SOUTHBRIDGE, Mass., Oct. 28, 2009 – Harrington Hospital has installed a new Chairman of the Board of Directors and two new directors and restructured to better serve the needs of its growing organization.
At its annual meeting, held yesterday at the Performing Arts Center at The Overlook in Charlton, Ronald Carlson was officially installed as Chairman of the Board, to serve for the 2010 and 2011 fiscal years. Harringtons fiscal year starts on Oct. 1. Also installed as directors were David Turner, President and Chief Executive Officer of Masonic Health System of Massachusetts, in Charlton, and Mark Palmerino, senior financial consultant with CCR Wealth Management in Westborough.
“One of my top priorities and the boards top priorities will be to maintain the highest standards in patient care,” Carlson said. “We intend to focus on quality and safety, not only for our patients and their families, but for our physicians, nurses and other employees as well.
Carlson follows Alan S. Peppel as Chairman of the Board, whose two-year term has expired. Under Peppels leadership, Harrington developed its growth strategy. He also headed the search committee that brought in a new Chief Executive Officer, Edward Moore, upon the retirement of Richard Mangion.
“Id also like to thank Alan Peppel for the outstanding job he did as Chairman of the Board,” Carlson said. “He was a key figure in promoting Harringtons expansion in the community.”
A restructuring of Harrington, voted at the previous months Board of Directors meeting, also took effect with yesterdays meeting. As a result, Harrington Hospital is now part of a new corporate entity called Harrington HealthCare System, Inc.
“We voted to restructure as Harrington HealthCare System, Inc., to reflect the greater complexity and the additional components that make up our healthcare system,” said Harrington President and CEO Edward Moore. “Our new structure reflects the addition of Harrington Physician Services, a corporation that oversees many of our employed physicians, as well as the joint ventures of which Harrington is a part, such as our new cancer treatment center on our Southbridge campus and our Charlton medical office building.
“We are growing in order to better deliver Total Local Care – TLC – to the communities we serve,” Moore said. “This structure will make it easier for us to do so by creating four distinct entities that oversee our operations.”
The four corporations under the new Harrington HealthCare System, Inc., are Harrington Hospital, Harrington HealthCare at Hubbard, Harrington Physician Services and a new corporation established to house Harringtons joint ventures.
Harrington opened HealthCare at Hubbard in May of 2009 on the site of the former Hubbard Hospital in Webster. The Webster operation includes 24-hour emergency services, psychiatric care, pediatrics and obstetrical care, intensive/coronary care and comprehensive outpatient services.
Harrington Physician Services is a corporate entity that employs almost 50 physicians who are part of the Harrington physician family.
The joint venture corporation will oversee the organizations joint ventures such as the Central Massachusetts Cancer Center at 55 Sayles Street, on the edge of the hospitals campus in Southbridge. The center is a joint venture with a private corporation, Radiation Therapy Services, Inc., which operates the first floor of the two-story building, offering radiation therapy services to patients. Harrington operates the soon-to-be-opened top floor, which is called The Cancer Center at Harrington, and which will offer a variety of services, from infusion to counseling for cancer patients and their families.
Also part of the joint venture corporation is an MRI operation at Charlton, which is a joint venture with Harvard Medical Faculty Physicians from Beth Israel Deaconess Medical Center.
The officers of Harrington HealthCare System, Inc. are Carlson, Chairman; Theresa Colognesi, Vice Chairman; James Waddick, Secretary; and Thomas Sullivan, Treasurer. Sullivan also serves as the Chief Financial Officer of Harrington Hospital.
The new Board of Directors, in its entirety, consists of Carlson; Colognesi; Waddick; Turner; Palmerin; Anthony M. Detarando, Ex-Officio; Anthony Jay Detarando; Vladas Litani, M.D., President, Medical Staff, Ex-Officio; Peppel, Past Chairman, Ex-Officio; John G. Stagias, M.D.; and Tammy Vargas, M.D.
Harrington also announced new positions for two members of the hospitals Senior Leadership Team yesterday.
Peg Skowron, formerly Vice President, Nursing, has moved into the newly created role of Vice President for Quality and Risk Management. Continuing as a member of the Senior Leadership Team, she will be responsible for all Quality, Safety and Risk Management activities throughout the system. This will also include dealing with regulatory agencies such as the Department of Public Health and The Joint Commission.
“With the renewed focus and priority that both the Board and Senior Leadership have placed on Quality and Safety, Pegs skills and significant experience at Harrington will help us be successful in these critical areas that affect both our reputation and reimbursement,” Moore said. “Peg will be fully engaged in all committees focused on quality, safety, service and risk management. She will work very closely with Dr. Art Russo, our Chief Medical Officer, and the medical staff to achieve goals as outlined to our Board.”
In addition, Tom Hijeck, Site Administrator at Harrington HealthCare at Hubbard, will also take on the position of Vice President for Nursing.
Said Moore, “Tom has extensive Chief Nursing Officer experience at both St. Francis Hospital in Hartford and MetroWest Medical Center in Framingham and Natick. In both cases he oversaw patient care in a two-campus model. Reporting to Tom will be the Department of Nursing and the Health Education Department as well as the Harrington HealthCare at Hubbard campus in Webster.”
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