Skip to content
Menu
Home

Affordable housing: A healthcare issue + a workforce issue

When you retire after a decade at the helm of the region’s largest healthcare organization—and one of the region’s largest employers—there are bound to be changes in store.

“I’ve been retired for about six weeks now,” said Dr. Mark Keroack, a Springfield native who served as president and CEO of Baystate Health from 2014 to July 2024. “And I’ve been adjusting to life without people pinging you every ten minutes. It was nice to take a two-week vacation this summer instead of one week. Next month we’re going to Paris to celebrate my wife’s birthday.”

“My wife, Dr. Ann Errichetti and I on vacation in Ireland.”

One thing that isn’t changing for Keroack is his support of Way Finders, who he came to know as a trusted partner during his tenure with Baystate Health, which employs more than 13,000 people across five hospitals and 80 medical practices. Under his leadership, the organization shifted its focus to the prevention of disease and expanded partnerships in the community to benefit public health.

“It’s a rare individual who doesn’t have some experience with Baystate at some point in their life. Between 60 and 70 percent of all healthcare activity in western Mass happens through Baystate,” said Keroack, a specialist in infectious diseases prior to becoming an administrator. “In 2017, Baystate got involved in what’s called the Accountable Care Organization, or ACOs, using a population health model of care. That’s where we jumped at the opportunity to accept a global budget for the care of roughly 50,000 underserved individuals [receiving MassHealth/Medicaid] and agreed to be responsible for all their healthcare needs.”

“A shot of the clinic team at High Street Pediatrics taken during the pandemic (I am in back). These are the folks doing the heavy lifting for the Medicaid ACO.”

Taking such an approach, Keroack explained, really changes how you think about care. Instead of waiting for people to get sick and come in the door or seeing them each month to treat the same urgent issues, you need to worry about what’s going on with them outside of the office or emergency room. You start looking further upstream.

“Once we made the ACO commitment, all of a sudden there’s a whole bunch of things we needed to pay attention to more than ever before, which fall under the rubric of the social determinants of health,” said Keroack, referencing the web of non-medical factors that shape one’s health and well-being. “These include economic vitality, food security, legal aid, behavioral health, transportation, childcare. Among many other things at the personal, social, and community levels. Which can take on this larger-than-life significance in some communities and really thwart your best efforts to practice good care.”

Keroack began by calling friends across the country who worked at safety-net and county hospitals. “I asked, ‘What were the first things you started working on?’ And more often than not, housing was the number one thing that they prioritized, even before food insecurity. They said, ‘You’ve got to secure housing.’ It’s really hard to accomplish good medical care without secure housing. Housing security and housing affordability are foundational to health and prosperity.”

Consider someone who has diabetes, heart disease, or another chronic condition. Or who has a high-risk pregnancy. Or who is recovering from surgery. If the person is also unhoused or facing eviction, Keroack said, it’s almost guaranteed that they are not going to be prioritizing their healthcare needs.

“My official Baystate shot.”

“One of the first things we did, part and parcel of the ACO movement, is partner with Way Finders and other social service organizations, such as the Food Bank of Western Massachusetts, Legal Aid, the Springfield Housing Authority, and Behavioral Health Network,” said Keroack. “We began to think more holistically about keeping people healthy and dealing with housing instability and other issues.”

Shortly after this partnership came together, which created a more seamless conduit for eligible patients to connect with Way Finders’ programs and services, Keroack got involved in statewide activities around workforce development.

“One of the things that struck me was how many people of working age are leaving our state, close to 100,000 in the last five years. And the number one cited reason is housing. So, the issue of housing security and housing affordability became not only a healthcare issue, but also a workforce issue for us,” said Keroack, who admittedly is still trying to break the habit of using “we” and “us” in reference to his former employer. “The cost of housing and the lack of available housing stock impacts the available number of people working in the healthcare space.”

Keroack is buoyed by the housing policy initiatives led by Governor Maura Healey, which include developing a cabinet-level housing office for her administration and the passing of the Affordable Homes Act, but he recognizes that the housing crisis isn’t anywhere near solved.

“Getting housing right is a complex puzzle, like controlling diabetes. There are a bunch of things you’ve got to do and there’s kind of one way to get it all right and about a hundred ways to do it wrong,” said Keroack. “If you care about the health and prosperity of people in our communities, ensuring that they have affordable, safe, reliable housing is a great way to start. Way Finders is one of the key social organizations that I regularly support because I know through our partnership with them that they are doing good, impactful work. I feel very comfortable that my money is going to good use each year.”

Thank you for your support, Dr. Mark Keroack, and we congratulate you on your retirement.

Support Way Finders.