Cam Patterson, MD, UA system choice for UAMS chancellor's job.

The University of Arkansas System announced today that UA President Donald Bobbitt will recommend cardiologist Dr. Cam Patterson, COO of Weill-Cornell Medical Center, New York Presbyterian Hospital, as the new chancellor at the University of Arkansas Medical Sciences.

Bobbitt will make the recommendation to the UA Board of Trustees at a meeting the first week in January, spokesman Nate Hinkel said.

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Patterson will start work June 1. His total pay will be $1.2 million. That’s a bit of a raise from former Chancellor Dan Rahn, who was paid a salary of $630,000 and $270,000 in deferred compensation. Hinkel said the components of the pay package had yet to be approved.

Interim Chancellor Stephanie Gardner, Pharm.D., Ed.D., will continue in the job until Patterson arrives.

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In his application letter, Patterson, who has been COO at N.Y. Presbyterian/Weill-Cornell since 2014, wrote that when he assumed the position of chief of cardiology in the department of medicine at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill, his division faced a budget deficit of $1.9 million, on top of $700,000 in deficit accounts in clinical trial programs. “Through analysis of our revenue cycle, growth in selected areas, reconfiguration of the cardiology service line, restructuring our clinical trials program, increases in research-related activities providing salary support, and improved efficiencies in billing, collections, and administration, we were able to submit a balanced budget for FY2007, a near $2 million/yr turnaround in 12 months’ time.”

At UAMS, Patterson faces a bit bigger problem: a deficit that now stands at $72 million and direction from the UA board to come up with a balanced budget for fiscal year 2019.

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