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A day after announcing the sudden departure of the interim head of OHSU Health, the unit that runs hospitals and clinics, Oregon Health & Science University interim president Steve Stadum appointed another health care retiree to the temporary position.
Tim Goldfarb ran OHSU Health from 1987 to 2001. He moved on to run the University of Florida’s Shands hospital system. After his retirement in 2016, he returned as interim CEO of OHSU Health, a role he reprises starting today.
Most recently, Goldfarb has been a consultant to OHSU, working on its purchase of Legacy Health, which is under review by regulators.
Goldfarb “holds a deep understanding of the unique opportunities and challenges our health system currently faces,” Stadum said in an email to staff today. “I am confident Tim will make this transition as smooth as possible.”
Goldfarb replaces Ann Madden Rice, who held the interim position for just five weeks. Rice is the retired president of Abbott Northwestern Hospital in Minneapolis.
The appointment is the latest in a series of management changes at OHSU that began in June when Dr. John Hunter stepped down as head of OHSU Health after seven years in the job. Joe Ness replaced him on an interim basis while also working as chief operating officer of OHSU Health.
More turnover came in October, when Dr. Danny Jacobs resigned as head of all OHSU operations. The OHSU board planned to appoint medical school dean Dr. Nate Selden to a three-year term without a nationwide talent search, but abandoned the plan after Gov. Tina Kotek publicly opposed it, making way for Stadum, a lawyer and OHSU veteran, to become interim president.
More change came in December, when Dr. Brian Druker, developer of Gleevec, a drug that revolutionized cancer treatment, stepped down as head of the Knight Cancer Institute. He said he was resigning because OHSU had “forgotten” its mission and was no longer a place to do cutting-edge research.
Goldfarb is the president of the Foundation for Medical Excellence. He served as chair of the Accreditation Council for Graduate Medical Education and was on the boards of the Council of Teaching Hospitals and the Association of American Medical Colleges.
He grew up in rural northern Arizona, where both his parents were polio victims, according to a biography from the foundation. He received his undergraduate degree from Arizona State University and returned there to get a master’s degree in health service administration.