Meet Your AAPL Board of Directors: Jimmy Y. Chung, MD, MBA, FACS, FABQAURP, CMRP

Where did you get your undergrad training, medical school, and post-grad clinical training?

I received my BA in chemistry at UC Berkeley, MD at UC San Diego, and completed my surgery residency at the University of Washington. I received my MBA at the University of Massachusetts.

What is your current job/position?

I am chief medical officer at Advantus Health Partners, which is the full-service supply chain and resource management company under Bon Secours Mercy Health, a 50-hospital IDN based in Cincinnati. I am responsible for clinical engagement strategies, growth, and operational oversight of clinical transformation processes and innovations for the company, with a specific focus on standardization and alignment balanced with clinical quality and outcomes. Essentially, I oversee the value analysis team for Bon Secours Mercy Health supply chain and the clinical strategy for AHP.

Where were you born and where did you grow up?

I was born in Seoul, South Korea, but immigrated to the United States at an early age. We first lived near Rochester, New York, then moved to the Los Angeles, California, area, where I spent most of my youth.

How did you first become acquainted with the AAPL?

I always had a passion for health systems management and quickly took on leadership roles at my hospital and in the community where I practiced. I soon started taking courses through the ACPE (now AAPL) in the early 2000s to enhance my knowledge and grow my skills, anticipating a potential career shift to management later in my career. The more I learned from the ACPE courses, the more I realized how little I knew and how much is missing in traditional medical school education. These early courses really inspired me to pursue a career to make healthcare better and have a broader impact on our community and society.

What have you learned, so far, by sitting on the AAPL board?

I have already learned so much from fellow board members. We are all passionate about making healthcare better. The U.S. healthcare system is broken and not getting better. Our patients and our communities deserve better. Everyone knows this, but our system lacks a coordinated effort to align the stakeholders and economics toward real improvement. The AAPL is one of few organizations that can unite physicians and physician leaders to work together and make a difference. Aligning and partnering with other health organizations on our mission will be critical to our success. I am very impressed with the dedication and passion shared by the board and the staff of AAPL to make the organization the premier source of physician leadership education and a key leader in healthcare system transformation.

What book(s) are you currently reading? And who are your favorite writers?

I’m finishing Think Again by Adam Grant and How Covid Crashed the System by David Nash and Charles Wohlforth. I actually met with Dr. Nash recently to discuss his book and shared thoughts on what it will take to fix our broken health system. I’m also fascinated by our universe and the laws of physics, and I have greatly enjoyed The Elegant Universe and its sequels by Brian Greene. It’s exhilarating to expand our minds with such amazing concepts and to think about the meaning of our existence.

For fiction, my favorite authors are Kurt Vonnegut and Thomas Hardy. Jude the Obscure changed my life when I was a teenager. Unfortunately, I haven’t found a lot of time to discover more modern authors, so I have promised myself to do that more this year.

Who are your real-life heroes?

I have always admired Jimmy Carter for his humanitarian work and contributions to the human race, especially the poor and indigent. His compassion, humility, generosity, authenticity, and respect for human dignity inspire me and guide my style and approach in my life. In fact, when my family immigrated to the United States in 1977, he was the president, so I adopted his first name as my own. I have to admit that I’m very proud of that fact.

I also consider my children real-life heroes. I admire them for their grit and perseverance as they deftly grow up in this increasingly challenging and complex world without losing their hope and aspirations. I constantly look to them for inspiration and guidance to maintain perspective and direction through my daily challenges. They are my compass.

What do you consider your greatest achievement?

One of my greatest honors was being elected chair of the Association for Healthcare Resources and Materials Management (AHRMM). I was the first physician in its history to be elected to its board of directors and then later serve as its chair. AHRMM had started working on a program to link the health supply chain industry with clinical quality and outcomes, and we truly felt that this was a significant milestone toward legitimizing the important role of physicians in optimizing resources and appropriate utilization to improve the patient experience while validating the critical role of supply chain professionals in delivering safe, effective, and high-value care. This spawned physician leadership roles in supply chain for health systems, which prior to this was relatively unknown to practicing physicians. I continue to work with AHRMM and other organizations to develop education curricula on supply chain for physicians and formalize the physician leadership role.

What about the AAPL mission excites you the most?

For decades, AAPL has provided invaluable education that helped physician leaders to not only advance their careers, but also to really make a difference in leading their organizations to improve healthcare. As times change and technology advances, the new generation of physician leaders will need new tools and updated skill sets for the future. I am excited that AAPL is always thinking ahead and looking toward the future, “skating to where the puck is heading,” if you will, to develop innovative solutions for educating our future leaders with tools that are relevant and effective.