What a shame to lose a smart talented woman that Bernadette is? Do we really think she resigned after moving her family and buying a house only months earlier? She was all about listening to people and making change for the better and I bet you someone didn’t like it. How much has the hospital paid out to get rid of people who upset the status quo in the past two years. I would never donate money to MVH. The level of reckless waste is ridiculous.

In lieu of all the recent goings on at MVH I wonder if there’s not a lot more to this story. When a senior executive, and her salaried spouse, both leave suddenly in the middle of the week without any advance notice this strikes me as very odd. A lot has been bandied about in the last year regarding transparency and community outreach. I’d like to hear more.

This place is really mis-managed. Constant departures and disruption. Is anyone looking at this?

It seems the island has a hard time attracting and keeping upper management whether it’s the hospital, the airport, police chiefs, Building Inspector‘s, School administrators and the list goes on. What is the underlying reason for all the turnover? Are we that hard to deal with? Is it no one wants to give up they’re little power control?

A hasty/abrupt exit for a Senior level position is never a good sign of CEO Communication skills or lack thereof..especially after 5 months !!! I'm thinking that even if the MVH has announced some previous cosmetic BOD resignations & personnel changes , the old Guard is still driving the Bus ...

Worrisome. With so many of us waiting to get assigned to Primary Care Doctors, I cannot help be feel concerned that the hospital would consider going without a COO. COOs are so frequently charged with internal oversite, a function that seems unpopular here, frankly. With no COO, leadership and the board have no internal eye to which they need to answer. Just worrisome not to have that role filled here, especially given the history of what’s been going within the institution?

Absent more facts I am unwilling to speculate on the circumstances surrounding the departure of the COO. However, I would like to offer another perspective in response to some of the critical toss off remarks in several of the comments on this story. The “old guard” replaced a one story ramshackle wooden building with a new, modern building and raised $50 million to pay for it. They engineered a take over by Massachusetts General Hospital that linked our small, Island hospital to one of the finest medical institution’s in the world. They have worked tirelessly — not without missteps — to build a well managed hospital and keep the Island’s only nursing home open to those who would otherwise have no place to go. They lend their talents and skills without compensation. The “history of what’s been going [on] within the institution” includes the expansion of the physical therapy department, where I received great treatment for a shoulder injury, the fairly recent addition of top notch orthopedic surgeon Dr. David Halsey, who talked me out of shoulder surgery, and the arrival of Dr. Amar Luzic, who has proven to be as caring as Henry Nieder, my longtime and now retired primary care doctor. Not every departure of a hospital administrator or physician is linked to a calamity, mismanagement or malfeasance. Sometimes jobs just don’t work out.

Nelson Sigelman's comment was the the fairest and wisest I have read since last year's acrimony.The accomplishments of the "old guard" were stated with the appreciation they deserve. The legacy of Tim Sweet and Rachel Vanderhoop, together with the Trustees and donors who gave large and small amounts is finally being appreciated. For all the reasons Nelson identified, when we look up and view our beautiful hospital and how much it means to this community let us not forget the "old guard" who made it possible.

Hello everyone, when I first met the new COO, I told her she would NOT last in this climate of MV Hospital MGT. Note she was too global with as we call it on the other side "over in America we do it this way, not this rural island way"; which in itself is very different than any one place, one visits throughout our world!

At the end of the day, this should be about attracting the best doctors and nurses we can find. Patient care is what we care about. Managers and their styles will come and go.

Where to start. First, you don't own the place so you don't get to know why someone leaves unless they tell you. Massachusetts is an at will employment state. You can be fired or quit and that is that unless you are in a Union. Everyone serves at the will of a boss. You work out or you don't. It is really that simple. Change is what is hard and convincing people to go along with change is even harder still. It is why you see so few folks survive doing the hard things that are necessary to have vibrant and successful businesses. If you never want change the place will fail unless you chose to compete. You have to keep up with the world that is changing around you. Whether that is implementation of new electronic health record systems or billing systems or organizational structures, every one has to adapt. The best part and worst part of the island is that the employee pool is what we have here, bar the few that come from off island daily or are contractors on assignments for short periods. This means no competition for excellence and that creates an insufferable challenge to change. Maybe folks who read these columns don't think things need to change. Check last year's annual report. Operating gain was just over 560K in a high reimbursed critical care setting, Windermere lost just over 1.5M. Net fundraising off set the loss, thank goodness. Investments were a good gain. If you have to live off investments, it might not be sustainable if you want any capital improvement projects without significant borrowing. The place needs ongoing change. It will continue to eat through people as a result. Be patient. Continue to bring in new blood. Progress will happen to the dismay of some and not fast enough for others.

The real crime here is the lack of journalism. This article gives the hospital official line and nothing else. Did anyone even reach out to Ms. Thomas for a comment or try to find the reason for leaving on such short notice? The same thing happened when a physician left last fall and all this paper printed was the hospital's facts. I notice that this hospital loses administrators and physicians early in their contracts over and over and we find out the underlying causes behind their departures. We are just stuck with the hospital press release and a bunch of rumors left in the comment feed. Maybe The Gazette should make a few phone calls and find out what is going on.