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Edward “Ted” Schreck backed into health care administration while teaching American secondary school in Switzerland. He responded to a want ad seeking someone to handle continuing medical education and landed at Sutter Hill/St. Joseph Health System in Santa Rosa.

“After graduate school, if someone would have asked me if I thought I’d end up in health care administration, I never would have said yes,” said Schreck, the new chief executive for USC University Hospital and the USC/Norris Cancer Hospital.

“Now, I don’t think there’s a more exciting environment to work in,” said Schreck, who worked at Sutter Hill/St. Joseph in different capacities for 15 years before becoming president and CEO of the Eden Township Hospital District in Castro Valley, Calif.

“There’s the drama you hear about in the media, the life-or-death decisions, but best of all, when you’re working at a well-run hospital, you’re dealing with an intellectual elite,” he said.

Schreck, who received his doctorate in public administration and his master’s degree from USC, says “there is tremendous pressure on teaching hospitals right now. The challenge is trying to survive in this crazy medical marketplace.”

Schreck says that HMOs pressure teaching hospitals like USC to lower costs. “They’ll say, ‘Well, you do cardiac bypass surgery for X dollars, but this hospital does it for less, so we want you to lower your cost by $1,500. We have to demonstrate that our costs are higher because they include cutting-edge techniques and experimental studies.”

Besides making University Hospital and Norris “managed care friendly,” Schreck says he must ensure that they attract enough revenues to maintain their quality. He plans to make sure that all faculty members are among the top in the country.

“We must fulfill our function as a teaching and researching hospital and never forget about the patient,” he said. “To me, it’s just a lot more exciting than selling insurance.”

Alexa Apallas

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