New chief nursing exec at Health Sciences North

SUDBURY, Ont. – Lorraine Carrington (pictured) has been appointed HSN’s vice-president and chief nursing executive, effective August 20th. She will be the successor to David McNeil who served in this role for 17 years, and in January was promoted to Senior Vice-President, Patient Experience and Digital Transformation.

The Vice-President and Chief Nursing Executive leads a team of more than 1,100 employees and has a budget exceeding $154 million in surgery, medicine, emergency and critical care, patient flow, utilization as well as infection prevention and control.

Ms. Carrington brings 30 years of Ontario healthcare experience to HSN. For the last 18 years, she’s served in progressive nursing leadership roles in acute care, serving as Manager at Sunnybrook Health Sciences Centre, Manager at the McLaughlin Durham Regional Cancer Centre, Director at the North York General Hospital and Director at Lakeridge Health.

Her portfolios included nephrology and diabetes, cardiac diagnostics and rehabilitation, infection prevention and control, medicine, bed allocation and patient flow, critical care, cancer and elder care.

Prior to 2000, she served as staff nurse, research coordinator, charge nurse, and clinical educator, giving her a well-rounded perspective of teaching and research.

A Certified Health Executive (CHE), she completed a Nursing Diploma at Seneca College, a Bachelor of Science in Nursing at York University and a Master of Health Sciences at Athabasca University. She completed certifications in oncology nursing and project management and served as Adjunct Professor at the Lawrence S. Bloomberg Faculty of Nursing at the University of Toronto.

The appointment was recommended by a nine-member Advisory Committee composed of representatives from the HSN Board, Senior Leadership, patient advisors and union leadership.

“We are thrilled to have someone of Lorraine’s caliber as our next Vice-President and Chief Nursing Executive,” explained president and CEO Dominic Giroux. “Lorraine will bring to HSN insights from her leadership work at two other Ontario academic health science centers, at a regional cancer program and at a similar-sized Ontario community hospital,” added Giroux.

“I am very excited by this new opportunity,” offered Carrington. “I look forward to moving to Greater Sudbury, meeting the rest of the HSN team and external partners, contributing to the success of our future 2019-2024 Strategic Plan and achieving accreditation and quality improvement targets,” concluded Carrington.

HSN wants to thank the director of critical and emergency care, Lisa Smith, for exercising exceptional leadership as Interim Vice-President and Chief Nursing Executive since January.