Mike Bloom (center) joined the Palladium movement to advance a new healthcare commons in 2023
When Mike Bunting first started with Bloom Healthcare, the organization was little more than a bold vision carried by a small, mission-driven team of healthcare professionals dedicated to making an impact. Yet, for him, it represented something deeply personal. Healthcare had always been both a professional calling and a personal frustration—he had watched family members suffer through a fragmented system that often failed to provide comfort or dignity. It is a common thread for care minded leadership in healthcare every day. What drew him to Bloom was its mission: to bring care directly into the home for patients too frail or complex to navigate the traditional healthcare system.
He recalled watching his grandmother endure repeated hospital visits, each one traumatic and disorienting, when what she wanted most was time in her home surrounded by family. Bloom promised a different path. It took the time-honored concept of doctors making house calls and reimagined it with modern innovation, aiming to provide quality, high-touch care for people at the hardest moments of their lives. For Bunting, joining Bloom wasn’t just a career move—it was a commitment to a mission he believed was profoundly necessary.
Building in Colorado
In its early days, Bloom served 2,000 patients in Colorado with a staff of just over 30. From the beginning, the question was not if the model was scalable, but how it could be thoughtfully sustained, supported by payers, and fit within the healthcare system? Within a few years, Bloom grew to serve more than 9,000 patients and employing over 450 staff members.For Bunting, joining Bloom wasn’t just a career move—it was a commitment to a mission he believed was profoundly necessary. For Bunting, joining Bloom wasn’t just a career move—it was a commitment to a mission he believed was profoundly necessary.
“joining Bloom wasn’t just a career move—it was a commitment to a mission he believed was profoundly necessary.”
Recognition followed. Bloom was named a Denver Post Top Workplace year after year, becoming one of the top two mid-sized companies in the region and the number-one workplace for nurses nationally. Bunting attributed this success to a philosophy that
prioritized caregivers first. “If you don’t take care of your frontline team, they can’t take care of patients,” he said to us during our discussions.
The proof was in the outcomes. Under the ACO REACH program, Bloom outperformed peers nationwide on every quality measure. Its most meaningful metric was “days at home”—a measure of how much time frail patients could remain in familiar surroundings rather than cycling through hospitals or rehab centers. This was the heart of the mission: helping people age in place, with dignity.
Expanding to Texas
As Bloom looked beyond Colorado, San Antonio became its next frontier. Unlike traditional healthcare expansions that displace competitors, Bloom entered an under-served market with significant unmet need. The core model—home-based, high-touch primary care—remained the foundation, but the team thoughtfully adapted its approach 10-20% to better meet local needs, demographics, and partnerships.
Diabetes, for example, was a much more pressing condition for the population in San Antonio than Denver, demanding extra training and closer collaboration with local partners. Flexibility was key. Expansion required careful communication with staff in Colorado, some of whom worried about losing the community-focused identity they cherished. Bunting helped connect the growth story back to Bloom’s mission: “We expand not for growth’s sake, but because there are patients who desperately need what we do.”
Leading Through Change
Bunting’s leadership philosophy evolved alongside Bloom’s growth. Naturally democratic, he always believed in empowering his team to make decisions. But during the pandemic, he recognized that moments of crisis required decisiveness, clarity, and urgency. Over time, he has built a flexible leadership framework that balanced empowerment with the ability to act swiftly when circumstances demand it. That is where he points to the value of being a part of a growing community of leaders encompassed within the Palladium Forum.
This adaptive approach has been institutionalized at Bloom through significant investments in leadership development. In 2022, they launched the LEAD program, combining in-house curriculum, quality-improvement projects, and mentorship from senior leaders. Nurse practitioners gained business strategy insight from the CFO, while hospice nurses received mentorship from the CEO. The program created a deep bench of future leaders capable of carrying the mission forward.
Beyond Business: The Bloom Foundation
But Bloom’s mission was never limited to clinical care. Often, patients’ most pressing needs lay outside medicine—air conditioning in a sweltering summer, plane tickets for family tosay goodbye, meals or medication that fell through coverage gaps. Bloom sought to remove barriers that threatened patients’ dignity when essentials fell outside Medicare’s scope.
This commitment gave rise to the Bloom Foundation. Funded in part by the annual Bloom Golf Tournament, (The Parnassus Group is an annual sponsor/participant) it became a lifeline for patients and their families. What began as a community event turned into a reflection of Bloom’s ethos: healthcare as an act of humanity, strengthened by partners across the ecosystem.
A Mission That Endures
As Bunting reflects on his journey, Bloom’s story emerges as one of innovation and impact—not only transforming the lives of patients but also elevating the careers of caregivers and shaping a nationally recognized model of home-based healthcare.
“Bloom sought to remove barriers that threatened patients’ dignity when essentials fell outside Medicare’s scope.”
From its beginnings in Colorado to its expanding footprint across states, Bloom has remained true to its mission: to deliver care where it matters most—at home. For Mike Bunting, the measure of success isn’t just organizational growth, but the quiet victories it enables: more days at home, more moments with loved ones, and more dignity at life’s end.
And for him, that remains the ultimate measure of what matters most.