Improving the health status of people in America’s most underserved communities has been the mission and calling of Benjamin Anderson, who currently serves as CEO of Kearny County Hospital, a comprehensive rural health complex located in southwest Kansas.
Anderson has received national acclaim for his work in physician recruitment, health promotion, women’s health initiatives, rural healthcare delivery innovation, and research-based transitions from volume to value. His work has been featured by National Public Radio, Sports Illustrated, ABC News, the Associated Press, and in nearly every major healthcare publication. He regularly leads teams of people to serve at Eden Children’s Village, an orphanage and medical clinic in northern Zimbabwe.
“One of the key things that I try to talk about is, the providers grew up in one culture and the administrators grew up in another culture. That culture may be in the same hospital, but they could've been miles apart.”
His career in healthcare administration began in 2009 as CEO of Ashland Health Center, a struggling hospital and the only healthcare provider in a Kansas town of 900 people. There, he led an effort that dramatically revitalized the community’s healthcare services, recruiting and retaining several medical providers to serve a multi-county area on the border of Kansas and Oklahoma.
Benjamin holds Bachelor of English and Master of Business Administration degrees from Drury University in Springfield, Missouri. This January, he completed the course work for his Master of Healthcare Delivery Science degree from Dartmouth College in Hanover, New Hampshire. He and his wife, Kaila, have four children ages 3, 3, 1 and 1.