West Penn Allegheny Health System said Thursday that Connie Cibrone, the CEO of flagship Allegheny General Hospital for 10-plus years, has resigned, a move that will allow the health system's new CEO to hire his own leader for the hospital.
Cibrone, 53, will remain on the job full-time through the end of the year, said West Penn Allegheny spokesman Tom Chakurda. A national search for a replacement has begun.
"Connie Cibrone has served our system and AGH with unflagging dedication and distinction during the past 22 years," Christopher T. Olivia, CEO of parent West Penn Allegheny, said in a statement. "Throughout her career with the organization, and particularly during times of adversity, she displayed a keen intellect, unlimited energy and a constancy of purpose that earned her the respect and admiration of staff and colleagues alike."
Cibrone's resignation allows Olivia, 45, who joined the health system in March, to pick his own executive to run Allegheny General.
In April, he installed Dawn Gideon as CEO at the combined Western Pennsylvania Hospital in Bloomfield and West Penn Hospital-Forbes Regional Campus in Monroeville.
Gideon began her health care career as a planning and marketing associate with the former Monroeville-based Forbes Health System, eventually becoming its chief operating officer. She joined West Penn in May following three years with Huron Consulting Group, where she had been a managing director and interim management group practice leader.
Cibrone said in a statement that she was blessed to spend 22 years at Allegheny General. "I feel extremely blessed to have spent so much of my career at AGH, and I am most appreciative of the exceptionally talented and dedicated health care professionals who have inspired my leadership and have helped make this institution such an outstanding, patient-focused provider of care."
Hiring a new Allegheny General CEO is a minor bump for Olivia compared to the health system's other recent problems.
Olivia replaced Jerry Fedele, who resigned in July 2007 as a result of clashes with doctors and administrators at West Penn and AGH over combining services and making investments.
Within days of Fedele's announcement, his hand-picked selection as West Penn's CEO, Mark Palmer, resigned eight months into the job.
Since Olivia's arrival, he's had to contend with the discovery in July that payments from patients and vendors were overstated by about $73 million.
In a related matter, the Securities and Exchange Commission in August sent West Penn Allegheny a letter stating it is conducting an informal inquiry into the system's finances.
Last month, Olivia said his plan to return West Penn Allegheny to financial health -- it lost $15.6 million during the first nine months of the fiscal year that ended June 30 -- involves shrinking the system's 13,000-person work force by 400 to 500, primarily through eliminating unfilled positions. Significant losses are expected for the entire fiscal year.
Olivia has hired some 60 consultants to examine every aspect of the health care system, looking for ways to cut costs. Chicago-based Wellspring Partners has identified about $66 million in operational cuts. The work force reduction is projected to save some $12 million, or about 20 percent of those cuts.
The West Penn Allegheny executive also emphasized there are no plans to close any of the system's six hospitals, which include Allegheny General, West Penn, the West Penn-Forbes Regional Campus, the AGH Suburban Campus, Canonsburg General Hospital and Alle-Kiski Medical Center.
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