Fletcher Allen Health Care has hired a new president and chief operating officer, the state’s only academic medical center announced Thursday.
Eileen Whalen is a trauma nurse and former CEO of the largest public hospital in Washington state. Whalen will report to John Brumsted, who will remain Fletcher Allen’s CEO. Brumsted is also the president and CEO of Fletcher Allen Partners, a four-hospital network in Vermont and northern New York.
“Eileen brings considerable experience both as a nurse and senior health care administrator to Fletcher Allen,” Brumsted in a statement. “For the past two-and-a-half years, I have had joint responsibility for leading both Fletcher Allen and Fletcher Allen Partners. As Partners grows in complexity I need to turn my focus more toward leading the network. I am placing the oversight of Fletcher Allen Health Care in good hands.”
Fletcher Allen Partners is looking to bring new organizations into its network in 2015, Brumsted has said, and since its inception in 2011 its revenue has grown $650 million to $1.6 billion, according to the bond rating agency Moody’s.
Whalen has more than 35 years of experience in health care, according to a news release. She was most recently the CEO of Harborview Medical Center in Seattle. In addition to being that state’s largest public hospital, it is also an academic medical center as part of the UW Medicine Network.
“My husband and I are looking forward to our move to Burlington and I am excited to be joining the talented team at Fletcher Allen,” Whalen said in the hospital’s statement, “I’m looking forward to leading an organization that is so well-positioned to thrive in this rapidly-changing health care environment.”
