Meet the team
Wyatt Decker, MD, MBA, joined Optum in 2019. In his role as chief executive officer of Optum Health, Dr. Decker oversees the care delivery and ambulatory care capabilities of Optum Care, as well as major platforms serving Behavioral Health, Population Health, Complex Care and consumer offerings at Optum. He is leveraging the full value of Optum's distinctive assets in data, analytics, technology and clinical expertise to improve the health outcomes and experiences for the millions of people receiving care in local care systems and everywhere Optum serves consumers and patients.
Prior to joining Optum, Dr. Decker served for more than two decades at Mayo Clinic, one of the largest not-for-profit, academic health systems in the U.S. He most recently held the dual role of chief medical information officer for Mayo Clinic, and CEO of Mayo Clinic in Arizona. At Mayo Clinic, Dr. Decker pioneered the use of innovative digital technologies, including telemedicine and AI, to deliver health care expertise to affiliated care providers nationwide, as well as leading the digital strategy around engaging and empowering patients.
Under his leadership, Mayo Clinic in Arizona was named the number one safest teaching hospital in the U.S., the number one hospital in Arizona by U.S. News and World Report, and achieved the highest possible CMS ratings for both patient quality and patient experience. He oversaw the launch of the Mayo Clinic Alix School of Medicine’s Arizona campus, and the building of an advanced, National Cancer Institute-designated Cancer Center.
Dr. Decker also has served as a Professor of Emergency Medicine at the Mayo Clinic College of Medicine, and directed the Emergency Medicine Residency Training program at Mayo Clinic.
Dr. Decker holds an MD from Mayo Clinic Alix School of Medicine and an MBA from Kellogg School of Management, Northwestern University and a Bachelor of Science from University of California, Santa Cruz.
Travis Winkey was appointed president of Optum Health in 2020, where he is responsible for overseeing growth, innovation and emerging business development, business alignment and operations. Prior to this role, Winkey was the chief development officer of UnitedHealth Group, leading all development efforts enterprise-wide. Winkey has played a number of executive roles across several UnitedHealth Group companies since 2009.
Prior to joining UnitedHealth Group in 2009, he was founder and general partner of BlueStream Ventures, where he helped build a number of software and technology infrastructure companies. Previously, he served as the managing director and head of mergers and acquisitions at Dain Rauscher Wessels, which became part of Royal Bank of Canada.
Winkey has an MBA from The University of Chicago Booth School of Business and a BA from Wartburg College.
Derek Chao, MD, is a physician, health care executive, and a nationally recognized leader in value-based care strategy. With over two decades of success in developing innovative programs that improve quality, lower total cost of care, and enable patients to live healthier lives, Dr. Chao is at the forefront of redefining health care in the United States.
In his current role as president and CEO of Optum Pacific West, Dr. Chao oversees the growth and operations of Optum Care in California, Oregon and Washington. As the largest region in the Optum nationwide network, he is responsible for the experience of 25,000 physicians, 2.6 million patients and more than 11,000 employees.
As a health care executive, Dr. Chao leads business development for the fast-growing Pacific West region, collaborating with external partners to find opportunities for growth and driving the M&A process. He oversees contract negotiations involving network design and has succeeded in driving down the total cost of care through strategic partnerships with health systems in a complex multi-payer environment.
At Optum, Dr. Chao is a leader in advancing value-based care, expanding access to high-quality, affordable, and convenient care across the diverse communities of America’s West Coast. Under his leadership, Optum received the Best Medical Provider in the Southland designation by readers of the L.A. Times, Top Doc status for hundreds of Optum Washington clinicians by Seattle Metropolitan and Seattle magazines, and numerous quality awards across the region.
Most recently, Dr. Chao served as chief medical officer for Optum Pacific West, leading the clinical team of one of the nation's largest multi-specialty integrated care organizations. In this role he led clinical strategy, quality, affordability, risk adjustment, network strategy and provider experience in addition to all clinical programs and teams.
