Page 42 - Healthcare News Sep/Oct 2022

HEALTHCARE HEROES OF WESTERN MASSACHUSETTS
EMERGING LEADER
Dr. Sundeep Shukla
Chief and Physician, Baystate Noble Hospital Emergency Department
He Has Devoted His Career to Improving the Community’s ‘Safety Net’ Net’
DBy George O’Brien
r. Sundeep Shukla, or ‘Sunny,’ as most everyone calls him, has always felt at home in the emergency room, and he has never really wanted to work anywhere else.
There is a fast pace and decidedly unpredictable nature to the work, he said, noting that each day, and each hour, are different from the one before and the one after. But there are many more reasons why he has chosen to spend his career in this setting, the most important being the ER’s important role, both to the hospital in question and to the community it serves.
“The emergency room is the safety net for all patients,” Shukla
explained. “Many patients do not have access to healthcare; we feel that the ER can provide care to anyone who walks through the door, regardless of whether you have insurance, regardless of your background; we’ll see anyone who walks through our doors, and I’m proud to say that.”
But Shukla has done more than work in the ER. Indeed, throughout his career he has devoted time and energy to bringing new efficiencies, better ways of serving patients, and, yes, better ways of doing business to the ER, especially in his current role as chief of the Emergency Department at Baystate Noble Hospital in Westfield.
And he brings what would be considered a somewhat unique background to this assignment. In addition to attending the University of Missouri for his undergraduate studies and earning his medical degree from Manipal University in Karnataka,
India, Shukla also earned an MBA, with an emphasis in medical management, from UMass Amherst in 2017.
He has used all these degrees, as well as his hands-on experience in the ER, to help improve service, efficiency, and quality, and reduce wait times and what are known as ‘walkouts’ — people who come to the ER but leave before being seen, for whatever reason.
“Having earned that MBA, I was able to reconfigure how I look at things in my brain,” he said. “Before, it was all medicine- related, but by doing the MBA, I was able to focus on flow and how we could improve certain processes to make an impact on the total visit.
“At Baystate Noble, we do small things like put a greeter in the waiting room so when patients come in there’s someone they can talk to, someone they ask questions to; they round, they give
Leah Martin Photography
Having earned
that MBA, I
was able to reconfigure how I look at things
in my brain. Before, it was all medicine-related, but by doing
the MBA, I was able to focus on flow and how we could improve certain processes to make an impact on the
”
A28 2022
2022 HEALTHCARE HEROES
“
total visit.