Daniel Kane, CEO of Nassau Health Care Corp., takes one of the

Long Island Business News, Sep 10, 2004 by Claude Solnik

Daniel Kane had a very short retirement. It lasted all of 33 days. Less, in fact, if you consider the time he spent vying to take over as acting chief executive officer of Nassau Health Care Corp., the embattled group that runs Nassau University Medical Center.

Kane, who spent the previous 14 years at the top of Englewood Hospital and Medical Center in Englewood, N.J., where he earned praise for building that institution's reputation, was named acting CEO July 7 and took over at the entity that operates NUMC on Aug. 2. Now, rather than consulting, teaching, playing golf or getting involved in local charities, as he planned, Kane arguably has the toughest job in the healthcare business on Long Island.

Some even wondered why the 61-year-old would want the job at NUMC, which underwent hundreds of layoffs, lost $26.7 million in 2003 and has been unable to negotiate a new contract with its union.

Then there's the litigation with the organization's former CEO, Richard Turan, who left in June after a tumultuous three years as reports emerged that he accepted a $125,000 raise without board approval. He sued NHCC last month, demanding $1.2 million in back- pay.

I can't comment on Turan's situation, Kane said. The facts surrounding Turan's departure are in dispute.

At a meeting on his first day at work, Kane tried reassuring concerned community and political leaders that he knew what he was getting into.

He said this is something he always welcomes new challenges. He has a contract only for a year and he'll see where it takes him at the end of that year, said Nassau County Legislator Norma Gonsalves, R-East Meadow. The community leaders that met with him felt he was straightforward & didn't hedge on questions.

In just a few weeks under Kane, several measures that stalled under Turan have advanced.

For one, the board approved refinancing $259 million in debt, which could save between $10 million and $22 million. And Nassau County agreed to renegotiate its agreement with the organization, granting a measure of certainty that the county doesn't plan on severing crucial contracts.

Under Kane, the organization is also pushing to sell the 71-acre, 889-bed A. Holly Patterson geriatric center and rebuild a new 600- bed nursing home on NUMC's 51-acre campus.

It's also planning to issue a request for proposals that could lead to collaborations with other hospitals and a clinic to serve veterans.

Kane, who says he sees the turnaround as a challenge that I found very compelling, may be on a kind of honeymoon amid high hopes. But so far, he has succeeded in getting people pumped up over the organization's prospects, said Lawrence Gottlieb, NHCC chairman.

There's an advantage sometimes to being a new guy on the block, Gottlieb said. He can look at this hospital from A to Z and preserve and improve what's working, eliminate those programs that aren't working and fix those that aren't working but should be.

The Civil Service Employees Association, which represents most of the hospital's 3,600 employees, is taking a wait-and-see approach before christening Kane a comeback CEO.

All I can tell you is that Daniel Kane is new. We've met with him, said George Walsh, president of the CSEA local 830 unit at NUMC. We're willing to sit down, work out our differences and try to make the hospital work better.

Born in Brooklyn, Kane has devoted his life to healing healthcare problems in one way or another.

He began at Maimonides Medical Center in the 1960s as a teenager, doing everything from helping transport patients to working the elevator before rising to administrative positions at various hospitals.

What I liked about it is that a hospital is a microcosm of society, said Kane. He earned a bachelor's degree in business administration from City College of New York in 1964, a master's of science in healthcare administration from the Columbia University School of Public Health in 1966 and a doctorate in public health from the University of Pittsburgh's Graduate School of Public Health in 1973.

He has led hospitals in Pennsylvania, Rhode Island, Wisconsin and New Jersey, where he also served as chairman of the New Jersey Hospital Association.

Kane views himself as a leader who's able to work with employees, government and residents - a skill that's crucial at an institution often bogged down in contentiousness.

My style is collaborative, said Kane. At the same time, I have no problem making decisions.

Still, Kane is no miracle worker. He led Englewood through some profitable years and some losses and left it in the red, but he points out that a hospital's bottom line depends greatly on government funding and managed-care companies.

At the average hospital, 50 to 75 percent or more of its revenue comes from government sources and it has no control over what the government pays for the services it provides, said Kane. It also has very little control over what commercial insurance companies pay.

In 2003, Englewood provided about $14 million in services for people who don't have health insurance or can't afford to pay, for which it was compensated about $950,000.