Honoree: Brian Tiffany, MD, Ph.D., FACEP
Partner
Premier Emergency Medical Specialists
With more than 20 years in the health care industry as a student, physician, researcher and educator, Dr. Brian Tiffany considers the emergency department a special place.
Tiffany is a partner at Premier Emergency Medical Specialists, which provides emergency medicine specialists for Chandler Regional and Mercy Gilbert medical centers. He also serves as vice president of medical staff for both hospitals. Tiffany began working in the emergency field in 1990, and has continued to grow his practice and expertise in that area. He joined Chandler Regional in 2003 as an attending physician in its emergency department, and has had a major impact on the way the department is run.
Accomplishments there include revamping existing processes, putting new processes in place, revitalizing the work force, and ensuring quality care and safety for patients, all the while reducing wait times and improving the patient experience. He has recorded similar improvements with the team at Mercy Gilbert. People who work with Tiffany know him as a driven, intelligent and dedicated person who accomplishes everything he sets out to do — and more. His experience and vast knowledge of his primary field, along with his depth of vision as a researcher, come into play as he quietly attends to his patients and confers with his colleagues.
Tiffany works to improve the emergency medicine experience for patients and their loved ones, implementing new processes that improve the quality of care, decrease time spent in the waiting room and eradicate redundancies.
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Finalist: John Shufeldt, MD, JD, MBA, FACEP
Founder and CEO
NextCare Urgent Care
Dr. John Shufeldt certainly qualifies as a jack-of-all-trades. He is founder, CEO and chief medical director of NextCare Urgent Care, is a managing partner of a law firm that bears his name, is an instructor of business law at Arizona State University, and is a certified airline transport pilot.
And he’s also a practicing emergency physician at St. Joseph’s Hospital and Medical Center. Founded in 1993, NextCare has grown in to a health care operation with more than 1,000 employees. Shufeldt promotes the benefits of urgent care as a convenient and affordable solution to the overcrowding of emergency rooms in Arizona. Shufeldt’s core values at NextCare — caring, excellence, integrity, and results — have made it possible for Arizona residents to receive quality, affordable health care.
NextCare is contracted with every major insurance plan. Shufeldt oversees NextCare’s six acting medical directors in Arizona, North Carolina, Georgia, Texas, Colorado, and Virginia. He holds active medical licenses in six states.
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Finalist: Julianne Thompson, MD
Medical Director
Desert Mission Community Health Center
They call her Dr. T. That’s how patients refer to Dr. Julianne Thompson, medical director of Desert Mission Community Health Center in Sunnyslope, which serves families in need.
Thompson supervises two medical assistants and a mid-level provider, works closely with directors and support staff of other Desert Mission programs, and sees patients ranging in age from newborn to elderly. Many of her patients speak only Spanish, but that’s not a problem as Dr. T speaks the language fluently.
Thompson spends much of her time treating acute medical problems such as ear infections and upset stomachs, but she also helps patients manage chronic conditions.
Much of Dr. T’s challenge as a primary care physician working in an underserved community is finding much-needed resources for her patients, including medications, tests and special formula for infants. The immunization rate among her patients is 97 percent, compared to a state benchmark of 82 percent for two-year-olds.
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