A new organization being forged in merger discussions between Catholic Health East and Trinity Health will be headed on an interim basis by leaders drawn from both organizations.
CHE President and Chief Executive Judith Persichilli will be interim president and chief executive of the new organization. Larry Warren, Trinity Health's interim chief executive, will be the new company's interim chief operating officer.
A national search for a permanent president and chief executive of the unified ministry is underway, according to a joint statement by Newtown
Square, Penn.-based CHE and Livonia, Mich.-based Trinity Health announcing the interim leadership appointments and 12 members of the new company's 15-member board. The merger is expected to be completed this month, creating a company with operations in 21 states, more than 87,000 employees, annual revenues of about $13.3 billion and combined assets of roughly $19.3 billion.
In October, when Trinity Health and CHE announced their intent to combine into a new company, Joseph Swedish was picked as its president and chief executive for the combined entity, and Persichilli was to be its executive vice president. At the time, Swedish was president and chief executive of Trinity Health, a job he left in March to become chief executive of WellPoint, one of the country's largest health insurers. Warren, a former chief executive of Howard University Hospital in Washington, D.C., accepted an appointment as Trinity Health's interim chief executive and left the Trinity Health board at that time.
CHE and Trinity Health said in a joint release in early April that the board of directors for the new organization will include six members from the CHE board, six members from the Trinity Health board and three new members who do not serve on either board and will be appointed at a later date.
The founding board of directors for the new entity includes five women religious, a physician scientist, two nursing executives and individuals with expertise in health safety and the administration of nonprofit organizations. They are:
-
James D. Bentley, former senior vice president of strategic policy planning for the American Hospital Association, Silver Spring, Md.
-
Dr. Joseph Betancourt, director of The Disparities Solutions Center at Massachusetts General Hospital and a senior scientist at the Mongan Institute for Health Policy, both in Boston
-
Sr. Suzanne Brennan, CSC, executive director of Holy Cross Ministries, Salt Lake City
-
Melanie Dreher, a nurse who is dean of the college of nursing at Rush University, Chicago
-
Mary Catherine Karl, a certified public accountant who is prinicipal of the Surgical Safety Institute, Tampa, Fla.
-
Sr. Mary Mollison, CSA, vice president of ministry and spirituality for Agnesian Health Care, Fond du Lac, Wis.
-
George M. Phillip, president emeritus of the University at Albany-SUNY, New York
-
Sr. Kathleen Popko, SP, president of the Sisters of Providence, Holyoke, Mass.
-
Stanley T. Urban, chair of Hope Ministries, Newtown Square, Penn.
-
Roberta Waite, associate professor of nursing and an assistant dean at Drexel University, Philadelphia
-
Sr. Linda Werthman, RSM, adjunct social work professor at the University of Detroit Mercy in Livonia, Mich.
-
Sr. Barbara Wheeley, RSM, CHE Sponsors Council coordinator
Copyright © 2013 by the Catholic Health Association of the United States
For reprint permission, contact Betty Crosby or call (314) 253-3477.