Ascension Michigan’s market leader leaving post
Gwen MacKenzie, Ascension’s market executive in Michigan will leave her role effective April 30.
MacKenzie was chosen for the job in 2014 by Ascension Healthcare CEO Patricia Maryland, and MacKenzie said she promised to remain in the role for three to four years.
Dr. Joseph Cacchione will replace MacKenzie on an interim basis while keeping his current role as president of Ascension Medical Group.
MacKenzie is credited with having recruited 136 new providers, including 100 physicians, and having opened a 60,000-square-foot, $17.5 million health center campus during her tenure. Ascension Michigan is also one of the markets that underwent a rebranding campaign to align with the national Ascension identity.
Ascension Michigan also experienced recent layoffs at its 14 hospitals. About 500 employees, including managers, nurses and other staff, have lost their jobs. Ascension, the nation’s largest Catholic health system, is in the middle of a major restructuring that includes reshuffling its executives, creating new staffing models and compensation standards, and downsizing its hospital footprint while adding to its outpatient and telehealth network, and bolstering its subsidiaries.
Chicago-area health systems cancel merger
Rush Health and Little Company of Mary Hospital and Health Care Centers have called off plans to merge.
Rush, a three-hospital network anchored by flagship Rush University Medical Center in Chicago, and Little Company, a small community hospital in south suburban Evergreen Park, announced their intent to combine in October.
“Representatives of the Rush system and Little Company of Mary Hospital and Health Care Centers have mutually agreed to terminate their integration discussions,” the not-forprofits wrote in a statement.
The deal would have marked Rush’s expansion to the south suburbs and ended Little Company’s run as an independent hospital.
Rush has been hustling to bulk up as its rivals grow. Advocate Health Care, based in the western suburbs, and Milwaukee-based Aurora Health Care just finalized a mega-merger across state lines, creating the 10th largest not-for-profit health system in the nation. Presence Health and Ascension Health officially tied the knot in March.