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Dr. William Jessee

Appointed last month by Beaufort County Council to a three-year term on the Beaufort Memorial Hospital (BMH) Board of Trustees, William F. Jessee, M.D., FACMPE, brings to the nine-member board an in-depth knowledge of hospital board, management and clinical staff responsibilities for patient-care quality and safety.

Jessee retired in 2020 as senior medical advisor at A.J. Gallagher Integrated Healthcare Strategies, and earlier spent 12 years as president and chief executive officer of the Medical Group Management Association (MGMA), gaining extensive experience in all facets of the management of well-run, cost-effective medical groups highly rated by both patients and physicians. Prior to his retirement he was consistently ranked in Modern Healthcare’s Top 100 Most Powerful People in Healthcare and Top 50 Most Powerful Physician Executives.

During his tenure with MGMA, Dr. Jessee also served for nine years as a board member for Exempla Healthcare, a three hospital system based in Denver, CO. Before joining MGMA, Jessee was vice president for quality and managed care standards at the American Medical Association. He has also served as CEO of a regional integrated delivery system in Louisville, Ky.; vice president of the Joint Commission on Accreditation of Healthcare Organizations; and corporate vice president for quality management at Humana Inc. From 1980 to 1986, Dr. Jessee was a full-time associate professor at University of North Carolina Gillings School of Global Public Health, Chapel Hill.

An honors graduate of Stanford University, he received his medical degree at University of California San Diego School of Medicine and completed his residency in preventive medicine at University of Maryland Hospital, Baltimore. Prior to moving to Beaufort in 2018, Dr. Jessee’s family owned a home on Fripp Island where they regularly vacationed for more than a decade.

Remaining in their leadership positions on the BMH Board of Trustees are David House, chair; William “Bill” Himmelsbach, vice chair; Steve Larson, M.D., secretary; and Vernita Dore, finance chair. Also on the board are Carolyn Banner, Ph.D., Eric Billig, M.D., Jane Kokinakis, D.O., and Richardson LaBruce, as well as ex-officio board members Kurt Ellenberger, M.D., Hampton Long, Alice Howard and Paul Sommerville.