Pandemic Reflections

Ken Holmen, MD

The pandemic shined a bright spotlight on health care and it illuminated major fault cracks in how America thinks and goes forward into the 21st century. That’s what I’m worried about. I’m spending a lot of time talking with leaders about that. How do we not circle the wagons, but embrace a broader conversation about what America in the 21st century looks like?

The 21st century of America is very different than what I was raised in. Rather than complaining about it, or trying to resist it, we should embrace it and to some extent figure out the excitement of a new tomorrow.

Ken Holmen, MD, CentraCare CEO

I’d like to have us all think about that differently and go on that journey together.

How do we continue to stay innovative and connected? We need to be bold again. How do we think differently about how we do our work together?

How do we stay safer together? We have had to arrest people who assaulted our nurses, so our society needs to get safer – safer in our care institutions and safer in public platforms. My commitment to our workforce is to continue to look for ways for us to be safe. To me, that’s the future of healthcare.

Our volume was enormous during the pandemic. Our team members worked 20,000 extra shifts. We had people that were working 60, 70, 80 hours a week. And that includes people on the floor and in the clinics, people in our finance area, everybody. And that’s why I use the term ‘war.’ When there’s a war going on, you’re in the foxhole and you’re working. That’s one thing I am proud of for the organization – that they recognized the shared pain and gain.