Dr. Irving Pike, ’78 alum, elected president of the American College of Gastroenterology

Irving M. Pike, MD, FACG, a physician hospital executive and expert on endoscopic quality indicators, was elected by the membership as the 2017-2018 President of the American College of Gastroenterology (ACG), a national medical organization representing more than 14,000 clinical gastroenterologists and other specialists in digestive diseases. Dr. Pike officially took his position as President during the College’s Annual Scientific Meeting at the World Congress of Gastroenterology at ACG2017, held this week in Orlando. In this position, Dr. Pike will direct ACG’s programs which include continuing medical education in the clinical, scientific and patient-related skills of gastroenterology, activities involving national and state medical affairs, health policy issues, and clinical investigation.

Dr. Pike currently is Senior Vice President and Chief Medical Officer at John Muir Health in Contra Costa County, CA, a role he assumed in 2012. There he serves as a key member of John Muir Health’s executive leadership team, providing medical and clinical leadership, expertise and perspective to the executive team, medical staff and clinical employees throughout the organization. Dr. Pike also plays a key role in the development and execution of business strategies that support the organization’s growth. At John Muir Health, he continues to be active as a gastroenterologist and also provides GI care as a volunteer for a local indigent clinic. Additionally, Dr. Pike serves as President of the John Muir Specialty Medical Group.

Before his move to John Muir Health, Dr. Pike had practiced gastroenterology in Virginia Beach, VA since 1983. He spent 12 years as a physician executive with non-profit Sentara Healthcare in southeastern Virginia as Vice President of Medical Affairs, Medical Director Physician Education, and Medical Director Care Management. In his role as Vice President for Medical Affairs at Sentara, Dr. Pike had responsibility for patient safety, care management and care delivery, including clinical quality improvement, as well as medical staff leadership development and education.

From 1986 to 2012, Dr. Pike was Assistant Professor of Clinical Internal Medicine at Eastern Virginia Medical School. After earning his medical degree from the Medical College of Georgia, Augusta, GA, Dr. Pike completed his internship and residency in internal medicine at Southwestern Medical School, University of Texas Health Science Center in Dallas, and his fellowship in gastroenterology at the University of Texas Health Sciences Center, Dallas, TX.

Founding Director of GI Quality Improvement Consortium, Ltd.

Dr. Pike is the Founding Director and, from 2009 to 2017, served as the President of the GI Quality Improvement Consortium Ltd. (GIQuIC), an educational and scientific 501(c)(3) organization established by physicians specializing in gastroenterology. The GIQuIC’s purpose is to improve the quality of gastroenterology patient care throughout the United States and abroad. GIQuIC is a joint venture of the ACG and the American Society for Gastrointestinal Endoscopy (ASGE). When Dr. Pike stepped down as GIQuIC President this year, its Board of Directors named Glenn M. Eisen, MD, MPH, FASGE, as the new GIQuIC President.

The GIQuIC grew out of Dr. Pike’s experience from 2006 to 2009 at Sentara Healthcare in Virginia. There he successfully completed a pilot project whereby physicians from across the country submitted colonoscopy quality indicator data to a central repository, using diverse methods of submission. This included extraction both from paper charts and endowriter software. These data collection strategies demonstrate different methodologies and devices, for recording endoscopy procedures, can benchmark using a central data repository. Additionally, benchmarking reports can be used to provide physicians feedback on their performance.

In 2009, ACG and ASGE agreed to take over the project and roll it out nationally. They jointly established GIQuIC as a non-profit educational and scientific organization.

Dr. Pike’s History of Leadership in ACG

A member of the ACG Board of Trustees since 2007, Dr. Pike has served as an officer of the College since 2013. In 2015, he was selected by the ACG President to deliver the Emily Couric Memorial Lecture, “National Registry Benchmarking for Colonoscopy Quality: The ‘High Road’ Toward Improving the Performance of Colonoscopy and Cancer Prevention.” Dr. Pike has contributed as a member of the ACG Credentials Committee (2000-2001) and Practice Management Committee (2002 to present; Chair, 2004 to 2007.) He also served as Co-Chair of an ACG-ASGE Joint Task Force for Development of Endoscopic Quality Indicators (2005 to 2006.) He also served as Co-Chair on the updated papers that were published in 2015.

A noteworthy speaker and educator, Dr. Pike has presented frequently on the business of health care, endoscopic quality indicators, and physician leadership topics. From 2014 to 2017, Dr. Pike was named by Becker’s Hospital Review as one of “100 Hospital and Health System CMOs To Know,” and from 2010 to 2016 by Becker’s ASC Review as a “Gastroenterologist To Know.”

“The ACG will continue to evolve to support gastroenterologists’ need for help navigating an increasingly complex regulatory environment as well as pressures from the government and private insurers. The College will continue to be proactive in these regards and educate legislators and CMS on the impact of potential decisions on our members and our patients. My goal will be for the ACG to continue to lead in this effort, rather than follow,” said Dr. Pike.

“Among my priorities as ACG President is to remain focused on keeping the College in a position to maintain GIQuIC as an important means for practicing gastroenterologists to lead the way in defining and using quality metrics that are relevant to improving the care our patients receive,” commented Dr. Pike.

According to Dr. Pike, the GIQuIC registry started as a way to benchmark and improve the quality of work performed by gastroenterologists and evolved into an active role for the GIQuIC in defining what measures would be important for determining quality, rather than have CMS or another organization decide for gastroenterologists what they felt would be important.

“By being out front in the quality movement, we have found a third benefit of GIQuIC. We, the ACG in partnership with the ASGE, have been able to advise CMS and insurance companies that society-led efforts are superior to complex institution methodology for developing measures and reporting them,” said Dr. Pike.