Dr. Chao serves on the executive advisory board of several private equity firms and is a member of the President’s advisory council of La Verne University. He received his bachelor’s degree in biochemistry and cellular biology from the University of California, San Diego, and earned his medical degree from Penn State. He is board certified in both internal medicine and nephrology.
Patrick Conway, MD, MSc, joined Optum in February 2020 and serves as the chief executive officer of Care Solutions at Optum, part of UnitedHealth Group. He leads a portfolio of care continuum businesses with over $30 billion in annual revenue serving over 50 million people across acute and post-acute care, care in the home in-person and virtually, mental and behavioral care benefits and delivery, broad population and complex disease health management, specialty care and government health services.
From 2017 to 2019, Dr. Conway was president and chief executive officer of Blue Cross and Blue Shield of North Carolina, leading the organization to be recognized nationally for innovation, value-based payment and investments in better health outcomes.
From 2011 to 2017, Dr. Conway served as deputy administrator for innovation and quality at the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services (CMS) and as director of the Center for Medicare and Medicaid Innovation (CMMI) and the agency’s chief medical officer. He also served as principal deputy administrator and acting administrator of CMS. Before joining CMS, he oversaw clinical operations and quality improvement at Cincinnati Children’s Hospital Medical Center. He remains a practicing pediatric hospitalist.
A respected leader, innovator and clinician, he was elected to the National Academy of Medicine (NAM) in 2014, received the President’s Senior Executive Distinguished Service Award, and was a White House Fellow from 2007 to 2008.
Dr. Conway received his MD with high honors from Baylor College of Medicine, residency training at Boston Children’s Hospital, and Master of Science in clinical epidemiology from the University of Pennsylvania.
Kristy Duffey was named chief nursing officer of Optum Health in November 2022 and chief operating officer of Optum Home and Community Care in December 2021. She oversees Optum HouseCalls, Optum at Home, Senior Community Care and Post-Acute Care programs.
Duffey is responsible for driving Optum Health as employer-of-choice for advance practice clinicians by leading key workforce development strategies and initiatives. Duffey leads interdisciplinary clinical teams delivering care in the home, as well as in community settings such as skilled nursing facilities. Her clinical teams bridge home and clinic to coordinate care across physicians, nurse practitioners, pharmacists, social workers and other experts to address the full medical, behavioral and social needs of all patients from healthy to the most complex.
Previously, Duffey served as chief executive officer of Optum Population Health Solutions and led the business transformation and external partnerships for whole-person care products and services. Prior to joining Optum, Duffey served as vice president of clinical operations at XLHealth and as executive director at Evercare Health Plan, which was acquired by Optum. She is a certified geriatric nurse practitioner and serves as a fellow at the American Academy of Nursing.
Duffey currently serves on the boards of the United Health Foundation, Calm and Children’s HeartLink, and advocates for the clinician workforce through UnitedHealth Group’s Center for Clinician Advancement. She is also a member of Chief, a private network focused on connecting and supporting women executive leaders.
Duffey received her MS from the University of Maryland School of Nursing and her BSN from the University of South Carolina.
As chief clinical officer (CCO) of Optum Health, Daniel Frank, MD, oversees our clinical strategy and value-based care approach across the Optum Health businesses, including our centers of excellence focused on quality, affordability, complete and accurate documentation, and risk. His team, Clinical Performance, partners closely with teams across Optum and UnitedHealthcare on our value-based care delivery strategic growth area.
Dr. Frank has long focused on the effective development and implementation of clinical priorities and related programs to achieve greater clinician and patient satisfaction, and high-quality, affordable health care. Prior to his role as CCO, he held a number of leadership positions within Optum Health and Optum Care including lead physician, local and national medical director roles focused on process improvement and quality initiatives, and, most recently, chief medical officer of Optum Care.
His career with Optum began in 2008 at Southwest Medical Associates in Las Vegas, Nevada, where he served as a primary care physician and medical director. Before joining Southwest Medical, he was in private practice in south Florida.
Dr. Frank received his bachelor’s degree in microbiology at the University of Florida, and his medical degree from the University of Miami, Miller School of Medicine. He completed his residency in family practice at Jackson Memorial Hospital in Miami where he became board certified in family medicine.
