Summary: This month in our issue, we examine why hospitalists’ work experience and job skills make them naturals to join the executive ranks of hospital administration. Dr. Patrick Torcson, an internist and Chief Integration Officer at St. Tammany Parish Hospital in Covington, Louisiana, talks about why he joined the leadership track and his journey to the C-suite. Dr. Torcson says being able to think at a systems level, to put one’s ego aside, and to listen well are core qualities of good leadership, and that clinical credibility is the foundation of hospital medicine leadership. Also in this issue, we look at CMS’s again-delayed and controversial two-midnight rule, address the shortcomings of the designation “observation status” in our Policy Corner column, review the latest in clinical literature, and feature newly minted SHM President Burke Kealey’s first President’s Corner column on the social movement that is hospital medicine.
