Bruce Pearson took over the CEO role at John C. Lincoln North Mountain Hospital in Phoenix in April. AB met with him to find out more about his goals for the hospital, as well as his insight on various issues the health care industry is facing.

What is your background in the health care industry?
I grew up in the Northwest and I had a Master’s in Business Administration, and I had a desire to get into hospital management. I moved to Arizona to go back to school at Arizona State University — they have a master’s program in health services administration. So I came here for an MHA degree and I went to work for a local health care organization and I just loved it here. So we moved here 26 years ago, and I’ve had the opportunity to work at several facilities/hospitals around different parts of the Valley — the central Valley, the West Valley, the East Valley — and now it’s my opportunity to work in the North Valley.

What prompted your move?
John C. Lincoln has an excellent reputation for clinical care as being a place that people want to work for, and one of its designations is as a magnet hospital for nursing. It was actually the first hospital in the state of Arizona to become a magnet hospital … What that means is they met the criteria that had been established at a national level to receive a designation as a hospital that truly is a magnet to attract and retain professional nurses. … Also, the organization is truly unique among hospital organizations in its level of commitment to the local community here. We not only provide hospital and health care services, but John C. Lincoln also has demonstrated a tremendous commitment to other community-oriented services through our Desert Mission, which was actually started over 80 years ago in the area. We have a food bank, we have the Lincoln Learning Center (a nationally accredited child-care facility), a community health center, a children’s dental clinic … providing free dental care, the Marley House (a family resource center that helps stabilize families in crisis) and a neighborhood renewal program.

What are your goals for the hospital?
It’s already a great organization, but my goal as the CEO is to work with the team of people who are here to continue to make improvements in the quality of care that we deliver, in our technologies (continue tobring in the latest technology and applying it), working with the physicianswho are here and with new physicians who come in and bring new skills, and to continue to make this agreat place for patients toreceive care, for staff to work and for physicians to practice medicine.

What is the greatest dilemma facing hospitals in Arizona?
One of the challenges nationally for hospitals is a shortage of health care professionals, and nursing would be a great example of that. The John C. Lincoln organization has a very successful nursing program in partnership with Grand Canyon University and we work with them and other universities and colleges to help train nurses. It is a problem, but John C. Lincoln is also part of the solution.