CHICAGO — The new czar of University of Illinois health programs wants to see greater coordination of the widespread holdings in Chicago, Rockford and Urbana.

Joseph "Skip" Garcia, 56, becomes the vice president for health affairs on June 16. He will continue to hold appointments as a professor of medicine and vice chancellor for research at the UI-Chicago.

Garcia joined the UI Feb. 1, 2010, after four years as chairman of the Department of Medicine at the University of Chicago. He's an expert on lung illnesses.

He was formally promoted Thursday at the Board of Trustees meeting in Chicago.

Garcia said he wanted to integrate all the clinical aspects of the UI's health science, hospital and clinical operations. The future vice president said those operations are not well-integrated now.

"One of the strong virtues of the creation of this position is exactly that until now we have not been able to integrate programmatically between health science colleges, the hospitals and the other components," Garcia said.

Mirroring President Michael Hogan's thinking about university-wide centralization of some polices and services, Garcia wants to see all the campuses held to the same standards.

"Now with a reporting structure that allows alignment of the entire health care system, there will also be great opportunities for enterprise-wide thinking," he said.

He said some units were "possibly working at cross purposes" up to now.

There are also potential costs savings from some centralization, Garcia said, giving billing as an example.

As a lung specialist, Garcia has a special interest in asthma and other conditions and the disparity with which members of different races are diagnosed and treated.

"Chicago is a sweet spot for our (research) group that works on these issues," Garcia said.

Continuing with asthma as an example, he said New York and Chicago are the two worst cities in terms of treating patients in a uniform matter despite racial or financial disparities.

"We're excited about reducing disparity (in diagnosis and treatment). There's no one approach. In key areas, there needs to be better access to evaluation and screening. It's a 'child to adult' sort of scenario; we need to be thinking about the entire life span," he said.

Garcia said Chicago has a large Hispanic population from diverse backgrounds, and there are both research and treatment options for UI health workers.

In fact, he said, he was attracted to the UI from the University of Chicago because of the diversity of both the Chicago campus and the service area for its hospitals and clinics.

"Throughout my academic career, the single thing I've tried to adhere is to be impactful. The University of Illinois shares my passion for cultural diversity and serving the health needs of the under-served," he said.

One of the UI's biggest challenges, he said, has been serving those communities in competition with five or six academic health centers.

He also said the state's continued budget problems will also be a continuing challenge.

"But that's also an opportunity for us to be more efficient and to increase our net margin," Garcia said. "We will have to move quickly."

He said he will stress the training of Latino and African American physicians and other health workers.