By THOMAS GRILLO
SALEM — If Dr. David J. Roberts gets a call from President Donald Trump seeking advice on the future of Obamacare, the next president of North Shore Medical Center (NSMC) will deliver these three words to the White House: leave it alone.
“Don’t throw the baby out with the bathwater,” he said. “I would say keep the bones and tweak it. But the president has not called me.”
Roberts, the center’s chief of cardiology, replaces Robert Norton, who retired as NSMC president last month. The first priority for the 63-year-old Danvers resident will be to tackle NSMC’s budget deficit. At the close of fiscal year 2015, the center lost $36 million and last year losses swelled to $48 million.
“Our financial situation is heading in the wrong direction, we have to reverse that trend and get ourselves on a better fiscal footing,” he said. “The amount of money we’ve been losing over the last few years is unsustainable. We’ve got to figure out how to grow the business and decrease our costs so we end up in a better place financially. That’s job one.”
Some of their costs were one-time big ticket charges, such as the move to electronic medical records, Roberts said. The consolidation of the Lynn and Salem campuses will save a significant amount of money, he said.
“When organizations are headed in the wrong direction, they have to make course corrections that can be painful and we’re about to go through that,” he said. “We need to be here 50 years from now providing care. We will have to make the hard choices … it’s going to be rough for a little bit until we can assure our survival, but I am optimistic.”
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NSMC is a member of Partners HealthCare, founded by Massachusetts General Hospital and Brigham and Women’s Hospital.
Roberts received his medical degree from the University of Vermont and completed his residency at Kaiser Foundation Hospital in San Francisco, specializing in internal medicine. He completed his research fellowship at NSMC focused on cardiovascular disease. He has been on the NSMC medical staff since 1985 and with Massachusetts General Hospital since 1993.
Roberts said he plans to keep some patients as a way to continue to understand what it’s like to be a care provider.
“I want to stay close enough to the caregiver experience so that I know what’s going on,” he said.
Roberts said he never imagined himself in a managerial role, but tough times called on him to act.
“My whole 32-year career has been in this institution and we are about to go through some hard times,” he said. “I know the place and this is a moment where I must step up. I think I am well-positioned to get this organization to where it needs to go, so I raised my hand.”
Partners’ board of trustees voted Tuesday to name Roberts as president, effective this spring.
“Dave is uniquely qualified to work with community leaders on the North Shore as well as with clinical leaders throughout the Partners system to ensure that the needs of patients are always being put first, while working to put NSMC on a more sustainable path for the future,” said Dr. David Torchiana, Partners president and CEO, in a statement.
Thomas Grillo can be reached at [email protected].
