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After 25 years of practicing internal medicine, Lafayette native Dr. Ronald James Ritchey was ready for a change. He consulted with the Louisiana Medical Mutual Insurance Company (LAMMICO), then traveled throughout the country with Amedysis. He even received an MBA at the University of Louisiana at Lafayette. Five years ago, his life changed when he was introduced to Louisiana Health Care Review (LHCR), a healthcare quality improvement organization working under contract with Medicare and Medicaid.

For about 20 years, LHCR has been under a Medicare contract to do quality oversight for its Louisiana beneficiaries in Louisiana. In Mississippi and Illinois, the organization is under contract to Medicaid to perform quality oversight and utilization review for those states' Medicaid organizations.

During his tenure at LHCR, Ritchey worked in various capacities before being dubbed medical director for corporate affairs last year. The organization has two other medical directors – one working specifically with review of cases, medical quality issues, and beneficiary complaints; another interacting more directly with providers in the northern part of the state. Ritchey's responsibilities are concentrated in the corporate office, dealing with issues such as business development and design of quality improvement plans.

Before becoming medical director, Ritchey was a consultant, helping LHCR develop a program for disease management. Eventually, he designed new business opportunities, wrote grants for Medicare and Medicaid, and worked with new business proposals, such as developing disease management for diabetes or heart failure. As medical director, Ritchey splits his travel between Baton Rouge and Lafayette during the week. Occasionally, he visits the Jackson, Miss. and Springfield, Ill. offices for contract-related issues, including negotiating contract extensions and designing quality improvement programs for new contracts.

Ritchey has found a good fit with LHCR. "LHCR's focus, as the name implies, is healthcare quality," he said. "They are very passionate about quality, which is something I am quite interested in, and I have an opportunity to impact. Instead of one patient at a time, you get a chance to impact a larger number of patients and, hopefully, improve their outcomes."

In his rare off-time, Ritchey's artistic side emerges – painting and sculpting. For the last 30 years, he has been an avid runner. He also enjoys fishing and sailing at his Cypremore Point camp.

As to his diversified career, Ritchey says that, unquestionably, the most rewarding part was "working individually with patients and their families. You learn out of necessity a lot from your patients. They teach you a lot about yourself."

Additionally, Ritchey relishes his post-practice career path. "I have also enjoyed working with organizations that are focused on high quality healthcare," he said. "I have had an opportunity to learn about a variety of aspects of healthcare. So, that's been a very positive outcome for me."

To inform clinicians, quality professionals and policy makers about healthcare quality, LHCR is hosting the second Louisiana Health Care Quality Summit on Monday, May 18, 2009 from 9 a.m. to 3:30 p.m. at the Hilton Capitol Center Hotel in Baton Rouge. Political consultant and Louisiana native James Carville will kick off the activities, with speakers and breakout sessions throughout the day.

Summit speakers include LHCR's President/CEO, Gary Curtis, Gov. Bobby Jindal or La. Dept. of Health and Hospitals Secretary Alan Levine, LHCR Director of Quality Scott Flowers, Ritchey, Dr. Kirby Goidel of LSU's School of Public Policy, RN Linda Polo of St. Tammany Parish Hospital's Department of Head/Infection Control, Ken Alexander of LHA, Dr. Charles Cefalu and RN Lynne Rhodes of Minden Hospital. Topics include, but are not limited to, ARRA stimulus package overview, MRSA prevention, surgical care infection rate reductions, care transitions collaborative best practices, electronic records security and privacy protection, new healthcare research from LSU's School of Public Policy, diabetes resources, and preventing colon and breast cancers, pneumonia and influenza.

To register, visit LHCR's website at www.lhcr.org.

Tags:

Louisiana Health Care Quality Summit, Louisiana Health Care Review, Louisiana Medical Mutual Insurance Company, Ron Ritchey, University of Louisiana at Lafayette

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