Days after announcing KentuckyOne breakup, CEO Ruth Brinkley says she's stepping down

Only a week after announcing KentuckyOne Health would sell off most of its assets in Louisville, the health system said that CEO Ruth Brinkley will step down, effective July 14.

Chuck Neumann, current interim president of University of Louisville Hospital, will take over as interim president and CEO. Brinkley will work with Neumann in an advisory role through mid-September, according to an announcement released Friday morning by KentuckyOne. 

More on KentuckyOne 

With KentuckyOne's retreat in Louisville, selling hospitals is a major undertaking

Here are the facilities KentuckyOne Health is selling

Are future hand transplants at Jewish Hospital in jeopardy?

Who might buy Jewish Hospital and other KentuckyOne sites?

Here's what patients should know

“Ruth has led KentuckyOne Health since the very beginning in 2012. As CEO, she developed the statewide structure for a complex organization, and established the vision and purpose for our path forward,” said Richard Schultz, chairman of KentuckyOne Health's board of directors.

“As we move into the next evolution of our health care system, I am excited for her as she also enters the next phase of her life and career."

In a statement, Brinkley said she has been honored to lead KentuckyOne.

“While I'm leaving the organization, I will continue my professional life through mentoring and developing leaders for success in executive management and board of director roles, and other leadership positions," she said.

Brinkley's compensation was listed as $1.2 million in 2015, the most recent year of federal tax filings for the nonprofit.

Neumann intends to shift from his current position as interim president of U of L Hospital when that hospital and the James Graham Brown Cancer Center transition to University Medical Center on July 1.

More:Community relieved Our Lady of Peace not being sold

KentuckyOne, which has struggled financially for the last four years, announced last week that it would sell Jewish and Sts. Mary & Elizabeth hospitals in Louisville and several other smaller facilities and doctors practices to focus on Central and Eastern Kentucky. The move comes as KentuckyOne parent Catholic Health Initiatives looks to shed debt and freshen the balance sheet as affiliation talks conclude next month with San Francisco-based Dignity Health.

Brinkley, who is in her mid-60s, is a veteran health care executive, having worked in Arizona and Alabama. The registered nurse was named president and CEO of KentuckyOne when CHI formed the health system.

Several doctors, including a few who were notified this spring that the health system would terminate their employment contracts, have blasted Brinkley's leadership and questioned why CHI allowed the health system to put once-vibrant local institutions at risk. 

More:Here are the facilities KentuckyOne Health is selling in Louisville

More sympathetic views of her tenure, however, hold that the network of hospitals and outpatient facilities was doomed to fail, given the challenges of staying profitable in a rapidly transforming industry.

Within two years, the nonprofit company laid off 500 people and didn't fill about 200 jobs as CHI posted a $218 million deficit. The local health system came under attack last fall from doctors and nurses at University of Louisville, with which KentuckyOne had a management agreement, for nursing shortages that the clinicians alleged was endangering patients.

The problems were addressed, according to state inspections, but U of L Hospital received the lowest possible score from the U.S. Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services in a rating system enacted to grade hospitals on a variety of measures.

U of L officials decided to terminate the management agreement with KentuckyOne last December, a move that Brinkley told the Courier-Journal prompted the health system to bore in on a new strategy for survival.

She described the breakup as a "selfless act."

Reporter Grace Schneider can be reached at 502-582-4082 or gschneider@courier-journal.com.