(April 3, 2023) The president of Mass General Brigham Healthcare at Home, Heather O’Sullivan, has joined the Board of Trustees at Nantucket Cottage Hospital.

O’Sullivan, who has more than 20 years of experience as a clinical executive, joined Mass General Brigham in July of last year. She previously served as Executive Vice President and Chief Clinical Innovation Officer at Kindred at Home, the nation’s largest provider of home care services.

“We are very excited to attract someone of Heather’s caliber to our Board,” said Craig Muhlhauser, chairman of the hospital’s board of trustees. “In addition to an outstanding career of guiding enterprise-wide transformation and innovation for various healthcare organizations, her expertise in providing care outside a traditional hospital environment is a perspective we believe will bring
a lot of value to the organization and our community.”

In her current role, O’Sullivan’s focus is expanding Mass General Brigham’s ability and capacity to shift acute-level care beyond traditional hospital settings to the home, while improving patient outcomes, increasing access and lowering costs. O’Sullivan is defining the future of care through the use of digitally enabled patient monitoring and enhanced provider technology while mobilizing the next generation workforce model through expanded practice opportunities. In evolving the system’s Healthcare at Home strategy, she leads a cross-discipline team of more than 1,000 employees including advanced practice providers, physicians, paramedics, nurses, personal care attendant, physical, occupational and speech therapists and personal care assistants.

“I’m honored to join an already-talented Board of Trustees and bring a new perspective and innovations to Nantucket Cottage Hospital,” O’Sullivan said. “Nantucket is a very special place with unique healthcare needs and it’s an honor to be able to serve the community in such a meaningful way.”

Heather has also worked directly with patients, spending significant time as a nurse practitioner delivering post-acute and longitudinal care to skilled nursing facility residents, and ultimately leading UnitedHealth Groups’ largest region of providers in New England.

In July 2022, Eliza Miller took to Instagram with a post that brought huge relief to family and friends. After four terrifying days, her four-year-old daughter, Emme, was home from Nantucket Cottage Hospital.

Eliza wrote: “Emme was having a hard time breathing suddenly. She had gone limp in Pat’s arms. We rushed her to the Nantucket Cottage Hospital ER and they immediately took action to get her oxygen, tests galore, hydration, and so much more. The excellent team at the hospital tried to Med Flight her via helicopter to Boston Children’s but with bad weather on the horizon, they told us it just wasn’t possible. They even attempted to send a Coast Guard plane and even that wasn’t possible. The downside to this beautiful island.

Over the course of three days, Emme improved, thanks to the team of amazing doctors, nurses, aids and more at the @ackhospital. I’ve never been so impressed.

They were on top of my little Emme, and we were able to stay together as a family during such a scary time. We feel so lucky for everyone on-island who helped us get through those four days.”

In a follow up email, Eliza continued to praise the NCH staff: “Our nurse for the first day, Jamie, I still remember was SO positive. She was a mom too and I could tell that she understood what I was going through, she did everything in her power to not only keep Emme comfortable and explain things that could be tough for a four-year-old to understand. She also kept me comfortable by explaining what she was doing the entire time. When we found out it was impossible for Emme to be transported off the island, the entire staff assured us they could keep her stable so that she would be OK until the weather passed. Ultimately, from the care she received at NCH, Emme was discharged and was able to finish her summer on Nantucket. It was a lot of emotion and stress, but the hospital staff was SO kind, so patient, so reassuring. Nantucket Cottage Hospital really saved Emme’s life with compassion and love and kindness. I will forever hold NCH in my heart. Emme’s too!”

“Please support the critical work of Nantucket Cottage Hospital with a donation to The NCH Fund.”
– Eliza and Pat Miller

(November 8, 2022) Capping off its 93rd year in business, the Hospital Thrift Shop set a new record by making its largest ever annual gift to NCH after the close of the 2022 season. The Shop presented a check totaling $600,000 to NCH, which is earmarked to fund the purchase of a new MRI machine.

“Our new MRI will enhance patient care at NCH by providing shorter scan times, a bigger entry to help with claustrophobia, and a much more quiet, relaxed scan experience. New procedures will also be added, including MRI breast imaging to aid in the early detection of breast cancer,” said Dr. C. Rumph, the Director of Imaging at NCH.

The Thrift Shop has now donated over $6.9 million to Nantucket Cottage Hospital since 1929. Thank you to everyone involved in the Thrift Shop’s success this season!

The Hospital Thrift Shop sells merchandise donated by island residents and visitors – anything from used books to furniture to artwork and everything in between – from mid-May through mid-October and operates as a separate non-profit organization. Thanks to a small staff, a dedicated team of volunteers and its Board of Directors, The Thrift Shop remains a favorite for island residents and visitors both in terms of donations toward a worthy cause and as a shopping destination.

Nantucket Cottage Hospital, a hospital in the Mass General Brigham system, is conducting a community health assessment to explore what matters most to people in Nantucket. The purpose of the survey is to hear directly from community members like you. The results of this survey will be analyzed and shared back with the community and will help us to take action to positively change the factors that influence people’s health.

Please read this important information before you begin the survey.

This survey will take approximately 5-10 minutes to complete. If you do not feel comfortable answering a question, you may skip it. Taking this survey will not affect any services that you receive. This survey is anonymous. If you have any questions about this survey, please contact Chris Glowacki cglowacki@partners.org

• Click to take the survey in English
• Haga clic para tomar la encuesta en español
• Clique para responder a pesquisa em espanhol

Thank you for your participation.

On Wednesday, August 24th, 2022, Board of Trustees Chair, Craig Muhlhauser, welcomed members of the community to Nantucket Cottage Hospital’s 111th Annual Meeting at The Nantucket Hotel. This was the first in-person NCH Annual Meeting since the summer of 2019. In his remarks Mr. Muhlhauser described a vision for the post COVID-19 future of the hospital that includes an emphasis on community engagement and talent development. Jeanette Ives-Erickson, RN, DNP, Interim President, also spoke about the team and shared excerpts of positive feedback from the public. The Annual Meeting was the first opportunity for many in the community to meet Dr. Barbara Malone since she was named Chief Medical Officer at NCH. Dr. Malone spoke about the record volume that NCH has seen this summer and the adjustments that have enabled the hospital to handle it. The Annual Meeting marked the end of board terms for trustees Stephen Karp and Sally Mason Boemer. Tim Mullen and Betsy Wright were named as new board members and previous trustee Jeanine Borthwick, who co-chaired the capital campaign for the new building, will rejoin the board.

A highlight of every Annual Meeting is the recognition of community members who have had a positive impact on the hospital and the heath of the community. This year NCH presented two Sandy Craig Leadership Awards. The award this year went to retiring Fire Chief Stephen Murphy and to outgoing NCH trustee Stephen Karp. The 2022 Myrt Eldridge Volunteer of the Year Award was presented to Jeanine Borthwick who architected the “Acks of Love” employee appreciation program in early 2022. The Phil Murray Business Award was presented to Hy-Line Cruises who transported over 50,000 COVID-19 test samples to the mainland free of charge over the course of the pandemic. The Bruce A. Percelay Philanthropy Award was presented to Kim and Alan Hartman who co-chaired the NCH Annual Fund for the past two years. This year’s Seinfeld/Hartmann Prize for Compassionate Care winner is Bonnie Fitz-Gibbon, the Palliative Care Counselor at PASCON.