Scott D. Hayworth, MD, FACOG, is the senior vice president and chief physician liaison officer of Optum Health, driving growth across the country as a physician leader supporting mergers, acquisitions and new strategic partnerships. He will also serve as an advisor to new initiatives. He was the CEO and market leader of the Optum Tri-State region, one of the five regions in the Optum Health nationwide network, from March 2021 to January 2023.
Dr. Hayworth has a national reputation as an authority on practice administration, multi-specialty group management and adaption to the rapidly changing environment in health care, including the transition to value.
Dr. Hayworth was the president and CEO of CareMount Medical (formerly Mount Kisco Medical Group, PC) for more than 20 years, overseeing nearly 15-fold expansion in size of the group prior to its becoming part of Optum Tri-State in late 2020. In 2019 Dr. Hayworth became chairman of the board and chief executive officer of CareMount Health Solutions, LLC, a collaborative physician-owned management services organization.
Dr. Hayworth is a consultant to the Vincent Department of Obstetrics and Gynecology at Massachusetts General Hospital and a clinical associate professor in the Department of Obstetrics and Gynecology at the Donald and Barbara Zucker School of Medicine at Hofstra/Northwell. He is a member of the board of America’s Physician Groups (APG).
Dr. Hayworth is a past associate dean at the Icahn School of Medicine at Mount Sinai. He is past chairman of the board of the American Medical Group Association and former national treasurer of the American College of Obstetricians and Gynecologists.
Dr. Hayworth has been named by Crain’s New York Business as a “Notable Health Care Leader” every year from 2020 to 2022. He was selected by Becker’s Hospital Review as one of their “105 Physician Leaders to Know” in 2019 and “112 Physician Leaders of Hospitals and Health Systems” in 2018.
Dr. Hayworth has an AB in biology from Princeton University and an MD from Cornell University Medical College (now Weill-Cornell Medicine). He completed his training in obstetrics and gynecology at Mount Sinai Hospital in New York.
As regional president of Optum Care, Tarek Elsawy, MD, FACP, oversees the operations and performance of health care delivery systems in the organization’s Northeast and Midwest regions. Dr. Elsawy is also the co-chair of the Physician Executive Council, the national physician leadership and governing body for Optum Care.
Dr. Elsawy came to Optum by way of Reliant Medical Group, the Massachusetts-based multi-specialty group he has led since 2016. At Reliant, Dr. Elsawy has overseen system transformation through the implementation of a team-based primary care clinical model. In 2018, Dr. Elsawy led Reliant through its acquisition by Optum.
Before joining Reliant, Dr. Elsawy held several executive positions at Cleveland Clinic. As vice president of regional operations and medical affairs, he had direct responsibility for 18 family health centers, and led operations at eight regional hospitals. He also led the development and implementation of Cleveland Clinic’s clinically integrated network (Quality Alliance and the Medicare Accountable Care Organization).
Dr. Elsawy received his medical degree from Case Western Reserve University School of Medicine. He performed his internship and residency in internal medicine at the University of Virginia Medical Center and engaged in a research fellowship at Johns Hopkins University.
Shawna Gisch has been with UnitedHealth Group for 13 years, splitting her time in leadership roles across Optum and UnitedHealthcare. Gisch is currently the CEO of Optum Health Solutions, a portfolio of solutions that combines insights, access and assurance to deliver a better care path for those who utilize health care the most. This $3 billion business impacts over 300 million consumers and serves employers, payers, the public sector and TPAs.
Prior to leading Health Solutions, Gisch held the position of senior vice president of clinical operations within UnitedHealthcare (UHC) Government Programs. Her team had responsibility for overseeing the clinical model for Medicaid, Medicare and Dually Eligible individuals. This includes the design and operational execution of innovative population health programs for the over 18 million members served by Medicare & Retirement and Community & State across all 50 states and the District of Columbia.
Gisch has also served as chief of staff to the Community & State CEO and led various teams within Optum Health, including managing a portfolio of case and chronic condition management programs.
