Board of Directors
Barbara A. Blakeney, MS, RN
Barbara Blakeney is the Innovations Specialist in the Center for Innovations in Care Delivery at the Massachusetts General Hospital, adjunct Professor of Family and Community Health at the College of Nursing and Health Sciences at the University of Massachusetts at Boston and the Immediate Past President of the American Nurses’ Association.
Charlotte Brody, RN
Charlotte Brody is the National Field Director for Safer Chemicals, Healthy Families, a new national campaign calling for stronger federal standards on toxic chemicals. Before joining the Campaign in May 2009, Charlotte was Director of Programs for Green For All, and before that the Executive Director of Commonweal. A registered nurse, Charlotte is a co-founder and former Executive Director of Health Care Without Harm.
Kathy Gerwig
Kathy Gerwig is Vice President, Workplace Safety for Kaiser Permanente (KP), where she is responsible for strengthening efforts toward the goal of eliminating workplace injuries for KP’s 140,000 employees and 12,000 physicians. In her previous role as director of Environmental Stewardship, Kathy was responsible for developing, organizing and managing a nationwide environmental initiative for KP. Under her leadership, KP received many environmental awards and became widely recognized as the environmental leader in the health care sector.
Bruno Giacomuzzi (Treasurer)
Bruno Giacomuzzi is the Vice President of Cardiac and Support Services for Resurrection Medical Center, a state-of-the-art 434 bed acute care community hospital located on the Northwest Side of Chicago. An executive with a multi-faceted background, Giacomuzzi directs the Medical Observation Unit, Cardiac Catherization Labs, Neurointerventional Services, Heart and Vascular Services, Electrophysiology, Cardiology, Pharmacy and Respiratory Services. His background allows him to also direct Environmental Services, Food Services, Security, Facilities Management and Construction Services for Resurrection Medical Center. His system duties include direction for Biomedical/Clinical Engineering, Laundry/Linen and Surgical Pak Services for all acute care facilities within the Resurrection Health Care System.
Bruno is an active member of the American College of Healthcare Executives (ACHE), the American Society of Healthcare Engineering (ASHE) and a Charter member of the American Society for Healthcare Environmental Services (ASHES). He won the ASHES Phoenix Award in 1995 for outstanding contributions to the field of Healthcare Environmental Services. Bruno earned a BA in psychology from DePaul University and a Masters in Public Health from St. Xavier University.
Andrew Pines
With 20 years of healthcare finance experience, Andrew Pines has completed a broad array of taxable and tax-exempt security offerings and advisory assignments for many of the largest and most sophisticated healthcare organizations in the country. He has structured and executed tax-exempt bond transactions for healthcare organizations totaling over $20 billion in principal amount, with a specialty in transactions which are particularly complex from either a structural or a credit perspective. Andy has worked extensively on both financing and strategic engagements for large multi-hospital systems, including Catholic Healthcare West (CA), Via Christi Health System (KS), St. John Health System (OK), Jefferson Health System (PA), MedStar Health (DC), MemorialCare (CA), and Community Medical Centers (CA), as well as for large integrated delivery systems, such as Kaiser Permanente (CA), Sharp Healthcare (CA), Scripps Health (CA), and Group Health Cooperative (WA). Prior to joining Citi, Andy worked as a credit analyst for a major international bank, a manager at a large public utility and in the financial engineering department of another large investment bank.
A creative finance professional, Andy has been also primarily responsible for many important new financing initiatives. Most recently, Andy spearheaded the team that designed and implemented a 15MW solar energy program for Kaiser Permanente. Andy also chairs the Western Regional Council and is a national board member for MedShare, a non-profit organization that recycles surplus medical supplies and equipment from the U.S. to the developing world.
A native of Miami, Florida, Andy holds an MBA in Finance/Accounting, with honors, from Columbia University and a Bachelors of Science in industrial engineering, cum laude, from the University of Miami. Andy currently lives and works in San Francisco with his wife and three children.
John W. Strong
John Strong is Senior Vice President of Management Services at Nexera, Inc. a wholly owned subsidiary of Greater New York Hospital Association Ventures. This division provides outsourced services to clients including Supply Chain Procurement, Distribution, Central Processing, Linen, Receiving, Environmental Services, Facility Management, Clinical Engineering and Food Services. John is also President of World Product Centre Marketing, a GNYHA joint Venture with Extell Development Company. WPC is the world’s first permanent healthcare marketplace and education center being developed in New York City. John is responsible for overseeing domestic and international partnership creation and sales and marketing activities with leading healthcare companies.
With more than 35 years of healthcare experience, John has an extensive background in supply chain management. John was President and Chief Executive Officer of Consorta, Inc., a leading healthcare resource management and group purchasing organization based in suburban Chicago. Prior to joining Consorta, John was Senior Vice President with Concepts In Healthcare, Inc., an Ashland MA consulting firm. He was previously Chief Operation Officer with Premier Purchasing Partners, L.P., and was a key architect of Premier’s powerful group purchasing program.
Sister Susan Vickers (Chair)
Susan Vickers is the Vice President of Community Health for Catholic Healthcare West (CHW). She is responsible for directing and overseeing system-wide community benefit initiatives, corporate social responsibility and ecology programs at CHW, the eighth largest not-for-profit hospital provider in the nation and the largest hospital system in California. Susan directs CHW’s shareholder initiatives, and collaborates with other members of the Interfaith Center on Corporate Responsibility (ICCR) to raise social responsibility issues with the management of companies in CHW’s investment portfolio.
Alan R. Yuspeh
Alan Yuspeh is Senior Vice President and Chief Ethics and Compliance Officer for HCA, Inc. (Hospital Corporation of America). In this position, Mr. Yuspeh is responsible for HCA’s Ethics and Compliance Department and Government Programs Department. He chairs the organization’s Sustainability Steering Committee. Mr. Yuspeh’s career prior to joining HCA was based in Washington, DC, for 24 years. For 15 years of that time, he was in private law practice, last as a partner with the law firm of Howrey & Simon. Mr. Yuspeh served as General Counsel to the Committee on Armed Services of the United States Senate from 1982 to 1985. He also served as a member of the staff of United States Senator J. Bennett Johnston of Louisiana from 1974 to 1978. He was Administrative Assistant, or chief-of-staff, and Legislative Assistant. He began his career as a management consultant in the Washington, DC, office of McKinsey & Company.
Mr. Yuspeh received his Bachelor’s degree at Yale University, his Master in Business Administration (MBA) degree from Harvard Business School, and his law degree from Georgetown Law School.
