Close Up
New chair of medicine eager for challenge
Anne Curtis says her primary task is to bring the Department of Medicine’s 14 divisions into one cohesive and interactive unit. Photo: DOUGLAS LEVERE
The Department of Medicine is the largest academic department at UB. It comprises 140 faculty members and 14 divisions spread throughout four hospitals and medical centers. Managing and coordinating the divisions while advancing the department as a whole presents a significant challenge.
Anne Curtis, a dynamic and energetic cardiology specialist recruited from the University at South Florida, was named Charles and Mary Bauer Professor of Medicine and appointed department chair in September after an intensive nationwide search.
Curtis is eager to shoulder the task.
A native of Brooklyn, Curtis is returning home, in a sense. She grew up in the New York Metropolitan area and did her undergraduate work at Rutgers University, received her MD from the Columbia University College of Physicians and Surgeons, and then headed south to Duke University. There she completed fellowships in cardiovascular diseases and clinical cardiac electrophysiology—the science of elucidating, diagnosing and treating electrical disorders of the heart.
The University of Florida-Gainesville recruited her in 1986, where she spent the following 19 years developing the university’s clinical cardiac electrophysiology program. She then moved to the University of South Florida in Tampa in 2005 to become chief of its Division of Cardiology and director of cardiovascular services.
“Those were excellent years, advancing in an academic career and growing a program in cardiac electrophysiology,” says Curtis. “There a lot of things I like about Florida—still do. It’s not bad to have January roll around and it’s 70 degrees outside. That is not hard to take. But in some respects I did miss the four seasons. I told people I’d never quite gotten used to shopping for a Christmas tree in shorts. This is the first winter I’ve been through in many, many years, so it will be interesting.”
Her three children—two of whom were born in Florida—were surprised, to say the least, when she accepted a position in Buffalo. “It creates some challenges in visiting,” Curtis says dryly. Diana, the oldest, is a second-year medical student at Florida State University, which Curtis says pleases her because it shows women can successfully juggle family and a demanding profession.
“Some children of physicians go running in the opposite direction because they look at the lifestyle and say, ‘this is too much.’ But Diana has decided to go into the same field, so it’s gratifying.” Katherine attends a community college in Gainesville. Alexander, the youngest, is attending the University of Virginia-Charlottesville on a tennis scholarship.
Curtis says the UB Department of Medicine is a good fit for her. “I wanted to come to a university where I could make a difference. I was looking for energy, for a dynamic situation where the leadership was supportive and eager to build an excellent school and excellent departments within the school. Everyone in medicine works hard,” she adds, “so if I’m going to work hard, I want to see something happen as a result.
“It also is important when coming into a situation like UB, where the university doesn’t own the hospitals, that there is a collegial working relationship between the university and the hospitals. That was a very key factor for me when I interviewed with hospital leadership here. I was satisfied that they were supportive and eager to build excellent departments and to increase the number of faculty to accomplish that goal.”
Several challenges await Curtis’s attention as she settles into her chairmanship. She hopes to collaborate with UB’s Women’s Health Initiative group to study atrial fibrillation and women’s cardiovascular health, and she has been asked to join the writing group that will be developing manuscripts on research coming out of that group.
Those are not her first priorities, however. Bringing the department’s 14 divisions into one cohesive and interactive unit is her primary task.
“One of the challenges I saw in this department is that it’s very siloed. People who work at the different hospitals, as well as at our out-patient settings, may never see anyone else in their department. The first thing I need to do is create a sense of unity among the division chiefs and communicate key initiatives with them. Then it’s their responsibility to bring that back to their faculty. I’ve instituted regular group meetings with the division chiefs and that’s been very well received, and I’m also having regular individual meetings.
“It’s the sense of a unified department that I want to build on,” says Curtis. “I think the best way that will happen is by developing a formal strategic plan for the department. I’ve hired a consultant to do that, and we will start the process in February. We will bring the key leadership and stakeholders together for a kick-off meeting and interviews, then there will be an off-site retreat in May. In the next few months after that, we will put together a formal plan for what we want to do to move this department forward.”
Curtis’s overall goal is to create a “triple-threat” department—one that, in the aggregate, offers excellent clinical care, teaching and research. “Dean (Michael) Cain has challenged us to accomplish this, and I firmly embrace it,” she says. “Any one individual usually doesn’t do all three, but it’s realistic to expect each faculty member to do two out of three. Faculty must have a blend of skills.
“If a division needs more work in research, we will hire more physician scientists, and if a division is more heavily research-based, we will need to hire more clinicians. Our strategic plan will lay that out and we will implement that over a three-to-five-year period. I think it’s hard to go out as far as five years, personally,” continues Curtis, “but as long as I meet my goals for years one, two and three, that will go a long way to getting us where we need to be.”
Two additional goals are on her agenda for the next 90 days: making long-needed progress in hospital contracting and recruiting a chief for the internal medicine division.
Curtis is acutely aware that managing a department of this size is a huge responsibility, but she says she is excited by the challenge. “I wanted to take on a large project and see what I could do with it. The biggest potential pitfall I see is trying to keep tabs on everything. The chair of this department has to watch for the perception of being out of touch.
“It’s almost impossible to avoid that, with such a large and scattered department. To meet all 140 faculty, even if I scheduled three a week, would take me a year. But I’ve started meeting some of the younger faculty, those that have just been hired, and that’s been great. Now, I need to continue with other faculty and get a feel for their work. The best I can do is get around, interact with faculty, students and residents as much as possible, and try to do the best I can for the department.”
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