By Jerry Siebenmark, The Wichita Eagle, Kan.
Aug. 1–Via Christi Wichita Health Network has a new president and chief executive: Michalene Maringer.
Maringer will be the first woman to permanently lead the health network, which includes the St. Francis and St. Joseph hospital campuses, rehabilitation center Our Lady of Lourdes and behavioral health center Good Shepherd. She will start at Via Christi in early September.
“I’m very excited,” Maringer said Thursday from her office at St. Anthony’s Medical Center in St. Louis. “Via Christi has a national reputation for excellence in patient care and its commitment to Catholic health care.
“That’s what attracted me.”
Maringer has been at St. Anthony’s since 2004, where she works as executive vice president and chief hospital officer.
At Via Christi, she replaces Larry Schumacher, who in November joined Hospital Sisters Health System in Illinois as chief operating officer.
Laurie Labarca, who was serving as interim chief executive, will return to her previous position as executive vice president and chief operating officer of Via Christi Health Network.
Via Christi Health System chief executive Kevin Conlin, whom Maringer will report to, was not available for comment Thursday. Conlin said in a news release that Maringer has significant experience leading complex health care organizations.
Before joining St. Anthony’s, she was assistant administrator and chief nursing officer at St. John’s Hospital in Springfield, Ill.
She also has served as associate vice president and chief operating officer for Loyola University Medical Center in suburban Chicago and vice president for operations at the Medical Center of Wake Forest University/the Bowman Gray School of Medicine in North Carolina.
“Via Christi’s spectrum of health care settings is familiar to me in my 30-year career,” Maringer said.
Like Schumacher, Maringer got her start in health care as a nurse.
She holds a bachelor’s degree in nursing from the University of Illinois and a master’s degree from the Rush College of Nursing. She also was a Wharton Fellow at the University of Pennsylvania.
Maringer’s new job at Via Christi means the return to an environment she says she thrives in: working in a teaching hospital.
“St. Anthony’s is not a teaching hospital,” she said. “I miss that.
“That’s where I think I do my best work, and I can really make a difference and really contribute.”
Reach Jerry Siebenmark at 316-268-6576 or [email protected].
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