This roundup will be published monthly. It is meant to highlight some of healthcare’s recent hiring news and is not intended to be comprehensive. If you have news about an executive appointment, resignation or layoff that you would like to share for this roundup or the MedCity Moves podcast, please reach out to [email protected].
Hires
Jay Barth became the chief medical officer of Ascidian Therapeutics, a company focused on treating diseases by rewriting RNA. He has previously held executive roles at Merck, Amicus Therapeutics and Eisai.
Massachusetts-based Beth Israel Lahey Health named Rob Fields as executive vice president and chief clinical officer. He joins the health system from Mount Sinai, where he served as chief population health officer.
CareFirst BlueCross BlueShield named Daniel Zohorsky as its new vice president of strategy and corporate development. He previously served as strategy director at CareIon, the care services division of Elevance Health.
Providence spinout DexCare hired Jamie Gier as its new chief marketing officer. She comes to the company — which offers a platform that helps providers coordinate and manage digital care services — with more than 25 years of marketing experience. She previously held roles at GE Healthcare and Microsoft’s health division.
A Deep-dive Into Specialty Pharma
A specialty drug is a class of prescription medications used to treat complex, chronic or rare medical conditions. Although this classification was originally intended to define the treatment of rare, also termed “orphan” diseases, affecting fewer than 200,000 people in the US, more recently, specialty drugs have emerged as the cornerstone of treatment for chronic and complex diseases such as cancer, autoimmune conditions, diabetes, hepatitis C, and HIV/AIDS.
Atlanta-based Emory Healthcare named Alistair Erskine to the new role of chief information and digital officer. He will also serve as vice president of digital health at Emory University. Erksine was previously chief digital health officer at Mass General Brigham.
FarmboxRx, a company that delivers food as medicine across the country in partnership with Medicaid and Medicare programs, appointed Sanjeev Balsara as chief growth officer. He has held executive positions at UnitedHealth Group, Anthem and Optum.
Direct-to-consumer health startup Hims & Hers appointed Daniel Lieberman as its senior vice president of mental health. Previously, he served as a clinical professor of psychiatry and behavioral sciences at George Washington University. He is also a distinguished fellow of the American Psychiatric Association.
Rob Hitchcock became the president and CEO of SelectHealth, the nonprofit insurance arm of Intermountain Health. Recently, he served as chief operating officer at CareIon. Hitchcock has also held executive roles at Humana, Centene and multiple Blue Cross Blue Shield affiliates.
Sutter Health named Jennifer Bollinger as senior vice president and chief consumer and brand officer. She comes to the Sacramento-based health system from New Orleans-based Ochsner Health, where she held the same title. There was also another executive who moved from Oschner to Sutter — Laura Wilt. She became senior vice president and chief digital officer at Sutter. At Ochsner, Wilt served as vice president and chief information officer.
Healthcare consulting and technology services firm Tegria appointed Ray Gensinger as senior vice president and chief medical officer. Gensinger comes to the company from Illinois-based Hospital Sisters Health System, where he served as chief information officer.
Tom Richards became executive vice president of business development at Transcarent, Glen Tullman’s employer care navigation company. Richards joins Transcarent after spending more than 35 years at Cigna.
UCSF Health named two new senior vice presidents, Cynthia Barginere and Timothy Kan. Barginere now serves as the health system’s president of adult services. She has recently held C-suite roles at the Institute for Healthcare Improvement in Boston, as well as Chicago-based Rush University System for Health. Timothy Kan became UCSF Health’s chief strategy officer. He comes from University of Iowa Health Care, where he held the same title.
Promotions
Thomas Owens became executive vice president and chief operating officer at Duke University Health System in North Carolina. Most recently, Owens served as group president of acute care, as well as president of Duke University Hospital. Owens succeeds Craig Albanese, who Duke tapped to be its next CEO.
Walmart named Brian Setzer as its new executive vice president of health and wellness. In his new role, Seltzer will oversee Walmart Health’s retail pharmacy, optical and healthcare delivery lines. He joined Walmart in 2021 as chief financial officer of the company’s health and wellness division.
Healthcare revenue cycle firm Waystar promoted its senior vice president of marketing, Missy Miller, to the role of chief marketing officer. In her past, she held marketing roles at McKesson Health IT (now a part of Change Healthcare) and Johnson & Johnson.
Layoffs
Telehealth company Cerebral laid off 15% of its staff, which is about 285 people. This is the company’s third round of layoffs in less than a year. Cerebral is facing some stressors — it recently admitted to wrongly sharing sensitive health data for over 3 million of its patients. The company has also come under fire from former employees and the media for being too hasty when prescribing young people addictive stimulant drugs like Adderall, and it faced an FTC investigation into its marketing practices last year.
Color Health let go of 300 employees. The genomics testing and population health company eliminated these positions as it shifts its focus away from Covid-19 testing.
Wisconsin-based Marshfield Clinic Health System laid off 346 employees. The health system said these changes are due to increasing labor and supply costs, as well as decreasing reimbursements.
Merative — health data company formerly known as IBM Watson Health — recently laid off about 150 people, or 12.5% of its workforce. The company said that these changes align with its “strategic plan for long-term growth.”
