Kevin M. Fickenscher serves as the President and CEO of AMIA, the association of professionals involved in transforming healthcare by creating knowledge from data and information that increases quality, reduces costs and enhances services.
Dr. Fickenscher is passionate about the urgent need for solving our nation’s healthcare problems and believes that the use of biomedical and health informatics can distill information for solving quality, cost and service issues. He believes diverse practitioners of informatics in a multi-disciplinary environment will lead the way toward more unified, care-driven and cost-effective healthcare outcomes. Dr. Fickenscher is an advocate for the necessary and inevitable transformation of healthcare in a responsible, innovative, creative and effective manner. He is an experienced public speaker with presentations to more than 750 regional, national and international entities.
Dr. Fickenscher is a recognized physician executive leader with extensive experience in strategic and operational development in complex healthcare organizations. He is a thought leader related to healthcare technology and information management and an expert in leadership development, strategic planning, organizational transformation, business development, policy development, and clinical quality improvement.
Prior to joining AMIA in 2012, he served in a variety of domestic and international positions for Dell Healthcare Services, primarily through the company’s acquisition of Perot Systems where Dr. Fickenscher served as the Chief Medical Officer and leader of the health care information technology consulting practice. He led the organization’s International Healthcare practice and extended operations into the Middle East, India, China and Latin America.
He first moved into the information technology world as the Chief Medical Officer at WebMD, then as Director of Clinical Transformation at Computer Sciences Corporation (CSC), before joining Perot Systems. Prior to his healthcare information technology focus, Fickenscher served in several administrative healthcare leadership roles, as Senior Vice President and Chief Medical Officer for two of the premier integrated healthcare systems in the nation—Aurora Health Care and Catholic Healthcare West.
Early in his career, Dr. Fickenscher contributed to academe in his role as an Assistant Dean with Michigan State University College of Human Medicine where he developed the Center for Applied Medical Informatics. In addition, he served as the Founding Director of the Center for Rural Health, University of North Dakota School of Medicine and Health Sciences, a nationally recognized research and policy center with an emphasis on rural healthcare. Dr. Fickenscher has also served as adjunct and associate professors at several universities and colleges.
His expertise has been called upon for testimony before the U.S. Congress on multiple occasions. He was a member of the Clinton Healthcare Task Force (1992) and served as the Health Advisor to the Biden for President Campaign (1988).
Dr. Fickenscher’s talent for leadership has been recognized for many years. As a physician executive he is a current Diplomat of the American Board of Medical Management (1992) and an Associate of the American College of Healthcare Executives (1988). He is also a Certified Physician Executive and Fellow with the American College of Physician Executives (1988) and a Fellow of the American Academy of Family Physicians (1988).
He was one of Modern Healthcare magazine’s 50 Most Powerful Physician Executives in Healthcare in 2007 and recognized as an Emerging Healthcare Leader in 1991 by The Healthcare Forum, Korn/Ferry International. Dr. Fickenscher was also a Regional White House Fellow finalist (1984) and a Kellogg National Fellow (1985).
Dr. Fickenscher graduated from the University of North Dakota, School of Medicine and Health Sciences in 1978 and trained as a family physician. He obtained his Family Practice Board-Certification in 1982.