Baptist Health System’s (BHS) board of trustees selected veteran health care executive Daniel J. Rissing as the interim chief executive officer for BHS. He started work Oct. 13.
“Dan brings with him the experience and the expertise to guide our management team through this time of transition and change at BHS,” said Dr. Michael Drummond, chairman of the BHS board of trustees. “We are delighted to have him join our team.”
Rissing has led several major health care organizations in his professional career, including:
ZPresident and chief executive officer, Division III of the Christus Health System of Dallas, Texas. In this position he was responsible for the operations of 12 hospitals in three states that had $725 million in revenue, 1,100 physicians and 8,400 employees.
ZPresident and chief executive officer of the ProMedica Health System in Toledo, Ohio, where he had the overall responsibility for a three-hospital system with annual revenues of $875 million.
Rissing is expected to be the BHS interim CEO for at least 90 days.
The trustees hired Rissing after interviewing a number of interim CEO candidates. They were aided in their search by Spencer Stuart, the executive search firm engaged by the board to find candidates to be the permanent CEO for BHS.
BHS, along with the Birmingham Baptist Association (BBA), also made a change in who can serve on the BHS board.
During the quarterly meeting of the BBA executive board Oct. 6, members approved a motion that would limit conflicts of interest for members of the BHS board of trustees, thereby causing the resignations of three trustees and rescinding the appointments of three others.
A joint task force of four BHS trustees, five members of the BBA executive board and two consultants on governance issues presented the motion to the BBA through Randy Atkinson, governance task force chair and pastor of Hillview Baptist Church, Birmingham.
The new process keeps BHS trustees from serving on the advisory boards of the 10 BHS hospitals, and members of the BHS hospital advisory boards would not be allowed to serve as BHS trustees. It also applies to members of the hospitals’ health authorities and others who have conflicts of interest due to business or other concerns.
When bringing the motion, Atkinson announced that Dr. Herman Ensor, Dr. Eugene Birdsong and Roy Sanderson had resigned prior to the Oct. 6 meeting because of concerns about this issue.
Drummond said of the three, “These are honorable men who resigned because they wanted to avoid any pretense of a conflict of interest. They have served the system well.”
Dan Nichols, moderator of the BBA and an advisory member of the BHS board of trustees, said the other three trustees whose positions were rescinded because of conflicts of interest were Judy Williamson, Clark Carpenter Jr. and Dr. David Currie. “They served with honor and they cared about the board,” said Nichols, who is also a member of the task force.
This brings the total number of trustees down to 11, plus the two advisory positions that Nichols as BBA moderator and BBA director of Missions Ricky Creech fill.
Nichols said, “Every hospital is under such scrutiny because of the HealthSouth debacle. Our action as the BBA (executive board) helps the (BHS) board of trustees and health system remain accountable to their missions.”
Drummond said the main conflicts of interest on the board were members who also served on local hospital and health advisory boards.
“As new hospitals were added (to BHS), one to two seats were added to the board,” Drummond said. “We have several board members who were placed on the board (of trustees) while sitting on local hospital advisory boards, and that’s a conflict of interest.
“It’s an evolutionary thing that in retrospect is inappropriate,” he said.
Drummond added that doctors and other community members from the areas where BHS hospitals are located can serve on the board of trustees, as long as they do not have conflicts of interest.
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