yes, but even earlier than that, how to help a healthy family stay healthy choosing. It’s surprising how many people don’t know how to choose and cook a healthy diet using fruits and vegetables and not using processed food. So I think the whole program of food as medicine, and how to cook here and do healthy food – I think we’re going to have to say, ‘This is how you do that.'”

She also emphasized the need to build robust workforce pipelines by partnering with educators and exploring the use of artificial intelligence and robotics to reduce administrative burdens.

“Let fantastic nurses get at the bedside and do what they’re passionate about doing,” she said. “I think we’re just beginning to see some of that innovation, and there’s a lot more to come.”