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Tag: Steve Arner

Construction begins on Carilion Taubman Cancer Center

Of the donors, health professionals and area leaders who turned out for Wednesday’s groundbreaking for the Carilion Taubman Cancer Center, Orion Moses, age 9, commanded the most attention. 

Doctors diagnosed Moses, who lives in Elliston, with leukemia at age 5. After enduring three and a half years of chemotherapy, he is now cancer free. 

“I think that the people at Carilion and the clinic are very kind,” he told the crowd who gathered under a tent on the Virginia Tech Carilion Health Sciences and Technology Campus in Roanoke on Wednesday. “They took really good care of me … I am really glad they get this new building. I know it will help other patients fight and win.”

Carilion has raised $74 million toward its $100 million fundraising goal for the cancer center set to be completed in 2027, Nancy Howell Agee, Carilion’s CEO emeritus, announced Wednesday. 

Former Advance Auto Parts CEO Nicholas Taubman, a past U.S. ambassador to Romania, and his wife, Jenny, gave $25 million to the project, which will bear their name. 

A man in a suit and a woman wearing green wear white construction helmets.
Former U.S. Ambassador Nicholas F. Taubman and his wife, Jenny. Photo by Beth JoJack

Carilion employees raised an additional $1 million for the building, following in the footsteps of Agee, who, along with her husband, Steve, kicked off fundraising for the effort with a $1 million gift in 2019. 

As Agee showed off a rendering of the facility to Wednesday’s attendees, she noted her brain doesn’t work in feet or yards. 

“People say to me, ‘How big is it going to be?’ I say, ‘Well, big enough,’” said Agee, who was succeeded by Steve Arner as president and CEO of Carilion Clinic at the beginning of October. 

Big enough, it turns out, is a six-story building. 

HDR, an employee-owned design firm with headquarters in Nebraska, worked with Carilion oncology teams to design the 257,000-square-foot building, which Agee described as “innovative” and “easy for patients to access.” The facility, she added, will provide “a beautiful environment for collaboration, hope and healing.” 

An illuminated staircase, visible from I-581, will be lit up in different colors to signify different types of cancers.  

“For instance, October is Breast Cancer Awareness Month, and our beacon, if it was here today, would be shining pink,” Agee explained.

Currently, Carilion treats about 3,500 patients for different forms of cancer each year, according to the health system. 

The Carilion Taubman Cancer Center will replace a 41-year-old building on South Jefferson Street. Blue Ridge Cancer Care, which partners with Carilion to provide medical and radiation oncology services at the existing facility, will continue to provide care in the new facility. 

“Beautiful buildings are important, but it’s what each of you do, who work in this building, that makes all the difference,” Agee said. 

The goal, Agee said, is for the new cancer center to be named a National Cancer Institute-Designated Cancer Center, a designation for facilities that “meet rigorous standards for transdisciplinary, state-of-the-art research focused on developing new and better approaches to preventing, diagnosing and treating cancer.”

The new facility should allow for more patients to be treated. Carilion’s oncology program will expand to include new services, including nurse navigators who will work to shorten the time between a patient’s cancer diagnosis and treatment.

The center will also bring advanced technology, clinical trials and medical practitioners of different disciplines to a single location, according to the health system.

Agee noted that Virginia Tech is deepening its commitment to cancer research. “Together, we’re advancing care and research, while also driving important economic development throughout our region and the Commonwealth,” she said. 

Del. Terry Austin, R-Botetourt, was among the attendees at Wednesday’s service. 

“It’s a great day in the Valley,” said Austin, who also sits on the Carilion Clinic Board of Directors. When Austin was diagnosed with bladder cancer in 2018, he received treatment through Carilion Clinic, the University of Virginia and the MD Anderson Cancer Center in Houston. 

From his experience, Austin said he saw firsthand that Carilion and Blue Ridge Cancer Care have professionals with the skills to fight cancer. “We just need the proper facility to do it in,” he said. 

Carilion Clinic CEO Agee announces retirement

After more than a decade at the helm of Carilion Clinic, Nancy Howell Agee plans to retire at the end of September, the health system announced Wednesday. Steve Arner, who was promoted to president in May 2023, will replace her as Carilion’s top executive, effective Oct. 1.

Agee was born at Roanoke Memorial and later lived there while attending nursing school. As the leader of the Roanoke-based health system, she helped transform Carilion into a fully integrated, physician-led clinic that includes a medical school and research institute with Virginia Tech.

“To do the work I love with the people I love at the place I love has been a privilege beyond measure,” Agee said in a video produced about her retirement.

Agee will serve as CEO emeritus through September 2025. In that role, she’ll focus on philanthropy. Last week, Agee celebrated the announcement that former U.S. Ambassador Nicholas F. Taubman and his wife, Jenny, have given $25 million toward a new building and expanded cancer program at Carilion Clinic.

Agee and her husband U.S. Circuit Judge G. Steven Agee gave $1 million to launch fundraising for the cancer center in 2019. 

“Steve and I are taking this step now to enhance care in our region, building upon the dedicated work of those who have come before us,” Nancy Howell Agee said in a statement at the time.

