Home-health provider Gentiva Health Services, Melville, N.Y., named Tony Strange as president and chief operating officer, effective immediately. Strange, 45, has served as executive vice president and president of Gentiva Home Health—which provides skilled-nursing, disease-management and physical-, occupational- and speech-therapy services in 36 states—since March 2006, after Gentiva acquired regional provider the Healthfield Group in February of that year.
Before the acquisition, Strange had served as Healthfield’s president and COO. He also held other leadership positions at Healthfield since he started as the company’s general manager in 1990. Ron Malone, Gentiva’s chairman and chief executive officer, said in a news release that Strange has played a “pivotal role in Gentiva’s transformation” during the last 21 months.
As Gentiva’s COO, Strange succeeds Al Perry, who retired in January 2006, according to David Fluhrer, a company spokesman. The COO position has been open since Perry’s departure, Fluhrer said. -- by Jessica Zigmond
