CentraCare President and CEO Dr. Ken Holmen joined my on WJON for our My Life feature.<\/p>\n
Ken Holmen (photo courtesy of Ken Holmen)<\/p>\n
Ken Holmen (photo courtesy of Ken Holmen)Early Years<\/p>\n
Ken grew up in a town of approximately 3,000 people in northwest Iowa called Forrest City.\u00a0 His mother was a nurse at the local hospital and his father was a teacher.\u00a0 Holmen describes his parents as conservative and his childhood as remarkably active and fun. He says he loved his parents very much and they were great people.\u00a0 \u00a0Ken was one of 4 children in the household… he had 2 brothers and 1 sister.<\/p>\n
Early Interests<\/p>\n
Holmen\u00a0participated\u00a0in music, sports and academic opportunities in school.\u00a0 He says in a small town they need participation in organizations and he was happy to do it.\u00a0 Because of Ken’s wide variety of interests and participation, he had friends who played sports, who were involved with music and those participating in academic groups.\u00a0 Ken was involved with band, choir and theater.\u00a0 He was also dedicated to his faith and participated with his Lutheran church.\u00a0 Ken really loved school and recalls being good at it.<\/p>\n
Ken Holmen (photo courtesy of Ken Holmen)<\/p>\n
Ken Holmen (photo courtesy of Ken Holmen)College Years<\/p>\n
After high school graduation Ken had opportunities based on his academic success.\u00a0 He chose to go to Augsburg in Minneapolis because it was in a metropolitan area and had a strong chemistry and biology program.\u00a0 He enjoyed his time at Augsburg and spent time learning the sciences and\u00a0was involved with\u00a0the Augsburg choir.\u00a0 Ken feels signing is good for the soul and helped him maintain a sense of balance.\u00a0 Ken still sings with the National Lutheran Choir.\u00a0 They perform 12-15 concerts across the country each year. Ken graduated from Augsburg in 1974.<\/p>\n
Medical School<\/p>\n
After college graduation, Ken applied for many graduate and medical schools.\u00a0 He recalls being accepted at several medical schools including the University of Minnesota Medical School.\u00a0 He chose to go there and graduated from the U of M Medical School in 1978.\u00a0 Ken says John Hanson, who was a family friend in Iowa chose to support him.\u00a0 John started Winnebago Travel Company.\u00a0 For 13 years John supported Ken financially throughout medical school, his post doctoral training, residency and research.\u00a0 Ken says this created a sense of obligation to pay it forward.<\/p>\n
Career<\/p>\n
At the age of 33 Ken was ready for a job.\u00a0 He was married to his wife, Linda at the time and the couple had 2\u00a0daughters.\u00a0 Ken was an\u00a0anesthesiologist and started working with a group in St. Paul.\u00a0 He split his time working with both pediatric and adult care.\u00a0 Ken spent the next 30 years of his professional career as an\u00a0anesthesiologist. Ken’s wife, Linda was a piano teacher and elementary school teacher while he was working in the Twin Cities.<\/p>\n
Switching to Management<\/p>\n
Ken began to show interest in the management\u00a0side of the Healthcare industry in his 50s.\u00a0 He was Chief of Surgery at Children’s Hospital in his 40s and was also on the board with Allina Health.\u00a0 Ken got his first fulltime health care executive position with Health Partners as a Physician Executive in 2005.\u00a0 He recalls this being a tough decision because his focus had to change.<\/p>\n
Ken Holmen (photo courtesy of Ken Holmen)<\/p>\n
Ken Holmen (photo courtesy of Ken Holmen)The Move to CentraCare<\/p>\n
In 2014 Ken was contacted to gage his interest in the CentraCare President and CEO position.\u00a0 He was initially not interested because of family reasons and his desire to stay in the Twin Cities.\u00a0 Ken became more interested after investigating the position and realizing the position resonated with him.\u00a0 He is pleased with the growth, commitment to service and accolades CentraCare has achieved on his watch.\u00a0 Ken is uncertain what is next for him but he remains committed to his position and advancing CentraCare.\u00a0 He acknowledges the tough decisions that face him on a daily basis as the healthcare industry continues to change.<\/p>\n
If you’d like to listen to my conversation with Dr. Ken Holmen, click below.<\/p>\n
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Visit New Munich, Minnesota in Pictures<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"CentraCare President and CEO Dr. Ken Holmen joined my on WJON for our My Life feature. Ken Holmen…\n","protected":false},"author":3,"featured_media":346461,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[35],"tags":[7890,170151,16339,210,1141,1142,74199,2295,74200,67,132,68],"class_list":{"0":"post-346460","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-health-care","8":"tag-articles","9":"tag-from-around-central-minnesota","10":"tag-from-the-wjon-newsroom","11":"tag-health","12":"tag-health-care","13":"tag-healthcare","14":"tag-morning-newswatch-with-jay-caldwell","15":"tag-newsletter","16":"tag-show-notes","17":"tag-united-states","18":"tag-unitedstates","19":"tag-us"},"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/pubeurope.com\/@us\/115470898867262689","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/346460","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/3"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=346460"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/346460\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/346461"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=346460"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=346460"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=346460"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}