Orthopaedic Surgeon

Overview

The Division Chief reports to the Department Chair. The Division Chief manages clinical planning, operations, and performance of their subspecialty service. The chief is responsible for setting and maintaining quality standards, providing oversight to the division’s educational environment, and motivating the research activities of the division. The division chief will also help the chair in fostering the professional development of faculty members within the division to ensure faculty fulfillment, retention, and wellness.

The Division Chief will be responsible for navigating appropriate growth of the division in support of the overall department’s goals and strategic plans. Division expansion includes programmatic planning as well as recruitment of faculty, midlevel providers, and division-specific staff. The Division Chief should also identify threats and opportunities and communicate them with the Departmental leadership team. The Division Chief is expected to be a clinical and academic role model and leader for the department. The Chief is expected to meet regularly with their division faculty, understand the issues they face, and provide the Department Chair with opportunities for the division to function at the highest level.

Responsibilities of a Division Chief:

Clinical Operations, Quality, and Productivity

• Develop an effective clinical service that consistently meets or exceeds patient expectations and meets contemporary standards for academic departments of Orthopaedic Surgery

• Align division operations and plans with the department’s strategic plan and develop division-specific initiatives to help meet the plan.

• Collaborating with the Vice Chair of Operations to optimize productivity through effective system design and resource utilization including, but not limited to, optimization of shared OR and clinic resources

• Optimize individual as well as division clinical productivity while achieving financial sustainability

• Comply with all rules, regulations, and procedures of the operational environment

• Take the initiative to promote innovation while continuously improving clinical quality and achieving positive patient outcomes

• Monitor relevant benchmarks to ensure quality, safety, and efficiency of patient care

• Collaborating with the Vice Chair of Quality and Safety to establish and maintain the quality and service standards established by the Department. Monitor Hospital quality improvement results for the division as well as safety and M&M reporting

• Ensuring hospital, ambulatory, and on-call coverage to the standards established by the System

• Partner with non-physician administrative team to achieve all the above objectives

***Operations Assessment Benchmarks: Growth in new patient visits, % of new patients seen in 14 days, OR and Clinic exam room utilization, WRVUs (individual), WRVU per CFTE (division), and the year over year growth for the division (cases, visits, WRVUs), Divisional Quality initiative projects

General Expectations

• Meet regularly with the Department Chair, Vice-Chairs, and Senior Administrative Officer

• Convene and lead regularly scheduled division meetings

• Keep general summary minutes of the meetings

• Attend all Division Chiefs’ meetings

• Attend Leadership Steering Committee Meetings as requested

• Prepare summary reports as requested

National Reputation & Research Productivity

• Collaborating with the Vice Chair of Research to promote and support the investigational interests of the members of the division and ensure that their interests are aligned with the Department’s research agenda

• Demonstrate leadership skills to improve the image of the division/department faculty locally, regionally, nationally, and internationally

• Promote research productivity that produces advancements in science and/or clinical practice, helping to shape the current landscape and future leaders

• Demonstrate the ability to publish and support junior faculty in publishing efforts

• Hold board level or national positions in relevant medical societies

• Support and enhance the subspecialty education program of the department

***Reputation and Research Assessment Benchmarks Maintain a record of the number of first/last publications, Grant dollars for research productivity, Society membership and participation of the faculty, National positions held, Key Publication Editors, Grant Reviewers, and Symposium Leaders, Overall research productivity of the division

Faculty Recruitment, Development, and Retention

• Collaborating with the Vice Chair of Academic Affairs to support the professional development of the members of the division

• Recruit faculty and staff that will enhance Department goals and enhance its performance

• Become a mentor for the junior faculty and help them achieve their personal and professional aspirations

• Coordinate with division faculty to remove any communication barriers

• Address and help resolve specific issues affecting division faculty

• Create a collaborative environment that enhances the potential of the division

• Collect faculty feedback to continuously improve the culture and performance of the division

• Partner with the Department Chair to provide insight and guidance to the faculty to help them thrive in the Academic Health System environment

• Ensure division physician participation on hospital or system committees, task forces, and work groups

***Faculty Assessment Benchmarks: Written annual faculty assessments completed, Division faculty promotions, Rate of faculty turnover