BY TIM BONFIELD
The Cincinnati Enquirer
Warren Falberg, longtime top executive for Jewish Hospital, announced Wednesday that he will resign, effective Sept. 25.
Mr. Falberg was the chief executive at the city's fourth-largest hospital and nation's oldest Jewish hospital for 22 years, including the most tumultuous years in its 148-year history. Most recently, he was senior executive officer of the Jewish Hospital and a senior vice president of the Health Alliance of Greater Cincinnati.
Mr. Falberg, 60, is leaving in anticipation of a sweeping management reorganization at the Health Alliance, a change he said he supports even though it has no place for him.
"It was time," Mr. Falberg said. "The organization is in a major mode of change and I did not see myself having a role in that change."
The Health Alliance, formed in 1995 as partnership between the Christ and University hospitals, has grown to include the Jewish, St. Luke and Fort Hamilton-Hughes Memorial hospitals. With more than 12,000 employees, the Health Alliance is Cincinnati's fourth-largest employer.
Jack Cook, president and chief executive of the Health Alliance, said: "We are very sorry to lose Warren, but I understand and support his choice."
Mr. Falberg "deserves a lot of credit," Mr. Cook said, for successfully guiding Jewish Hospital through troubled times and for managing the shift to Jewish Hospital in Kenwood without a big job loss. Mr. Falberg took tremendous pride that all but six of more than 300 employees bumped in the transition were placed in other Health Alliance jobs, Mr. Cook said.
But it was not realistic to expect Mr. Falberg to play a lesser role in the new organization, Mr. Cook said. That plan envisions running the Health Alliance through eight product lines: cardiology, oncology, women's health, orthopedics, neurosciences, emergency care, behavioral medicine and community services.
The new managers and business plans are expected to be in place by year's end. But it will be a year before the plan is fully implemented, Mr. Cook said,
"It is a bold stroke and a needed stroke," Mr. Falberg said. "It is the right direction for this organization to take."
During Mr. Falberg's tenure, Jewish Hospital in Avondale became its own health system by acquiring the former Otto C. Epp Memorial Hospital in Kenwood in 1988, forming a physician practice organization and opening outpatient centers in Mason, Evendale and downtown Cincinnati.
In 1993, Mr. Falberg took the heat when Jewish Hospital decided to end its policy of permitting abortion on demand. The decision was an effort to make the hospital more attractive in alliance talks with other local hospitals.
Since 1993, Mr. Falberg was deeply involved in the fast-paced hospital talks that forged the Health Alliance and the competing TriHealth hospital groups. The Jewish Hospitals ultimately joined the Health Alliance in January 1996, after committing to a $90 million expansion of Jewish Hospital Kenwood.
More recently, Mr. Falberg supervised the transfer of services to the Jewish Hospital in Kenwood and the November 1997 closing of the main Jewish Hospital in Avondale -- which now serves as the Health Alliance laboratory and business center.
Before joining the Health Alliance, Mr. Falberg was a prominent voice on health issues. Since then, however, he has been less outspoken. Mr. Falberg said he plans to finish this year as a special consultant to the Health Alliance. After that, he has several "irons in the fire," including expanding his role as a college health care management professor and other possible jobs in the private sector.