Gisch graduated summa cum laude from Oregon State University with a BS in chemical engineering and a minor in business administration. She also received an MBA from Harvard Business School.
Bryan Grundhoefer brings more than three decades of expertise to his role as president of WellMed Medical Management. He is responsible for the complete operations of the award-winning, diversified health care enterprise.
Grundhoefer joined WellMed in 1998 as chief operating officer/chief financial officer and was promoted to president/COO in 2006. He has successfully managed various business development efforts, including acquisitions and opening of new clinics. Since joining the company, WellMed has grown from 12 clinics in San Antonio, Texas, to more than 350 clinics in 17 markets in Texas, Florida and New Mexico. Full-risk Medicare Advantage membership has grown from 15,000 to more than 800,000.
Grundhoefer also serves as president of the board of the WellMed Charitable Foundation, the nonprofit philanthropic partner of WellMed. This mission of the Foundation is to support caregivers and older adults in the communities that WellMed serves.
Before joining WellMed, Grundhoefer spent three years at Anthem Insurance (now Wellpoint) in Indiana, where he was first head of mergers and acquisitions, and then COO/CFO for a multi-specialty IPA which managed the full-capitation risk for more than 10,000 lives. Under his leadership, the company reached profitability in its second year of operations by tripling the number of covered lives, reducing the medical loss ratio and maintaining administrative expenses. He also guided the medical management and customer service operations, which included assisting practices in delivering state-of-the-art customer services through a joint venture with Disney University.
Grundhoefer previously served as an executive consultant at Ernst & Young.
A CPA and member of the American Institute of Certified Public Accountants, Grundhoefer earned his MBA in finance and accounting from the University of Texas at Austin. He also has a Bachelor of Science in industrial management (with distinction) from Purdue University.
Kevin J. Conroy has over 30 years of executive health care management experience in both public and private health care organizations. He is currently the chief executive officer and market leader of Optum Tri-State. One of five regions in the Optum nationwide network, Optum Tri-State comprises three large multispecialty groups, legacy CareMount Medical, ProHEALTH NY, and Riverside Medical Group, with nearly 2,000 providers serving two million patients.
In his most recent position as Optum Tri-State’s president as well as in prior positions as CareMount Medical’s chief financial officer and chief population officer, Conroy has been integral to introducing value-based care and improving the experience for providers, team members and patients. At CareMount Medical, he was responsible for several physician acquisitions and led the formation of the Group’s Management Services Organization. He was president and chief financial officer of WellCare of New York, a government programs health plan. He was also a founding member of a start-up Medicaid health plan, increasing access to primary care for residents of New York City.
Conroy serves on the board of US Fertility, one of the largest networks of fertility practices in the nation. He's a member of the Board of Partners Health Plan, a health plan dedicated to serving individuals with intellectual and developmental disabilities and their families. He's also a member of Neighbors Link, a not-for-profit organization dedicated to strengthening the whole community through the healthy integration of immigrants. Conroy is past chair of the Chief Financial Officer Council for the American Medical Group Association. He received his BA from Hamilton College and his MS from the University of Rochester.
Kristi Henderson is a health care executive with 25+ years of progressive leadership in a journey from bedside nurse practitioner to CEO. She has led digital health transformation at an academic medical center, a non-profit national health system, a big tech company and a payer/provider organization — the latter two being Fortune 5 companies.
She is the chief executive officer of Optum Everycare, which offers options for how consumers access care, virtually or in-person, using its community clinics, employer worksite clinics and national virtual clinic.
Henderson most recently led clinical operations for Amazon Care, a health care initiative for Amazon employees and their families. Before joining Amazon, she designed and launched a national center for patient access, virtual care and care coordination for Ascension Health.
She is the current board chair for the American Telemedicine Association and an affiliate faculty at Dell Medical School at the University of Texas-Austin.
Other leadership roles include service as an executive board member for the Association of American Medical Colleges Telehealth Committee, advisor for the National Quality Forum’s telehealth committee and co-chair of the Telehealth Committee for the American Nurses Association.
