Kathryn Swenson, clinical programs leadership athlete

Kathryn “Katie” Swenson always knew she wanted to go into medicine. As executive director of Intermountain Health’s surgical specialties and digestive health clinical program, she certainly draws on her years of experience as a physician assistant in pediatric transplant and pediatric general surgery-trauma. But she finds, too, that she draws just as much on the leadership and teambuilding skills she acquired as a U.S. Air Force aircraft maintenance officer.

We caught up with her recently to talk about military leadership skills, innovation through collaboration, and empowering patients to take control of their health. 

How did you end up in medicine? 

I started out as a bio-premed undergraduate at the Air Force Academy and thought I was going to go straight to medical school, but I got some good advice: take advantage of the military and gain some leadership perspective. I was stationed in England for about three and a half years leading an aircraft maintenance unit. I served during Operation Enduring Freedom and Operation Iraqi Freedom supporting the downrange mission from the home base.  

So I gained some really invaluable life experience, and then decided to go back to school and become a PA. I joined Intermountain’s pediatric general surgery-trauma team about 10 years ago. I’ve practiced clinically in pediatric transplant for about 4 years, and now I get to support our surgical teams as the executive clinical director of the surgical specialties and digestive health clinical program, supporting 12 surgical divisions. 

What does your day-to-day look like in that role? 

We partner with entities like Select Health, Castell, and Ventures throughout the enterprise, and we look at how to improve our surgical outcomes. Obviously, there are a lot of levers to do that. 

We look at modernizing surgical training and practice, both intraoperatively and in the ambulatory space. We infuse a lot of innovation and technology, and we’re expanding the surgical model to incorporate holistic approaches like preoperative optimization and enhanced recovery after surgery. So we’re really looking at what contributes to patients living the healthiest lives possible. 

What’s a project you’re excited about right now? 

I mentioned preoperative optimization, which is a multidisciplinary initiative looking at how factors like smoking cessation, malnourishment, obesity, sleep apnea, and diabetes management impact not only surgical outcomes, but also the long-term health of our patients. And we’re developing pathways to partner with primary care and co-create collaborative strategies for managing those conditions. 

The work we’ve done has contributed to decreased length of stay, lower ED return rates, decreased inpatient and outpatient readmissions, decreased surgical site infections, and total cost of care. In 2023 we amassed $30 million in cost avoidance for our payers and patients through this initiative. 

What does that look like in practice? 

We started with looking at patients undergoing elective procedures and then applied a few different interventions. For instance, it might be a conversation between the surgeon and the patient on specific risk factors related to smoking: Smoking cessation prior to surgery will not only help their overall long-term health outcomes but will also give them a greater chance of success with that procedure.  

Similarly, losing weight or bringing a patient’s blood sugar within an appropriate range has a significant impact on surgical and long-term health outcomes. We’ve also created pathways and interventions to address those key drivers. For example, if we’re addressing diabetes, we partner with primary care to consider medication management or referral to endocrinology. If a patient is struggling with the condition of obesity, we refer them to our LiveWell programs where they can get counseling on nutrition and healthy lifestyle options. 

This initiative goes beyond clinical diagnosis and sets our patients and care teams up for success by leveraging partnerships throughout the organization. Initiatives like preoperative optimization are about providing patients with specific tools and resources they need, and what I love most about this initiative is not just that it connects and aligns so many disciplines across the system, but it really does empower patients to take control of their health. 

I think that’s the direction we really need to go, because at the end of the day, our caregivers can’t be the solution for everything or everyone. Healthcare is costly, and the system doesn’t necessarily help patients navigate their own health outside our facilities, where life is happening. If you provide patients with the tools, then you’re really empowering the community as a whole to live a healthy lifestyle. 

Does your background as an aircraft maintenance officer influence how you practice? 

There are so many parallels between the military and healthcare, particularly the mission-first mindset of flight crews. I came into this profession with a team-based mentality, so if I’m on service, I’m not just thinking about my individual role in clinical decision-making; I’m also genuinely interested in how I can support my team’s performance and contribute to the patient’s overall course of care.  

When you step into healthcare and lean on those lessons in being trained to lead under pressure, I think it has created a stronger bond between myself as a clinical leader and my team of surgeons and APPs because I have first-hand experience as a physician assistant who can speak the language of surgery, but also because my leadership training enables me to speak the language of people.  

Do you have a favorite value? 

Well, certainly we’re better together. I think the value of team-based care cannot be overstated, in the cultural sense of building community within our organization, in the operational and financial sense in advancing our proactive care strategy, and in the clinical sense of impacting lives. People recognize Intermountain for just that – moving the needle and driving value in healthcare by being innovative and collaborative. I have deep appreciation for our mission here at Intermountain, and I love the direction we’re taking our surgical specialties and digestive health clinical program to infuse innovation and empower patients and caregivers to reach their full potential.