THE VOLCANO BEHIND AETNA

摘要

John W. "Jack" Rowe knew all about Aetna Inc.'s stingy, tough reputation when he ran Mount Sinai NYU Health, one of the country's largest private hospital systems. "They had become, for a variety of reasons, almost a poster child for the [insurers'] contentious relationships with physicians," says Rowe, a doctor who specializes in the physiology of aging. So when the Aetna board tapped Rowe in September, 2000, to head up its Aetna U.S. Healthcare unit―later spun off to become Aetna Inc.―the renowned 58-year-old geriatrician saw a chance to help fix what he calls the most broken piece of the health system. With a new management team, significant layoffs, and a deliberate retreat from unprofitable markets, the company went from bleeding money to making it in 2002.