Henderson received her Doctor of Nursing Practice degree from the University of Alabama-Birmingham and is certified as a family and acute care nurse practitioner.
Trip Hofer recently rejoined Optum Health, a UnitedHealth Group Company, as CEO of Optum Behavioral Solutions. Hofer is responsible for the overall strategy for our behavioral businesses, driving growth for our behavioral products and offerings, continuing to ensure our network supports timely access and expanding behavioral care delivery for the people we serve. Hofer is a visionary leader who has a reputation for bringing new and disruptive thinking to his teams. Under his leadership, we are building the optimal behavioral health platform — leveraging the behavioral benefits (insurance coverage), care delivery and digital capabilities of Optum to create better, more integrated solutions for our members, patients, clients and providers.
Prior to his current role, Hofer served as the CEO of AbleTo since 2018. AbleTo is a leading provider of virtual behavioral health care services for adults suffering from depression, stress or anxiety. At AbleTo, Hofer was responsible for driving significant growth for the organization in serving their members’ mental health needs with superior experiences and innovative solutions.
Prior to joining AbleTo, Hofer held leadership roles at CVS Health, Health Dialog and UnitedHealth Group — including leadership roles on the Optum Health Employer Solutions and Wellness and Well-being teams. Hofer spent several years with Booz Allen, a leading management consulting firm headquartered in Washington, D.C.
Hofer holds a bachelor’s degree in economics and environmental studies from St. Lawrence University and a Master of Business Administration degree from Yale University’s School of Management.
LTG (Ret) Patricia (Patty) D. Horoho is the chief executive officer of Optum Serve, the end-to-end federal business of both Optum and UnitedHealth Group.
Horoho joined UnitedHealth Group in 2017 to establish the Optum Serve brand, uniting 3 legacy businesses in the process. Under her leadership, Horoho has built a dynamic senior leadership team and has grown the Optum Serve employee population and business. This growth includes securing the $55 billion Veterans Affairs Community Care Network Third Party Administrator contract. Today Optum Serve continues to grow and expand its support of technology, health services, data analytics and consulting initiatives in both federal and commercial markets. In the last 2 years, Optum Serve has entered into new markets, grown the top line by 300%, improved bottom-line performance by 1,250 base points and grown into a multi-billion dollar organization.
In the midst of the COVID-19 pandemic, Horoho’s agility and ability to effectively leverage resources resulted in Optum Serve rapidly standing up new business models to support both COVID-19 testing and vaccine distribution. Under her leadership, Optum Serve implemented both the Priority Identification Vaccine Operating Tool (PIVOT), which informs and monitors equitable COVID-19 vaccine administration, and Vaccine Outreach – Implementing Community Engagement (VOICE), which provides customized community engagement and collaboration to address vaccine hesitancy and difficult-to-reach consumers.
Horoho is a values-based servant leader whose life’s calling is to improve the U.S. health care system, focused in the areas of health care delivery, health readiness and health disparities. While guiding Optum Serve through periods of immense growth and change, Horoho maintains a laser focus on championing health equity, inclusion and diversity efforts, and Veteran-focused initiatives at UnitedHealth Group. Horoho is a frequently sought-after speaker, leader and adviser in these areas.
Horoho’s distinguished professional career also includes 33 years with the U.S. Army, where she retired as a Lieutenant General, the 43rd Army Surgeon General and Commander of the U.S. Army Medical Command. She made history being the first woman, first nurse and non-physician to hold these posts. In these roles, Horoho led the third largest health care system in the world — a global logistics, research and care network across five continents, with a multibillion-dollar budget and staff of more than 156,000. An expert in health care transformation, Horoho moved the entire Army Medicine organization from a disease model of care to a system for health. She implemented groundbreaking and long-lasting initiatives around behavioral health, while improving health care considerations and force protection measures for military women.
Dominic King, MD, PhD, leads the Center for Advanced Clinical Solutions (CACS) at Optum Health, which is building innovative products that better enable our care teams to deliver proactive, best-practice care. The center brings together a cross-functional team of clinicians, designers, technologists and data scientists with a shared passion for using technology to enhance care delivery.
