Verga: old GMH is closing

by Mindy Aguon

Guam - The Guam Memorial Hospital will be under new leadership come July 1, as the agency's Board of Trustees announced the selection of Joseph Verga as the new chief executive officer.  Verga is no stranger to the island and understands the numerous challenges GMH faces.

"The old GMH is closing and the new GMH will be opening shortly," Verga told KUAM News. "I would not see a reason why anybody would have to leave (off-island) for quality healthcare when the services can clearly be provided there." Verga, the hospital administrator and CEO-select says he's looking forward to transforming the island's only civilian hospital and changing the way GMH does business.

He says it's unacceptable that island residents have to go off-island for treatment and services. "I certainly want to keep the people of Guam on Guam and make them proud of the healthcare they can get there," he explained.

Verga is currently the president and CEP of Canadian Medical Placement Service in London, Ontario in Canada.  He brings with him decades of experience in the healthcare industry not to mention he's an expert consultant for the Joint Commission and participated in getting GMH accredited several years ago. "Really, in a two-year space of time, the hospital really made a lot of changes and really accomplished a whole lot in a very short period of time in order to actually meet accreditation standards and actually get accredited," he said.

Maintaining that accreditation and making GMH a place for reliable healthcare with stable finances are just a few of the challenges Verga knows he's faces. He intends to rebuild the hospital with five pillars, what he calls "ACES plus Q" - Accountability, Cost-Effectiveness, Excellences, Safety and Quality. "I envision an organization with those five pillars as the prime drivers for everything we do in this organization and going forward," he stated.

Details of his contract have not been released yet as it awaits final signatures, but Verga says the agreement is for three years with an option to renew for another three.  He intends to make Guam his home and hopes to start the job in early-July. "One of the first thing I intend to do is take a complete operational review from top to bottom for cost-effectiveness, for efficiency, pretty much everything is on the table," he said. "And finance all the way to materials management. Number one to make sure we are not only managing the hospital as cost effectively as we can and providing the highest quality of service that we can but also that we're maximizing revenues."

As for the opening of a private hospital, Verga says he isn't threatened and says he intends to sit down with the principles and discuss a strategic plan that can benefit both GMH and the Guam Regional Medical Center.

In the meantime Interim Hospital Administrator Rey Vega has not said whether or not he will remain on board at the hospital in another capacity when Verga takes over.  Vega said, "We'll cross that bridge when we get there."