Nearly a year after former Fairview Health Services CEO Rulon Stacey stepped down, another major leader is leaving the company to avoid upcoming structural changes.

 

Fairview Chief Operating Officer, University of Minnesota Medical Center President and M Health Co-President Carolyn Wilson resigned Nov. 2 according to an email interim CEO David Murphy sent to Fairview employees.

 

Wilson, who served as COO for about a year and a half, left her role due to plans — which she helped create — to merge University Physicians and Fairview into M Health next summer. 

 

Officials don’t plan to fill the position opening, Murphy said in the email, and Wilson’s responsibilities will instead be divided among other Fairview and University Physicians leaders.

 

Wilson was also a member of the University’s Human Research Protection Program Implementation Team, created last April to form recommendations concerning University research practices. 

 

In its plan, the team cited concerns over the schools’ “culture of ethics” as reason for HRPP changes.

 

Though Fairview Spokeswoman Jennifer Amundson said Wilson’s resignation was unrelated to the scandal, University Bioethics Associate Professor Leigh Turner said he disagrees.

 

Turner said Wilson was unresponsive to requests for information concerning protection for research subjects since the start of her term.

 

“Given her role at Fairview, she should be held more responsible and initiated investigations [into research participant protection],” he said.

 

Rumors of Wilson’s resignation have been circulating between Fairview employees for sometime, Turner said.

 

“Now she is leaving, but there has been no communication to the broader community,” he said.