Arner joined Carilion in 1996 as a financial analyst, according to Carilion. He’s also served as budget manager, human resources compensation and analytics director, president and CEO at Carilion Rockbridge Community Hospital and senior vice president of cardiothoracic and vascular Services. In 2003, Arner earned an MBA from Brigham Young University.

Arner continued to work as Carilion’s chief operating officer after being named president in 2023. Arner has led more than $500 million in facilities investments, including the Crystal Spring Tower addition at Roanoke Memorial Hospital that’s on schedule to be completed in 2025.

“Steve is a strong and capable leader whose commitment to our mission and deep knowledge of our entire organization make him well-suited for the CEO role,” James Hartley, chairman of Carilion Clinic’s board of directors, said in a news release.

In April, the American Hospital Association presented Agee with the Distinguished Service Award, its highest honor, recognizing her “significant lifetime contributions and service to health care.”

AHA President and CEO Rick Pollack noted that when Agee chaired the nonprofit organization’s board of trustees in 2018, her “visionary leadership” pushed the organization to “tackle value, affordability and disruptive innovation.”

Launching her career as a nurse, Agee went on to become the lead administrative director for a National Institutes of Health oncology grant in Roanoke. She was later promoted to a series of leadership roles at Carilion, becoming chief operating officer in 2001, a post she held for a decade before being named president and CEO in 2011.

In a video made by the AHA for the Distinguished Service Award, Jeanne Armentrout, executive vice president and chief administrative officer at Carilion, noted Agee is passionate about supporting other women working in health care: “She reaches out and mentors leaders regionally and even nationally and many times those leaders are women,” Armentrout said. “She really cares about mentoring women.”

Although women make up about 70% of health workers globally, they only hold 25% of leadership roles in health care, according to a 2023 report by Women in Global Health. 

In a statement issued Wednesday, Sean T. Connaughton, president and CEO of the Virginia Hospital and Healthcare Association, said that Agee “personifies health care servant leadership. Her journey has been a quintessential self-made American success story from her days as a candy striper following a teenage injury and hospitalization, as the first person in her family to graduate from high school, to her work as a hospice and surgery nurse, her civic engagement on behalf of the commonwealth and its people, her accomplished tenure leading Carilion Clinic, and her service as past Chair of the [AHA Board] and the Virginia Hospital and Healthcare Association’s board of directors,” he said in the statement. “She leaves Carilion in the capable hands of … Arner, a talented leader guiding Carilion to continued success.”

In Wednesday’s news release, Hartley added that he was grateful to Agee for her continued service. “Carilion and our community have been the fortunate beneficiaries of Nancy’s talents for more than 50 years,” he stated.

Earlier this month, Carilion announced plans to outsource dozens of functions including pre-registration and billing to Ohio company Ensemble Health Partners. All 780 Carilion employees who work in revenue cycle operations will be offered comparable positions with Ensemble, according to a Carilion news release. 

In U.S. News and World Report’s annual list of the best hospitals in the nation, released Tuesday, Carilion’s flagship hospital, Carilion Roanoke Memorial Hospital, tied for third overall in Virginia.

Carilion Clinic promotes COO Arner to president

Carilion Clinic has promoted its executive vice president and chief operating officer, Steve Arner, to president of the Roanoke-based nonprofit health system. He will remain COO while taking on new duties as president, Carilion said in its announcement Tuesday.

Nancy Howell Agee, who has served as CEO and president since 2011, will also continue as CEO.

In addition to serving as Carilion Clinic’s COO and executive vice president for the health care organization’s Roanoke operations since 2012, Arner has been president and CEO of the 703-bed Level 1 trauma center Carilion Medical Center since 2014. As president, Arner will oversee day-to-day management of the $2.4 billion health system’s seven hospitals and more than 240 medical offices.

He also played a significant role in the state’s COVID-19 response as chair of the Virginia Hospital and Healthcare Association from October 2020 through April 2022.

After joining Carilion in 2005, Arner held leadership roles in hospital administration, cardiac and vascular services, surgical services and facility management, and he also was president and CEO of Carilion Rockbridge Community Hospital. In 2003, Arner earned an MBA from Brigham Young University.

During his time with Carilion, Arner helped spearhead capital improvements, including the Crystal Spring Tower addition to Carilion Roanoke Memorial Hospital, which will be completed in 2025.

“Steve is an outstanding leader, and we are delighted to promote him,” Agee said in a statement. “He has a strong work ethic and cares deeply about our patients, our teams and our work together caring for the communities we serve.”

As VHHA chair, Arner coordinated the collective response of Virginia’s health care provider organizations to the pandemic, and he has served on the VHHA board since 2014 and its executive committee since 2015. Arner was also state delegate to the American Hospital Association Regional Policy Board from 2016 to 2021 and serves on the strategic planning committee for America’s Essential Hospitals.

“Carilion today is a nationally ranked academic health system that provides an extraordinary range of services, from primary care to the most advanced, complex care,” Arner said in a statement. “I look forward to continuing on a pathway of growth and collaboration.”