'A great foundation to build on': Akron Children's CEO reflects on his first 2 years

Nearly two years into his time leading Akron Children’s Hospital, Chris Gessner said the hospital has made a lot of progress with its goal to bring “highly accessible, convenient, world-class pediatric care close to the patient's home at an affordable price.”

Children’s has been expanding its outpatient services throughout Northeast Ohio and beyond, said Gessner. It has facilities as far south as Marietta two hours away.

A new pediatric behavioral health center also opened on July 18 in Canton.

'A great foundation to build on'

Gessner became Children’s president and CEO in October 2021 during the COVID-19 pandemic.

“I feel like we're making a lot of progress,” Gessner said. “There was a great foundation to build on.”

The Ligonier, Pennsylvania, native came from Boulder, Colorado, where he had been president and CEO of UCHealth University of Colorado Hospital since 2019. He spent nearly two decades in administrative roles at the Children’s Hospital of Pittsburgh, part of the UPMC Health System, including serving as president from 2008 to 2019.

Gessner is the first CEO tapped from outside Akron Children’s. He followed Grace Wakulchik, who retired after spending nearly 30 years at Akron Children’s and three years as president and CEO. She took over as CEO in 2018 for Bill Considine, who had been at the helm of the hospital for nearly 40 years.

'The perfect opportunity': New Akron Children's CEO Chris Gessner ready for challenges

Highlights of accomplishments

Gessner said he’s proud of advancements in patient care, recruitment and partnerships. The hospital also has been making improvements to online scheduling, he said.

“People don't want to call a call center or the physician office anymore,” said Gessner. “I expect that in five years, 70% or so of physician appointments will occur via the mobile app. So we're gearing up to make our schedules mobile friendly and easy to schedule with our primary care doctors and specialists.

“We’ve seen a huge jump up in the last year in that area,” he said.

Children’s has also recruited some new key leaders, Gessner said, including a new chair of the pediatric psychiatry department and a new chair for neonatology and maternal fetal medicine.

In July 2022, the hospital also became the exclusive sports health provider for the University of Akron Zips in a multi-year partnership.

Gessner said he and his team also continue to advance what the hospital calls its “Five True North Goals:”

• Build an inspiring, purpose-driven culture that enables people to find meaning in their work prioritizes employee well-being and embraces diversity, equity and inclusion. 

• Be highly accessible and convenient for patients and referring providers. 

• Be the high quality, low-cost pediatric population health provider in Ohio. “In Ohio, there's been a movement with the Medicaid population to have value-based care arrangements where pediatric entities become responsible for a defined group of pediatric patients and we get paid a lump sum each month to provide care for all of their needs,” Gessner said. “So we really want to be the entity that does that very effectively, and does it in a way that we can measurably demonstrate not only are we managing to the budget, but more importantly, we're providing really high quality care.”

• Grow and collaborate with strategic partners to be the pediatric provider of choice in the communities we serve.  "We have quite a few relationships throughout the region with other health systems,” said Gessner. “We want to be the pediatric provider of choice when we partner with health systems in their local communities and that's how we've gotten into Marietta. We partner well in Youngstown. We partner well in Canton. We partner really well with Summa.”

• Raise the academic profile of Children’s through excellence in clinical training programs and targeted research. Gessner said there are already some relationships with universities, but “we do think there's an opportunity to do more translational research here that will sort of contribute to the fields’ knowledge, but it also helps us recruit and retain talent here to Akron and Northeast Ohio.”

Living in Akron

Gessner and his wife have three grown children. The couple bought a home in West Akron and have gotten involved in the community. Gessner serves on the boards for the Greater Akron Chamber and the United Way of Summit and Medina and his wife volunteers at the Akron-Canton Regional Foodbank.

The couple also enjoys riding bikes on the Towpath Trail

“We are definitely getting involved in the community” Gessner said.

Beacon Journal medical reporter Betty Lin-Fisher can be reached at 330-996-3724 or blinfisher@thebeaconjournal.com. Follow her @blinfisherABJ on Twitter or www.facebook.com/BettyLinFisherABJ To see her most recent stories and columns, go to www.tinyurl.com/bettylinfisher

This article originally appeared on Akron Beacon Journal: Akron Children's CEO Chris Gessner highlights first 2 years on the job