Gov. Maura Healey and Brown University Health CEO John Fernandez in November unfurled the banner outside St. Anne's Hospital. The old sign reading "Steward Family Hospital" was covered by a spiffy new BrownHealth logo. The ceremony marked the $175 million handoff of St. Anne's and Morton Hospital in nearby Taunton to Rhode Island's largest health care system. It was also a good-riddance celebration of Steward Health Care's ignominious departure from Massachusetts that capped the Healey administration's campaign to put six of the bankrupt company's acute care hospitals in the hands of new operators. And maybe most important, it heralded the arrival of a potentially powerful new player to the state's hospital sector, one that is financially stable at a time when others are struggling, and one that brings the culture of high-level academic medicine to a part of the state away from Boston's world-famous medical hub. To the 1,600 employees at St. Anne's and 1,150 at Morton, Fernandez promised to "focus on GSD — get stuff done."
