LEXINGTON CLINIC Healthcare Innovation

With more than 100 years of serving patients, Lexington Clinic is Central Kentucky’s oldest and largest medical group, hosting more than 200 providers with expertise across more than 30 specialties. In total, Lexington Clinic employs more than 1,000 staff members and cares for more than 2,000 patients in the region every day. Across its more than 25 locations, it reaches some 600,000 patients per year.

With such overwhelming numbers, it’s clear that the group does an amazing amount of good. But at the same time, its team is able to remain focused on what matters to it more than the sheer volume of care: the quality.

“It’s all about the people and the process,” explained CEO Dr. Stephen J. Behnke. “If your organization can’t adapt to change and keep people and processes at the heart of it, it will not survive.”

At the heart of Lexington Clinic, patients will find the core tenets of service, integrity, excellence, compassion, respect and dedication — foundational elements that were first established by its founders. These guiding principles may be most apparent in the community outreach work that the Lexington Clinic does, like its diabetes education program, which provides patients with diabetes self-management education, and its Pink Ribbon Club, which supports women with breast cancer or who have had breast cancer.

But even though the Lexington Clinic is the region’s oldest and most prolific health organization, that doesn’t mean its leaders aren’t constantly striving to be better. For Behnke, that means continuing to orient care and services around the individuals who need them as well as advocating for his team members.

“I believe that we can do a better job of taking care of people by designing better systems and processes that allow better patient experiences,” he said. “Our patients deserve better, as do our staff.”

Behnke cites Dr. Barbara Casper and Dr. Joseph Mack as his personal role models, highlighting their kindness, leadership, innovation and process engineering skills as influences that drive the work he does every day at Lexington Clinic. And he also draws inspiration from the people who his team treats as well as the place where they do so.

“What I love about working in Lexington is that it has most of the big city amenities, but is much more relational, easy to navigate and retains that small-town charm,” he concluded.

859-258-4000 | lexingtonclinic.com

1221 South Broadway, Lexington KY