The American Medical Association named a new executive vice president late Wednesday afternoon, ending a difficult search that had dragged on longer than expected.
Dr. E. Ratcliffe (Andy) Anderson, former surgeon general of the U.S. Air Force, now faces the daunting task of helping the nation’s largest medical organization rebuild its grassroots membership and upper management ranks.
The dermatologist also will confront the heritage of the AMA’s ill-fated commercial deal with Sunbeam Corp. last fall: an ongoing lawsuit that could cost the Chicago organization millions of dollars and a still-tarnished image in the minds of doctors and the general public.
Anderson assumes the helm of the AMA in September, but will begin working with the organization over the summer, appearing for the first time before its leadership at the June annual meeting in Chicago.
In Anderson’s favor, according to AMA board chairman Dr. Thomas Reardon, were strong managerial and organizational skills. “He’s very personable, forward, bright, a quick thinker. We think physicians across the U.S. will be impressed,” Reardon said.
None of the AMA leaders across the country reached by phone Wednesday know the three-star general personally. But they greeted his appointment with an evident sense of relief, noting that he is not an AMA insider.
“This is a breath of fresh air for the AMA, a chance to bring in someone with a whole new set of ideas,” said Dr. Gary Krieger, speaker of the house of delegates of the California Medical Association. “It’s a very positive thing that he’s not ingrained in the AMA culture.”
All three previous AMA executive vice presidents, the top management position for the organization, which has an annual budget in excess of $200 million, spent years in and around the AMA and its member medical societies before reaching the AMA’s highest ranks.
That’s not true of Anderson, who was not made available for comment and who could not be reached in Kansas City, Mo., where he lives with his wife and three children.
His career has been spent in academic medicine, military medicine, and, most recently, hospital administration, according to information released by the AMA. Most recently, Anderson has been chief executive of Truman Health Systems, one of Kansas City’s largest hospital systems, and professor of medicine at the University of Missouri-Kansas City School of Medicine.
From 1994 to 1996, as Air Force Surgeon General, Anderson managed more than 50,000 employees at 87 medical facilities worldwide; in the four years before that, he ran the Air Force’s largest hospital, a 1,000-bed facility in Texas.
Given his background, “I have a feeling there’s going to be no nonsense about him, and that’s good,” said Dr. Robert Weierman, a New Jersey physician who chairs the AMA’s organized medical staff section. “We need someone who can stand behind the doctors in the trenches, listen to them, mobilize them, and support them.” “Fortunately, he is coming in with no baggage that I know of, and that’s important, because we have to reclaim our image,” Weierman said.
One of the most immediate tasks Anderson will face is bringing on several top managers to oversee crucial areas such as communications, business affairs, advocacy and legal affairs.
Those positions have been open since five AMA executives– including the previous executive vice president, Illinois physician P. John Seward–were asked to resign or left voluntarily in the wake of the controversy surrounding AMA’s commercial endorsement deal with Sunbeam for a line of home health-care products.
“He’s going to have to hire a fair number of highly placed people in short order and pull them together in a management team,” said Dr. Jerald Schenken, an Omaha physician and former secretary of the AMA. “That’s going to be a real challenge.”
