Timothy J. Walsh, president and chief executive officer of Martha’s Vineyard Hospital since 2002, will retire in April. Mr. Walsh announced his retirement to his board Monday night and to his staff on Tuesday.
“The hospital is in very good shape, and that is the way I want to leave,” Mr. Walsh, who will turn 69 in February, told The Times in a telephone call Tuesday. Mr. Walsh said he is looking forward to traveling with his wife Helen and spending more time in his woodworking shop.
“I could not be prouder of the many accomplishments we achieved together during my 13 years as your CEO,” Mr. Walsh told his staff Tuesday. “It has been an honor and a privilege to serve the Island community and work with you to help improve our ability to care for our friends, family, and neighbors. I sincerely appreciate all the hard work and first-class care you provide each and every day. I will always treasure my time at Martha’s Vineyard Hospital, and I will miss you all.”
“We will be forming a search committee over the next few weeks, and the work to find our next CEO will begin in earnest this fall,” Tim Sweet, chairman of the hospital board of trustees, said in a press release.
Changed landscape
The South Boston native will leave a hospital and health care landscape that is considerably different from the one he found when the hospital board of trustees named Mr. Walsh, then hospital chief financial officer, CEO in the wake of one of the most tumultuous periods in hospital history.
Over the fall and winter of 2001–02, the hospital administration found itself at odds with members of the nursing and medical staffs. The departure of former CEO Kevin Burchill and board resignations coincided with the election of John Ferguson, a seasonal resident of West Tisbury, to the chairmanship, the appointment that April of Mr. Walsh as interim CEO, and a lessening of tensions.
The hospital building was a decaying one-story wooden structure notable for the buckets in the hallways every time it rained. The emergency department afforded no privacy. Primary-care doctors were private practitioners operating out of rented hospital office space, and most offices were closed to new patients.
On July 26, 2002, standing before more than 30 employees gathered in the spare, institutional setting of the hospital cafeteria, Mr. Ferguson, then CEO of Hackensack University Medical Center in New Jersey, announced that Mr. Walsh has been selected as the hospital’s new CEO.
Employees cheered at the news. Their reaction was echoed in the comments of board members, community health leaders, and members of the search committee, who praised Mr. Walsh as a man with the skills and integrity to do the job.
Mr. Ferguson, widely credited with building Hackensack University Medical Center into one of the country’s best hospitals, said confidently that with the resources on the Island, there was no reason why Martha’s Vineyard Hospital could not be one of the best rural hospitals in the country.
The man put in charge of bringing about that change was Mr. Walsh.
A new $50 million hospital has replaced the wooden, ramshackle building. The hospital is now part of the Partners Healthcare network, and affiliated with Massachusetts General Hospital (MGH). The hospital staff now includes primary-care doctors, and MGH specialists provide radiology and anesthesiology services.
Wide praise
“I cannot say enough good things about Tim and what he has meant to Martha’s Vineyard Hospital,” Tim Sweet, chairman of the board of trustees, said in a press release announcing the news. “He was the perfect man — at the perfect moment. He guided us from post-bankruptcy in 2000 to the building of a brand-new hospital in 2010, to the award-winning health care institution we have become today. It will not be the same without him, but we are a far better place for having him at the helm for these amazing and transformative 15 years.”
During his tenure, Mr. Walsh oversaw a number of major projects, including completion of the $50 million campaign to build a new hospital building to house clinical services and inpatient care. The campaign, begun in 2005, culminated with the opening of the new building in 2010. The following year, the addition was recognized with the U.S. Green Building Council’s LEED (Leadership in Energy & Environmental Design), and achieved a Gold rating, the highest LEED-rated hospital in the Commonwealth of Massachusetts at the time, according to a press release.
In 2007, Mr. Walsh guided the hospital through an affiliation with Massachusetts General Hospital, cementing a partnership that continues to enhance Martha’s Vineyard Hospital’s quality of clinical care. The affiliation has helped the Island hospital bring a new oncology service to the Vineyard, and launch a new electronic medical record system designed to improve both quality and safety in patient care.
His latest project involves starting a new walk-in clinic to address a longstanding shortage of access to noncritical health care for Islanders. The clinic is expected to open in spring 2016.
Mr. Sweet said, “Our one final goal is to have the new walk-in clinic up and running prior to Tim’s departure.”
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