SAFFORD — A major change in Gila Valley leadership was announced Wednesday.
During the Mt. Graham Regional Medical Center Community Partnership Panel, Roland Knox, chief executive officer for the hospital, announced he is retiring effective in October.
“I’m deeply religious, and I really feel that two events, like open-heart surgery and a stroke all within 16 months, really prompted me to say, ‘You know, you really spend more time with your family,’ ” Knox said.
Knox said the hospital board has started the process to find a new CEO, and he would stay on to help if the search goes past his planned final day.
“I’m not on a run to leave. I am here and I will help to do whatever is necessary for the organization,” Knox said.
Knox has 22 years of service to MGRMC, with five years on the hospital board when he was the president of Stockman’s Bank, before being hired as the hospital’s vice president COO. He left in 2011 to join Northern Cochise Community Hospital in Willcox as CEO, before coming back to MGRMC as CEO in 2019.
Under Knox’s tenure, the hospital has greatly expanded, building two new medical office complexes and bringing in a new of health services under the hospital’s purview, as well as obtaining designation as a Level III Trauma Center and the hiring of a permanent oncologist.
Currently under development is the Copper Mountain Clinic-Thatcher, on the campus of Eastern Arizona College, which should be open in the summer of 2026; a new pharmacy building on the MGRMC campus to serve both the hospital and consumers; and a new Cardiac Cath Lab that is expected to be open by winter 2025.
Future plans call for expansion of the hospital’s surgery suites and Emergency Room.
Also taking part in the Community Partnership Panel was Randy Bryce, who moves from the chief of the Pharmacy Department into his new role as the hospital’s chief operating officer, following the resignation of Eric Neal. Neal accepted the position of CEO with Arbor Health in Morton, Wash.
