Next steps in the search for the Executive Vice President for Health Affairs March 10, 2023

Dear Campus Community,

I am pleased to provide the detailed job position that is being posted today for our next Executive Vice President for Health Affairs (EVPHA).

You can read that posting here: https://ukjobs.uky.edu/postings/455253.

Our search committee — co-chaired by Department of Psychiatry Chair Seth Himelhoch and Nancy Cox, Vice President for Land-grant Engagement and Dean of the College of Agriculture, Food and Environment — will meet for the first time next week.

Our search consultant, Greenwood/Asher, will also be in attendance. The firm has deep experience in both academic and health care searches and has worked often on our campus in recent years. Our goal remains to have a new EVPHA in place by late summer or early fall.

A critical theme throughout the job posting is the idea of alignment.

We are also currently searching for a new Dean for our College of Medicine. Searching for these two vital leadership positions at the same time is an opportunity for UK. The two most important health leaders will come to UK at the same time, become oriented to our campus together and will be expected to work in close partnership with each other to continue to elevate our education, research and clinical missions while also strengthening our growing academic health system.

To that end, we are casting the widest and strongest net possible to recruit the best person for this position. We will recruit nationally, expect someone with several years of administrative experience and welcome diverse backgrounds and advanced academic credentials from health care or related areas.

Our next EVPHA may be a physician, as in the past. But that person might also bring other experiences to the table. Nationally, about half of academic medical centers are administered by someone who is not a physician. That’s also the case for nearly a third of the largest 25 academic medical centers.

Our job — and our steadfast goal and commitment — is to find the right leader during a challenging and dynamic time for health care and higher education. I am very confident that UK HealthCare will be very attractive, given our growth, our mission and our trajectory as one of the nation’s finest academic health systems.

We will update you throughout this process as we continue our work to advance Kentucky in all that we do.

Thank you.

Eli Capilouto

President