Dr. King previously practiced as an academic general surgeon at Imperial College London, where he continues to serve as an honorary clinical lecturer. He has led applied research programs in patient safety, digital health and public policy, publishing over 100 articles in journals including Nature, The Lancet and Health Affairs. He founded the digital health company Hark, which was acquired by Google in 2015 and went on to lead the health team at Google DeepMind and then Google Health in the UK.
Dr. King holds an MEd (surgical education) and a PhD (behavioral economics) from Imperial College London. As part of his PhD, he co-authored the influential Mindspace report, which served as the initial operating framework for the Behavioral Insights Team in the UK Prime Minister’s office. He has medical degrees from the University of St. Andrews and University of Manchester, and undertook academic surgical training in Oxford and London.
Robert McBeath, MD, is chief medical officer of Optum Health and president of Mountain West Region for Optum Health.
He joined Optum Care in 2013 as the CEO of Southwest Medical Associates. In 2017, he became president of the Optum Care Mountain West Region. This region includes over 800 employed providers and 12,750 contracted providers in the states of Nevada, Arizona, Utah, Colorado, New Mexico, Idaho and Kansas, managing over 270,000 Medicare Advantage lives and over 500,000 commercial and managed Medicaid lives. In 2022, Dr. McBeath was named the chief medical officer of Optum Health.
Dr. McBeath has held several leadership roles within Optum Care and is past co-chair of the Physician Executive Council, Optum Care’s national clinical leadership and governing body, and also co-chairs the Optum Care Technology Executive Committee. He also serves on the Executive Committee of the Board of Directors for American Physicians Groups. He is also active in his local community of Las Vegas, where he’s served in a variety of community leadership positions, including the Community Advisory Board for University Medical Center, Southern Nevada’s safety net hospital, commissioner of the Nevada Athletic Commission and the only physician appointed to the Governor’s COVID Task Force. He also serves on the American Cancer Society’s CEOs Against Cancer board and is on the board of directors for Project 150, a local charity supporting homeless high school students.
Dr. McBeath completed his medical school training at the University of Nevada School of Medicine and his surgical internship and urology residency program at the University of Arizona Health Sciences Center in Tucson, where he served as chief resident. He is currently certified by the American Board of Urology and a Fellow of the American College of Surgeons. He received his Master of Medical Management from the University of Southern California.
Mark Flakne serves as chief financial officer of Optum Health. His responsibilities include business development and strategy, financial planning and analysis, regulatory, pricing, and capital management.
Prior to Optum Health, Flakne served as chief financial officer of Optum Insight, a publicly reported segment focused on technology, data and managed services. He joined Optum in 2012.
Flakne has 20+ years of finance leadership in healthcare and manufacturing industries. Prior to joining Optum, he held leadership roles at Ecolab and Pricewaterhouse Coopers, including merger and acquisitions and public audit.
Flakne is a certified public accountant (inactive) and holds a bachelor’s degree in accounting and mangement information systems from Carlson School of Management–University of Minnesota.
Melissa Mann leads the People Team (HR) for Optum Health. She is passionate about talent and working with leaders to hire, develop and engage the talent they need to drive business success. She also focuses on helping leaders build high-performing teams.
Mann has been with Optum for 7 years. She has led the People Team within Optum Insight, Optum Technology and Optum Shared Services. Before Optum, Mann worked for 14 years at Target in HR leadership roles in business partnering, talent management and organizational effectiveness. She has also worked at a health care technology startup and in benefits consulting at Mercer. She has a BA and MBA in human resource management from the University of St. Thomas.
Elisa Reliford is the chief growth officer for Optum Health. In this role, she leads strategic growth of all market client development and client management. Reliford started with UnitedHealth Group in 2004 and has held various leadership roles in both UnitedHealthcare national accounts and Optum.
Prior to joining UnitedHealth Group, Reliford was a consultant with Towers Perrin in Chicago, working with large, complex employers on all aspects of their health and welfare benefits strategy. Reliford also spent three years with CVS Health as a division head of specialty pharmacy, leading account management and sales for its rare disease, prior authorization and specialty fusion companies. In that capacity, she worked across employer, health plan, government and provider markets.
