STOUGHTON, Mass., June 2, 2020 /PRNewswire/ — Shields Health Solutions (the “Company”), the leading and largest network of hospital-based specialty pharmacies, today announced the appointment of accomplished healthcare executive Lee Cooper as Chief Executive Officer. As Founder and Chairman, Jack Shields will actively work with Mr. Cooper, as well as co-founder and President John Lucey, to develop and execute the Company’s strategy as it accelerates its successful growth trajectory.
As Shields’ CEO, Mr. Cooper will drive further expansion of the Company’s successful partnership model and help enhance its existing corporate infrastructure. Mr. Cooper formerly served as the President and CEO of GE Healthcare, U.S. and Canada, where he led an $8 billion commercial and service organization through a period of steady growth. In that role, he partnered with care providers, healthcare systems, and governments to improve healthcare quality, access, and affordability. Mr. Cooper subsequently joined Welsh, Carson, Anderson & Stowe (WCAS) as an operating partner focused on healthcare investments in 2019.
Shields, WCAS, and Walgreens joined forces in late 2019 in order to expand the Company’s unique specialty pharmacy model nationwide, provide care across more complex specialty disease states, and accelerate its integrated service and technology offerings. Since then, Mr. Cooper has been working closely with Mr. Shields and the Company’s leadership on expansion strategies.
“We are at an exciting inflection point,” said Mr. Shields. “Eight years ago, we embarked on a mission to become the industry leader in providing innovative care for the nation’s most complex patient populations. We now have the opportunity to bring that care to new populations and new geographies. As CEO, Lee will bring tremendous value. He is an incredibly talented and experienced operating executive, and he deeply understands and appreciates the evolving healthcare landscape and the critical role Shields plays now more than ever. I look forward to continued collaboration with Lee to realize the significant growth opportunities ahead.”
Shields has expanded its partnership base to now include nearly 40 health systems, representing more than 300 hospitals across the country. The Company’s programs now touch nearly 10% of the U.S. specialty patient population. Since 2018, Shields’ key patients-on-therapy metric has increased three-fold as its pharmacies have continued to expand the integrated care model across more than 30 specialty disease states, including oncology, neurology, rheumatology, and diabetes. In addition, through the recent global health crisis, Shields has maintained its focus on bringing its care model to the patients who need it most, having hired an additional 100 employees in the past eight weeks alone.
Mr. Lucey commented: “Our success and momentum is a validation of the essential role Shields plays in providing better care at a lower cost to the most vulnerable people in our communities. Jack and I are excited to bring Lee into the organization to continue to build with us the vision we embarked on eight years ago. With his outstanding track record of growth-oriented leadership and longstanding partnerships with care providers and healthcare systems across the industry, Lee’s leadership will continue to accelerate our growth trajectory.”
“I am energized by the opportunity to drive Shields’ next phase of growth as CEO and to build on the Company’s robust foundation,” said Mr. Cooper. “Together, we will expand Shields’ differentiated care model to more health systems nationwide and invest in our specialty pharmacy technology platform, enabling us to treat more patients in need of the most intensive therapies. I am excited to continue to work with Jack, John and the entire Shields team, as well as our valued hospital partners, to accelerate that vision.”
Tom Scully, Shields Board member, former administrator of the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services (CMS), and WCAS Partner added: “Under Jack’s leadership, Shields has become one of the fastest growing private companies in America. Jack is a ‘force of nature’ who has made an enduring impact on the health sector by creating an innovative model that provides a new and better model of care in specialty pharmacy. Jack is the reason we made this investment, and we hope and expect that Jack will remain a driving force, taking the Company to even greater heights in his role as Chairman and Founder.”
About Lee Cooper
Lee Cooper is a distinguished leader in the healthcare industry, including roles in healthcare-focused private equity and more than 25 years with the General Electric Company.
He is currently an Operating Partner at Welsh, Carson, Anderson & Stowe (WCAS) focused on healthcare investments. Prior to that, he served as President and CEO of GE Healthcare, U.S. and Canada, leading an $8 billion commercial and service organization within the global GE Healthcare business. In that role, Mr. Cooper oversaw GE Healthcare’s core businesses of Imaging, Ultrasound, Life Care Solutions, Enterprise Digital Solutions and Services and partnered with care providers, healthcare systems and governments to improve healthcare quality, access and affordability.
Earlier in his career, he held multiple Chief Commercial Officer roles, including for GE Corporate, GE Energy Management and GE Capital, Americas.
Mr. Cooper serves on the Board of the Healthcare Trust of America, Inc., the largest dedicated owner and operator of medical office buildings in the U.S. He earned his B.A. in Economics from Ohio Wesleyan University.
About Shields Health Solutions
Shields Health Solutions is a specialty pharmacy integrator and care provider, partnering with hospital leaders on every aspect of specialty pharmacy creation, growth and management. Shields provides the fastest, lowest risk model for health systems to create or grow a hospital-owned specialty pharmacy program. Started in 2012, Shields partners with health systems to provide on-site pharmacy and care professionals, a purpose-built specialty pharmacy technology platform, access to nearly all limited distribution drugs (LDDs) and most (health insurance) payors in the nation.
Through a differentiated care model that “plugs into” centralized infrastructure and provides high-touch pharmacy liaisons on-site, Shields delivers superior value and a best-in-class experience to health systems, patients, payers, and manufacturers. This results from unparalleled medication adherence (92%), quicker time to therapy (<48 hours), improved patient satisfaction (85 NPS), decrease in re-admissions, lower medical spend, and fewer adverse events. For more information, see https://shieldshealthsolutions.com/.