Ochsner Health is the leading nonprofit healthcare provider in the Gulf South. Ochsner inspires healthier lives and stronger communities through our mission to serve, heal, lead, educate and innovate.
Alexander Fortenko, MD, named Vice President of Innovation at Ochsner Health
Dr. Fortenko will drive the responsible adoption of artificial intelligence and emerging technologies across the enterprise.
Alexander Fortenko, MD, has been named Ochsner Health's Vice President of Innovation. In this leadership role, Dr. Fortenko will lead the strategic vision and long-term direction for Innovation Ochsner, including the data science team, the AI Center of Excellence and the Chief Medical Information Officers team.
Dr. Fortenko will drive the responsible adoption of artificial intelligence and emerging technologies across the enterprise, advancing clinical quality, expanding access to care and enhancing the experiences of both patients and employees. His work will also support governance, technology infrastructure, and the continued growth of Ochsner's innovation team.
"Ochsner has already built an extraordinary foundation in AI integration, with cutting-edge work that rivals the most progressive health systems in the country,” said Dr. Fortenko. “My goal is to build on that momentum and help establish Ochsner as the national gold standard for how artificial intelligence can be deployed safely, responsibly and at scale to improve patient care, empower clinicians, and transform the way healthcare is delivered.”
In addition to his leadership responsibilities, Dr. Fortenko will continue caring for patients in the emergency department. Maintaining an active clinical practice is central to his approach to innovation, ensuring he remains closely connected to the realities of patient care and the evolving needs of clinicians. That frontline perspective informs the design, evaluation and implementation of new technologies, helping ensure artificial intelligence and digital tools solve real clinical problems, strengthen workflows and enhances the clinician-patient relationship.
Dr. Fortenko joins Ochsner from NewYork-Presbyterian and Weill Cornell Medicine, where he served as Medical Director of Hospital at Home and Director of Clinical Innovation. There, he conceived, built and launched NewYork-Presbyterian's Hospital at Home program, leading its development from strategic vision and clinical design through operational implementation and successful patient onboarding. The program delivers hospital-level care in patients' homes, enabling some of the health system's most vulnerable patients, including older adults and those with complex medical conditions, to receive acute care outside the hospital while maintaining the same high standards of safety, quality and clinical oversight.
During the COVID-19 pandemic, Dr. Fortenko led NewYork-Presbyterian's telemedicine operations, developing the processes that connected critically ill New Yorkers to life-saving infusion treatments and ensuring eligible patients received timely access to treatment outside the hospital. In parallel, he established remote patient monitoring programs and enterprise telemedicine quality standards that helped scale virtual care across one of the nation's largest academic health systems.
Dr. Fortenko earned his medical degree and a master's degree in public health from the George Washington University.
About Ochsner Health
Ochsner Health is the leading nonprofit healthcare provider in Louisiana, Mississippi and across the Gulf South, delivering expert care at its 47 hospitals and more than 370 health and urgent care centers. Ochsner is nationally recognized for inspiring healthier lives and stronger communities through expertise, quality and digital connectivity. In 2025, more than 40,000 dedicated team members and 5,000 employed and affiliated physicians at Ochsner cared for more than 1.6 million people from every state in the nation and 65 countries. To learn more about how Ochsner empowers people to get well and stay well, visit www.ochsner.org.