Connect with us

Impact

Meet the new CEO of the HCA St. Petersburg hospital

Veronica Brezina

Published

on

Sally Seymour isn’t afraid to climb the totem pole at HCA Healthcare, which owns multiple hospitals spanning across Tampa Bay, where she has made her mark – and now she is taking the reins of the St. Petersburg campus. 

This week, Seymour stepped into her new role as the CEO of the HCA Florida St. Petersburg Hospital, a full-service, 215-bed hospital, as the former CEO of the St. Petersburg hospital was promoted to another position. 

Although St. Pete is somewhat new territory for Seymour, she has more than 20 years of health care experience and most recently served as the COO and interim CEO for HCA Florida Trinity Hospital.  

Seymour joined Trinity Hospital in 2018 from HCA Florida Fawcett Hospital, where she also served as COO. Over the last four years, she has been instrumental in supporting the growth of the Trinity’s women’s services and surgical and emergency programs during a time when the hospital’s inpatient capacity expanded to 340 beds that supported a secondary campus, with behavioral health services in New Port Richey and three freestanding emergency rooms, one each in Pasco, Pinellas and Hillsborough counties. 

Seymour’s journey through HCA began in 2013 when she was selected to participate in the HCA Healthcare Executive Development Program, and joined HCA Florida Largo Hospital as associate COO. Prior to HCA, she worked for Pfizer pharmaceuticals in San Francisco and Tampa.

Seymour shared her experience and goals for the St. Pete campus with the Catalyst, in her first interview as the CEO. The responses have been edited for clarity. 

St. Pete Catalyst: You’ve had quite the career journey through HCA. What skills and experiences from the other campuses are you bringing with you to St. Pete?

Sally Seymour: The acceptance into the HCA Healthcare Executive Development Program meant I could move to a new hospital. I spent two and half years at the Largo campus and learned so much about how they operated from the ground up from all facets and roles – inpatient, therapy, housekeeping – I’ve spent time with all of these folks who are the subject matter expert in their field. To have a successful hospital you need to know how all those elements work together. You can have the best neurosurgeon, but if your bed isn’t clean, you can get an infection – every aspect matters. 

What is your impression of St. Pete? I grew up in Upstate New York. My husband and I moved to Florida around 2005 and we didn’t know a lot about Tampa Bay as a whole. I love St. Pete. It’s fun to see the evolution of the town, it’s been remarkable – you get a different feel whether you’re on the beach or go downtown with the art exhibits and restaurants, and yet it still has this small-town feel and is so diverse for a smaller area. 

What is on your to-do list? Right away it is to get to know the team. I’ve been setting up one-on-one meetings and reaching out to board members and physicians. They’ve done phenomenal jobs. My primary objective is to listen and I’ve heard this hospital truly caters to the community. I’ve seen what differentiates us is how we serve the LGBTQ+ (lesbian, gay, bisexual, transgender and queer) community. In our delivery and labor department, we personalize the care to families, especially those who may not be defined as a traditional family. Having inclusive and personalized care, and health equity are important and it does lead to better health outcomes. This is something we really learned during the Covid pandemic when people needed to have their loved ones by their side. 

On the topic of Covid, what has it been like for you in leadership roles battling the ongoing pandemic and emerging infectious diseases?

One of the benefits of being in a much larger organization is the access to the HCA clinical database, where 185 hospitals share their best practices in treating diseases like monkeypox, and if you are the first hospital to receive a case of an infectious disease that’s spreading, you can reach out to your sister facilities. For example, when one of the first Covid cases appeared in Florida, it was at the Doctors Hospital of Sarasota, an HCA-owned campus. As soon as the patient arrived, all of the hospital executives got on a conference call and shared what they had learned and how the patient was treated. As a new CEO here, it gives me a lot of confidence to know I have this larger system backing me. 

Are there any plans for the campus to expand or leverage new technologies?

There aren’t any physical projects currently, but the team has shared their wish list to rehab some older areas of the building and update them on how care is delivered today. In technology, we have three Da Vinci surgical robots (which are used in minimally invasive surgeries) that produce amazing outcomes. Patients have a reduced length of pain from surgery and it reduces any chance of errors. We are capitalizing on updating the registration process for patients to check in on kiosks. 

What is a typical day like for you (keeping in mind it’s only been a few days)?

I wake up around 5:40 a.m. to walk my dog, a rescued mutt, and arrive at the hospital around 7-7:30 a.m. Sometimes that changes because I like to check in with the nightshift crew. During the day, I make leadership touch points and have different scheduled meetings. We are a very metric-driven organization and we do team huddles at 9 a.m. 

Outside of work, what are your hobbies, and what’s your family life like?

I have a daughter and a son, who was the one who begged us to get a dog. My husband is from Ireland, and we would make frequent trips there. I was a runner for years and ran a few marathons in San Francisco, but I had foot surgery so I haven’t found something that replaces running. 

For those who want to form a professional relationship with you, do you have a go-to meeting place?

I love meeting new people. I’ve had so many mentors over the years, and I’d love to be able to reverse that and serve as a mentor for someone else. I’m still exploring the city and would like to be introduced to new places. 

Continue Reading
Click to comment

Leave a Reply

Your email address will not be published. Required fields are marked *

By posting a comment, I have read, understand and agree to the Posting Guidelines.

The St. Pete Catalyst

The Catalyst honors its name by aggregating & curating the sparks that propel the St Pete engine.  It is a modern news platform, powered by community sourced content and augmented with directed coverage.  Bring your news, your perspective and your spark to the St Pete Catalyst and take your seat at the table.

Email us: spark@stpetecatalyst.com

Subscribe for Free

Share with friend

Enter the details of the person you want to share this article with.