Northwell Health’s Michael Dowling was named by Modern Healthcare magazine as one of the top influencers in healthcare in 2024. While Dowling said he is honored to receive the recognition, it is more so a testament to the strength of Northwell’s team of leaders and providers.
“These are not necessarily just about an individual,” Dowling said. “It is recognition to Northwell nationally, and I think that’s very, very, very important because I think it’s a recognition we deserve.”
Dowling, who placed No. 35, is the only New York CEO on the list. Modern Healthcare is ranked No. 1 in readership by healthcare executives, according to its website.
He has served as Northwell’s CEO and president for more than 20 years, but his time with the healthcare system goes back further all the way to its origins in the early 1990s.
Over his time with Northwell, Dowling has overseen its growth from its establishment through the 1997 merger with LIJ Medical Center and its growth into the health system it is today.
Prior to Northwell Health, Dowling said no healthcare system of its kind had existed in the Northeast.
With a healthcare system comes benefits, Dowling said, which are led through collaboration and exchanging of best practices between its individual hospitals and providers. He said this raised the bar for healthcare in the region.
“I believe that when you do that, you have a better opportunity to provide optimum care to the public,” Dowling said.
Healthcare consolidation has increased over the past decades. While consolidation can sometimes be feared, Dowling said this evolution and change for Northwell enable it to provide better and greater care by increasing its adaptability and flexibility.
“That’s what excites us,” Dowling said. “We try to be an organization that’s very innovative and creative.”
Dowling said adaptability is key in healthcare at all levels, and he shares this advice with all of Northwell’s new hires.
“It’s not what happens in your life that matters, it’s how you react to it,” Dowling said. “So changes occur, it’s necessary and it’s important and sometimes we adapt to the change and sometimes we create the change.”
Northwell has been a leader in healthcare in New York and nationally, such as through its establishment of an outpatient facility network, which Dowling said was the first of its kind in the state. Today, the system has 945 outpatient facilities.
“We like to be out front,” Dowling said. “We like to take some risk, we like to be creative and we adapt.”
Dowling pointed out notable moments in Northwell’s history, including its advancement into Manhattan with its takeover of Lenox Hospital, the creation of the Donald and Barbara Zucker School of Medicine with Hofstra University and the start of organ transplants.
For Dowling, the status quo is what he is competing against and what he seeks to break down at Northwell Health. While he said he is proud of Northwell’s achievements, he is never satisfied and is always seeking out ways to be better.
“When you become complacent, that is the first step towards moving backward,” Dowling said.
Dowling said Northwell’s adaptability is achieved through its staff, whom he seeks out for their ability to be “comfortable with the uncomfortable.”
“We just got to keep moving forward,” Dowling said. “Don’t look back. Stop trying to rebuild yesterday; yesterday is gone. Try to create tomorrow.”
One of the starkest personal stories that came to Dowling’s mind was the COVID-19 pandemic and how Northwell Health tackled a global pandemic that greatly impacted its community. He said he believed Northwell saw more COVID-19 patients than any other single healthcare entity in the nation.
During the pandemic, Dowling said he walked the halls of its COVID-19 units every day. While he saw devastating scenes, what stood out to him was the resilience of Northwell’s healthcare providers.
“You find out who the great people are when you’re in a situation like that,” Dowling said. “…To be able to witness that, it kind of gives you perspective. You think you’re brave, you’re tough and then you go out and you watch what goes on on those floors during those months and years and you realize that whatever you do you think is important, it only pales in comparison to what people on the front lines do.”
Dowling has also led Northwell Health as a leader in the intersection between social issues and healthcare, such as its establishment of the Center for Gun Violence Prevention.
While Dowling said some have criticized Northwell for going outside of its bounds, he said these social policy issues are a concern of healthcare.
For example, Dowling said Northwell often treats individuals who are victims of gun violence. Oftentimes these are children as Dowling said gun violence is the top leading cause of death for them.
“Some of these kids will never be the same,” Dowling said. “Some of them will survive and some of them don’t.”
By addressing gun violence, it takes the form of preventative medicine not so different than getting a flu shot. Rather than treating a person with severe symptoms from the flu, Northwell provides a vaccine to aid them and rather than treating a person who is shot, it seeks methods to diminish such violence.
Other social issues Northwell Health seeks to address to prevent health impacts include climate change and sustainability, as well as healthy and accessible food.
“Because how communities live and what happens in the community, how we relate to one another, how we talk to one another, all of that impacts negatively or positively to health,” Dowling said. “I define healthy very broadly. It is way more than medical care delivery.”
Looking to the future, Dowling said Northwell is expanding to Upstate New York, Connecticut, New Jersey, Pennsylvania and Florida. He said it is also seeking to bring healthcare closer to its patients by moving it out of the hospitals and into communities.