NYGH appoints new president and CEO

TORONTO – North York General Hospital (NYGH), has announced the appointment of Karyn Popovich (pictured) as president and CEO. Since October 2020, Karyn has been serving as interim president and CEO, and has had a range of clinical leadership and executive positions during her tenure at NYGH.

Throughout her professional career, Karyn has distinguished herself as a passionate champion of patient and family-centred care and the pursuit of excellence in quality and operational performance.

Karyn began her career at NYGH as a staff nurse in 1981, practicing in the Emergency Department (ED) and serving as manager and director of the department, one of the busiest EDs in the GTA. She played a leadership role in the department when NYGH was the epicentre of the SARS outbreak. Her senior executive roles have spanned multiple other programs and services including Critical Care, Medicine, Quality, and serving as the organization’s chief nursing executive.

Karyn was instrumental in building and sustaining the collaborative and high-performing culture for which NYGH is known. This culture was recently on display when the NYGH achieved an extraordinary 99.8% Accreditation score from Accreditation Canada in the midst of the global pandemic.

As an active Accreditation Canada surveyor, Karyn assists organizations across Ontario to foster a quality and safety culture. She is a passionate advocate for the organization’s new Strategic Plan – Thinking Beyond – and its focus on advancing an integrated health system and expanding and modernizing our hospital and Seniors’ Health Centre to meet the needs of our growing community.

Karyn will continue to be an energetic and effective partner with the organizations who make up our local Ontario Health Team, the North York Toronto Health Partners. She will also continue to represent NYGH at the regional and provincial levels, advocating for better access to care, health equity, and healthcare sustainability.

A mentor and teacher, Karyn inspires individuals and teams to go beyond what they think is possible. She will continue to teach the next generation of healthcare leaders at NYGH and through her Adjunct Clinical appointment at Lawrence S. Bloomberg Faculty of Nursing at the University of Toronto.