USC recently created the USC Health System Board, a new body that will provide high-level direction for the operations and strategic development of the University’s medical enterprise and joint ventures for surgical centers.

With the 2013 addition of USC Verdugo Hills Hospital, the clinical enterprise now includes three hospitals, more than 600 faculty physicians practicing through the USC Care Medical Group, five community-based ambulatory care clinics and a new medical foundation to engage community physicians in private practice.

In a Dec. 20, 2013, memo describing the inaugural appointments to the board, USC President C. L. Max Nikias, PhD, said that its members “will advise the university on strategic growth initiatives and financial performance of the system, and will monitor quality of care and service across the system.”

Nikias will serve as the board’s chair, with Tom Jackiewicz, MPH, senior vice president and CEO of USC Health, serving as vice chair.

The board also includes the following additional members, whose three-year terms began Jan. 1:

• Robert Abeles, MBA, USC senior vice president and chief financial officer

• Carol Mauch Amir, USC general counsel

• Edward Crandall, MD, PhD, chair, Department of Medicine

• Todd R. Dickey, JD, USC senior vice president, administration

• Scott Evans, CEO, PharmD, MHA, Keck Hospital of USC, USC Norris Cancer Hospital

• Elizabeth Garrett, JD, USC provost and senior vice president of academic affairs

• John Kusmiersky, USC trustee

• John Niparko, MD, president, USC Care Medical Group

• Carmen Puliafito, MD, MBA, dean, Keck School of Medicine of USC

• Leonard Schaeffer, USC trustee

• William Schoen, USC trustee

• Shawn Sheffield, MBA, MHSA, chief strategy and development officer, Keck Medicine of USC

• Vaughn Starnes, MD, chair, Department of Surgery

• Mark Stevens, USC trustee

• Debbie Walsh, RN, MSN, CEO, USC Verdugo Hills Hospital