Stony Brook Southampton Hospital Announces New Chief Nursing Officer

Althea Mills, RN, has been named Chief Nursing Officer, Vice President of Patient Care Services of Stony Brook Southampton Hospital.

“Althea joins the leadership team bringing a vibrant vision for nursing education,” said Robert S. Chaloner, Chief Administration Officer, Stony Brook Southampton Hospital. “She will play an instrumental role in recruiting and training staff, including for The Phillips Family Cancer Center which opens in December.”

Ms. Mills originally joined Southampton Hospital in 2014 as a Per Diem Nursing Administrative Supervisor. She became a fulltime employee in 2015 and was named Director of Nursing Education in January 2017. Shortly afterwards, she was promoted to Associate Director of Nursing. Ms. Mills took over as Interim CNO in April 2018 after longtime CNO Patricia Darcey retired

While studying in Trinidad, West Indies during the early 1980s, Ms. Mills’ nursing professors encouraged her to become a nursing educator. After moving to the United States in 1990, Ms. Mills pursued a Master’s Degree in Nursing Education from Molloy College. After graduation she secured a teaching position at Suffolk Community College where she is still an adjunct professor.

“Nursing Education is my calling,” Ms. Mills reflected. “I look forward to developing and implementing programs to help our nursing staff develop their full potential as part of the Hospital’s mission of providing the best patient care on the East End.”

More recently, Ms. Mills has guided the Hospital’s nursing team through two joint commission visits. She also assisted the Cardiac Specialists at Stony Brook Medicine train staff for Stony Brook Southampton Hospital’s new Electrophysiology Lab, which opened this past August and assisted with the Cardiac Catheterization Lab, which opened last year, and since then has seen more than 300 successful cases to date.