In March 2012, Oden was elected chair of the Board and officially began his role on Jan. 1. Within the past year, five new trustees, including former Sen. Judd Gregg, R-N.H., and Google executive Matthew Dunne, have joined Dartmouth-Hitchcock's Board.
The new group aims to determine a successful way to maintain Dartmouth-Hitchcock's "financial survival," Oden said. The hospital is currently deciding between two financial models or a mix between the two, Oden said. The traditional fee-for-service model is difficult to sustain because many of its payments come from Medicaid and Medicare, which now receive less federal aid than before. The second model involves requesting a segment of the population to pay a fixed amount of money, regardless of their current physical health and its associated costs.
"The advantage of [the second model], which is probably where we are moving to, is that it is in the interest of the hospital to keep you healthy." Oden said. "Whereas the old model it is in interest for unhealthy patients because the hospital gets paid for more service."
Dartmouth-Hitchcock Medical Center should tap into the many resources that Dartmouth has to offer, especially within the graduate schools, Oden said.
"If we have financial problems, we should make sure Tuck is helping us," he said. "If we have problems where advanced engineering can help, let's get Thayer."
Dartmouth's relationship with DHMC provides an opportunity for expertise exchange between the College's graduate schools and the hospital, DHMC external relations director Rick Adams said.
When Oden was appointed, the hospital lacked integration between DHMC's main hospital and its smaller community group practices and clinics, he said. Oden said would like to see Dartmouth-Hitchcock employees receive more recognition for their work.
"Everybody at Dartmouth-Hithcock does a really good job and they need to know the Board knows that," Oden said. "I stop all the time to tell people that we are the Board of Trustees, and we appreciate what you are doing."
Oden aims to make the Board, which currently has 25 members, smaller. The Board's optimal size is 17 to 21 people, and should contain six physicians, he said.
Most hospital boards have 40 to 50 people, making it difficult to produce productive and actionable conversations, Oden said.
Dartmouth-Hitchcock's board consists of the compensation committee, presided over by trustees with business backgrounds, and the value committee, run by trustees with medical backgrounds.
Oden hopes recently appointed Board members will support the hospital at both the local and national levels.
As a political figure for much of his career, Gregg brings a broad national view to the Board. Gregg was a U.S. representative, the governor of New Hampshire and, most recently, a U.S. senator until 2011.
Dunne is currently Google's head of community affairs. At 22, he was elected to the Vermont House of Representatives, where he served for seven years until he became the Clinton administration's AmeriCorps VISTA director. He later served two terms in the Vermont State Senate.
Oden taught at the College as a religion professor from 1975 to 1989. He then was president of Kenyon College and later Carleton College. Oden returned to Dartmouth and served on the Board for two years before being becoming chairman in January.
DHMC medicine department chair and surgery professor Richard Rothstein, vascular surgery section chair and surgery and radiology professor Richard Powell and Dartmouth-Hitchcock Manchester medical director Steven Paris will also join the Board.
