12 People You Need to Know in 2014: Dr. Robert Steele

When Dr. Robert Steele entered medicine, he didn’t consider the administrative side as an option. That was then. Now, Steele is the first physician to hold the post of president for Mercy Hospital Springfield.

“I just kind of fell into it, and I loved it,” Steele says of working medicine’s business side. “When you’re a physician, you’re affecting one patient at a time. When you’re an administrator, you’re affecting thousands of lives in the board room.”

Steele balances both. Thanks to supportive partners, he maintains his pediatric practice two mornings a week and as part of the weekend call schedule at Mercy Clinic Pediatrics-Whiteside, where he’s worked for 16 years.

“As a physician executive, there’s more credibility if you’re in the thick of it,” he says.

When he’s not seeing patients, Steele has operational oversight of Mercy Springfield Communities and helps guide the organization of more than 11,000 employees at 116 locations in Springfield, Lebanon, Cassville, Aurora, Mountain View and Berryville, Ark.

Steele admits to being surprised at the speed with which change has occurred in health care the past several years, especially in the three critical areas of delivery, payment and regulation. “There are very few industries that are undergoing changes this fast,” he says.

Some organizations simply won’t survive, Steele says, noting Mercy is ahead of the game because of its integrated teletronic health care records.

Still, the combination of the federal Affordable Care Act, sequestration and the lack of Medicaid expansion in Missouri means significant industry upheaval.

“We have substantial headwinds,” Steele says. “We embrace that disruption.”

Steele would like to see doctors get paid to keep patients healthy by, for instance, using technology to monitor health issues like congestive heart failure or diabetes before they cause something more serious.

“Right now, we get paid for putting you in the hospital,” Steele says. “The best hospital bed is an empty one.”

Steele also has been an aggressive advocate for children’s health care policy and practice through his leadership on the board of directors for Missouri’s Chapter of the Academy of Pediatrics. He championed the group’s 2004-06 Pediatric Immunization Awareness project and will serve next year as board chairman.[[In-content Ad]]