Keith Safian Celebrates 20 Years as Phelps CEO
Extraordinary growth over two decades.
June 2009. Phelps Memorial Hospital Center marks a significant milestone this
month when Keith Safian celebrates his 20th year as President and CEO. Under
Safian's leadership, the 235-bed comprehensive community hospital has grown
to become an important health care provider and major economic force in Westchester
County.
Phelps is one of very few consistently profitable hospitals in New York State,
operating in the black in all but one of the last 20 years. Since Safian was
hired in 1989, the operating budget has increased from $40 million to $188 million
in 2009.
Over the same time period, the hospital staff has grown from 800 employees to
1,540, making Phelps the 8th largest employer in Westchester County. The number
of physicians on staff at the hospital has grown from 189 in 1989 to 450 in
2009. Phelps is one of the few hospitals in the region that is continuing to
award merit increases to employees despite the economic downturn.
Last year, Phelps concluded a highly successful five-year capital campaign which
raised $20 million from private philanthropic sources, twice the initial goal.
Much of that money was used to fund the construction of a new 18,000-square-foot,
state-of-the-art emergency department, which opened in 2008.
In addition to expanding two inpatient units by 10 beds, another key expansion
that occurred on Safian's watch is a medical services building which opened
in 2007. The five-story facility houses an emergency training center, a wound
healing center, and an infusion center. The building is also home to Phelps'
extensive outpatient physical rehabilitation services, including the only aquatherapy
pool in Westchester located in a community hospital.
Next to the medical services building now stands a five-story 750-space parking
garage that has made visiting the hospital easy. Under Safian's direction, Phelps
maintains a policy of free parking for all, unlike many hospitals in the area
that have instituted parking fees. In toto, these expansions doubled the hospital's
square footage.
Within the past several years, Phelps has invested in expanding its pediatric
services. The new emergency department features the Thomas E. and Alice Marie
Hales Pediatric and Adolescent Center, and the hospital recently opened a newly
designed six-bed pediatric inpatient unit and a special care nursery for infants
born as early as 34 weeks. A pediatric hospitalist works with private pediatricians
to oversee the care of pediatric patients who are hospitalized. In addition,
a primary care pediatric practice and several pediatric specialist groups have
moved their offices onto the Phelps campus.
Phelps also entered an affiliation with New York Medical College whereby second-year
medical students receive clinical training at the hospital. The agreement covers
undergraduate medical education in pediatrics, obstetrics and gynecology, primary
care and clinical skills, and graduate medical education in pediatrics and obstetrics
and gynecology.
Safian initiated an unprecedented affiliation with Memorial Sloan-Kettering
Cancer Center (MSKCC) in 1995, resulting in Phelps becoming the first non-Manhattan
location at which MSKCC provides Radiation Therapy and Medical Oncology. On
Safian's watch, Phelps also became the first Westchester County affiliate of
Mount Sinai Hospital and joined the four-hospital HealthStar/Stellaris Network.
A key business decision made during Safian's tenure was the leasing of 21 acres
of the 69-acre campus to The Kendal Corporation for the building of Kendal on
Hudson, a not-for-profit continuing care retirement community that now houses
320 senior adults.
Under Safian's direction, Phelps and its Stellaris partner hospitals have been
at the forefront of information technology, having installed a hospital information
system that allows physicians to enter patient orders electronically and staff
to review and update computerized records at the patient's bedside. Phelps has
also improved patient care by installing a picture archiving and communication
system (PACS) that captures, stores, distributes, and displays radiologic images.
Patients' medications are electronically verified before each dose is administered.
Keith Safian takes a very systematic and strategic approach to hospital management,
having received two BS degrees in engineering from the University at Buffalo.
He then got an MBA from the Wharton Graduate School and began his career in
health care administration.
Safian has been active in a number of national, state and regional organizations
whose objective is to improve the delivery of healthcare. He was a member of
the American Hospital Association Task Force on Fragmentation of the Delivery
System, participated in The Joint Commission's Roundtable on the Nursing Shortage,
and recently presented at the National Patient Safety Foundation Congress in
Washington, D.C.
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