Reliford is a graduate of Hamilton College and holds both a Master of Public Policy and Master of Health Services Administration from the University of Michigan, Ann Arbor.
Chuck Swensson is the chief marketing officer of Optum Health, where he is responsible for planning, development, implementation and optimization of the marketing strategy to support growth and retention across and within the consumer, product and market segments of Optum Health. Swensson joined UnitedHealthcare in 2016 as SVP of Growth Marketing, Government Programs, leading a team of marketers and analysts leveraging consumer insights and data analytics to define market differentiation, increase brand health and drive attributable market leading new member growth and retention specific to Medicare Advantage, Medicare Supplement, DSNP, ACA and Part D.
Swensson came to UnitedHealth Group following a successful career in consulting and leadership roles within emerging agencies. In consulting, he provided go-to-market strategies for clients such as UnitedHealth Group, Prime Therapeutics, Toro Company, Digi International, among other mid-sized companies. Swensson holds a bachelor’s degree from Northwestern College and an MBA from the University of St. Thomas, Opus College of Business.
Scott Theisen is the chief executive officer of Home & Community Care and is responsible for leading Optum home-based care programs including in-home clinical assessments, and longitudinal and transitional care programs for members in home, assisted living and skilled nursing settings.
Through a team of more than 16,000 purpose-driven employees across all 50 states, Optum home-based care solutions provide holistic care and serve the physical, mental and social needs of people according to their personal care preferences. Home & Community Care is focused on delivering patient-centric health care with improved patient outcomes, increased quality, lower costs and high patient satisfaction.
Theisen has held various leadership roles across UnitedHealth Group for more than 25 years, including chief financial officer of the UnitedHealthcare Medicare and Retirement business.
Prior to joining UnitedHealth Group, Theisen worked for the public accounting firm of Price Waterhouse LLP, serving in various positions including senior manager-audit services. Theisen is a certified public accountant and holds a BA in accounting from Saint John’s University in Collegeville, MN. Theisen has 3 adult children and lives in the suburbs of Minneapolis, MN.
Mouli Venkatesan is the chief information officer of UnitedHealth Group’s Optum Health and Enterprise Clinical Technology. Venkatesan leads Optum Health and Enterprise Clinical Technology with the vision of delivering the next generation of health care by building a high-quality, comprehensive, connected and consumer-centric health care technology system built on personalized connections. Venkatesan currently leads a global team of over 7,000 team members who are working together to improve every care continuum touch point for patients, members and providers.
Venkatesan also leads the enterprise technology agenda for interoperability and closely partners with UnitedHealthcare and Optum business stakeholders, external regulators and industry collaborative standards forums to advance the interoperability agenda for those we serve.
Prior to this role, Venkatesan served as CIO of UnitedHealthcare Core Services. He was responsible for establishing, leading and executing strategic technology roadmaps and the associated capital investments to support UnitedHealthcare’s businesses through innovative and differentiated technology capabilities.
Venkatesan has an extensive background in the technology strategy and software engineering of modern engineering platforms and high-volume processing systems across the health care domain. He is committed to health care innovation and serves in an advisory role for both VIM and Diameter Health.
Venkatesan received his undergraduate degree in electronic engineering from Indian University and his MBA in health care from the University of St. Thomas.
Caitlin Zulla serves as chief executive officer of SCA Health, a specialist alignment organization and leader in the ambulatory surgery center (ASC) industry, with more than 320 surgical facilities, 13,500 aligned physicians and 11,500 team members, serving over 1.4 million patients annually. She most recently served SCA Health as chief financial officer and chief administrative officer with oversight of 10 business functions.
Before joining SCA Health, Zulla was senior vice president, revenue cycle services at MedAssets, a senior consultant at CBIZ, Inc., and a managed care analyst at Atlantic Health System.
Zulla earned a Bachelor of Arts from Princeton University, a Master of Public Health from Columbia University and a Master in Health Care Delivery Science from Dartmouth College.