Kathryn Paul: A life in health care.

• Author: Bronikowaski, Lynn
• Position: Executive Edge - Kaiser Permanente Group Operations West - Brief Article

QUITE BY ACCIDENT KATHRYN REAGAN PAUL FELL INTO A CAREER in the health-care industry that would take her from buyer for the Kaiser Permanente Medical Care Program in Oakland, Calif., to president of Kaiser Permanente Group Operations West in Denver, and now to president of Delta Dental Plan to Colorado.

"I grew up in a somewhat medical family, My mom (Helen Reagan) worked as a nurse while I was growing up, and her friends were nurses, so I was always interested in health care," said the Santa Barbara, Calif., native. "That was a time when opportunities for women were limited to social worker, teacher or nurse and my mom would say, No daughter of mine will be a nurse or a num."

With those words from her late mother to inspire her, Paul set out for the business world, selling computer parts while working her way through the University of California, form which she graduated with a sociology degree in 1968.

"That degree meant I knew how to do nothing," said Paul, who would go on to earn her masters in Public Health and Hospital Administration at Berkeley and her MBA at Harvard University.

She became intrigued by the clinic system that had employed her mother and had been spun off by the Mayo brothers to care for patients throughout the country.

"The clinics had an interesting perspective about the integration and quality you can get when you have teams of medical professionals working together to provide patient care," said Paul, who came to embrace the group-care philosophy that led her to Kaiser and kept her there until 1999 when she retired.

Among her highlights: championing Kaiser' Computer Information System, which is now the basis for patient care and a model health-care delivery information system, which is now the basis for patient care and model health-care information system; being a pioneer among women in health care who helped transform fledgling programs into success stories; and...