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Asheville's Mission Hospital names HCA Healthcare vet as new CEO

SOURCE: Asheville Citizen Times

AUTHOR: Dillon Davis

Mission Hospital CEO Chad Patrick. (Photo: Steve Janowicz)

ASHEVILLE — Mission Hospital has a new leader.

Chad Patrick, chief executive of HCA Healthcare's Orange Park Medical Center in Florida, has been hired to lead Mission's 763-bed facility, hospital spokeswoman Nancy Lindell stated in a June 18 press release. Patrick, who led his Jacksonville-based hospital for the past six years, joins a wave of fresh faces in the Western North Carolina health care market following HCA's $1.5 billion acquisition of Mission Health earlier this year.

He is expected to begin his new role by mid-July.

Of Patrick's hire, Greg Lowe, president of HCA's new North Carolina division, comprised of Mission's seven hospital system, said in the release that the company believes "excellent people make excellence happen."

"We are committed to delivering superior, patient-centered care, and look forward to having Chad's leadership here in Asheville," said Lowe, who was hired in February effectively to fill the duties of ex-Mission president and CEO Dr. Ron Paulus. Paulus left the job to take a strategic adviser role for HCA.

Under Patrick's direction, the Orange Park Medical Center opened a 42-bed patient tower, a level two trauma center, a heart and lung center and a new inpatient rehabilitation center, biography information provided by Mission shows. He also is credited for doubling the size of the hospital's emergency room and for leading a group that "pioneered robotic lung lobectomy surgery."

He's previously served in other hospital leadership roles including as division president of RegionalCare Hospital Partners in Tennessee, president and CEO of Meadowview Regional Medical Center in Kentucky, CEO of Dayton Heart Hospital and executive vice president and COO of the Southwest Ohio Region at Catholic Heart Partners.

Patrick holds a master's degree in health administration from the University of Central Florida and a bachelor's degree in respiratory therapy from Ohio State University, his Orange Park biography shows.