Chief executive officer of ASCA since October 2010, Bill Prentice has more than 25 years of experience in association management, government affairs, health care advocacy and public relations. Before accepting his current position at ASCA, Prentice was the senior vice president of government and public affairs and director of the Washington Office of the American Dental Association (ADA). Previously, he served as ADA’s senior congressional lobbyist, director of government affairs at the New Jersey Dental Association and vice president of a large New Jersey public affairs firm. Prentice started his career as legislative staff on Capitol Hill. He holds an undergraduate degree in political science from George Washington University, a master’s degree in government administration from the University of Pennsylvania and a law degree from Rutgers School of Law.
An information technology veteran with 30-plus years of IT experience, Nelson Gomes serves as Senior Vice President of Business Development and General Manager (New Jersey) for award-winning, healthcare-focused managed services provider Medicus IT (MIT). Nelson brings impressive healthcare industry knowledge and experience to his position at MIT, where he focuses on enhancing client relations, bolstering the company’s healthcare industry visibility, and helping more and larger practices get preventive with their IT rather than triage it. Before his work with the company, he spent more than 20 years building long-term relationships with clients, healthcare organizations and partner vendors as founder and leader of PriorityOne Group (P1). Founded in 1997, P1 was an award-winning Rutherford, N.J.-based provider of integrated managed IT services to healthcare organizations. Key to P1's success was Nelson's and the company's unwavering commitment to core values that guided the company's decision-making. In 2019, P1 merged with MIT.
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Lisa A. Austin, RN CASC, has been an RN for almost 40 years and in ambulatory care for the majority of those years. Her extensive operational development, management, and consulting experience provides clients with expertise in facility administration, budget development, regulatory compliance, staff recruitment and retention, equipment procurement, policy and procedure development and implementation, and organizational interfacing. Austin's national ASC and hospital department development and management expertise affords clients opening new facilities with unparalleled success. She has developed numerous surgery centers working in concert with investors, corporations, hospitals, architects, builders, and equipment manufactures/distributors through all phases of surgery center development and management. Austin is a current board officer of the Ambulatory Surgery Center Association (ASCA) and a past board member of the Colorado Ambulatory Surgery Center Association (CASCA), where she served as president. Austin has also served on multiple state and national committees to further the advancement of the ASC industry.
Rita Hernandez Figi is a human resource leader with extensive experience in all aspects of human resource management in multi-site corporations, including strategy, talent management/acquisition, employee relations, compensation, executive compensation, benefits, and acquisitions. She is a leader in employee engagement with the ability to mediate tense situations while mitigating risk and has extensive experience in shepherding mergers and acquisitions as well as guiding companies through growth. In addition to her role with MedHQ, Hernandez Figi has served on the American Heart Association Chicago Metro Board of Directors and on the American Heart Association National Compensation, Benefits, and Human Resources Advisory Board.
Tom Jacobs has served as CEO of MedHQ since its founding. He brings an enthusiasm for transforming the healthcare employment model through more effective people management. For nearly two decades, Jacobs has worked daily with ASC administrators nationwide to improve operations, reduce costs, and reduce their employer risk. His own healthcare background includes work as an ASC administrator, which helps him understand and relate to the issues facing his clients. Prior to entering the healthcare field, Jacobs applied his engineering- and operations-oriented skill set to high-tech and highly regulated environments, including Duke Engineering & Services (a subsidiary of Duke Energy), a digital marketing agency, and an enterprise IT solutions company. Jacobs has an MBA from the University of Notre Dame and a Bachelor of Science degree in electrical engineering from Iowa State University.
Andrew E. Blustein is the vice chairman of Garfunkel Wild, P.C. Blustein's practice includes the representation of hospitals, physicians, ambulatory surgery centers, and other healthcare industry-related clients (both for-profit and not-for-profit). Blustein has been a leader in developing and implementing compliance programs for healthcare providers and health plans, advising ambulatory surgery centers, and assisting hospitals in strategic affiliations. He frequently lectures on physician practice issues, private equity transactions, cybersecurity, telemedicine, corporate transactions practice mergers, and computer contracting. Admitted to the New Jersey Bar, the New York Bar, and the Connecticut Bar, Blustein is a member of the New York State Bar Association, the New Jersey State Bar Association (health and law section); prior co-chairman of the Westchester County Bar Association (hospital and physician law section), and the American Health Lawyers Association.
Karl Johnson joined MTBC with the acquisition of MediGain (Millennium Practice Management Associates). As a principal at Millennium, Johnson was instrumental in its growth over nearly 20 years. He was an early pioneer in leveraging offshore resources. His early career consisted of operations, marketing and physician management for the U.S. Navy, John Muir Medical Center, Tenet Healthcare, and a Catholic health system. He holds a BS and MHA from Brigham Young University.
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