Van Gorder Ranked One of Most Influential People in Health Care

In 2014, Van Gorder was honored by the American College of Healthcare Executives with the Gold Medal Award, the organization’s highest honor.

Also in 2014, Van Gorder’s book, “The Front-Line Leader: Building a High-Performance Organization from the Ground Up,” was published. A chronicle of Scripps’ turnaround and Van Gorder’s journey from police officer to CEO of a major health system, the book was ranked No. 10 on the July list of best-selling business books compiled by the specialty business book retailer 800-CEO-READ.

In 2013, he received the Innovation Award from Press Ganey, a national firm specializing in patient experience improvement.

Board-certified in health care management and an American College of Healthcare Executives Fellow, Van Gorder also served as 2010 chairman of the association, an international professional society of more than 40,000 health care executives who lead hospitals, health care systems and other health care organizations.

In 2010, Van Gorder launched a new direction for Scripps. In anticipation of dramatic changes in health care, he turned the organization on its side, creating a horizontally matrixed management structure to identify and significantly reduce unnecessary variation in patient care and health care operations. The new approach led to $341 million in performance improvements from 2011 to 2014.

Learn more about Scripps Health, a nonprofit integrated health system in San Diego, Calif.