Madden

NASHUA – Those who visit St. Joseph Hospital may notice a new face when they are walking down the halls, hanging out in the lobby or sitting in the hospital’s operating and emergency rooms. That new face is that of Vice President of Medical Affairs, Dr. Alison C. Madden.

Madden officially joined the St. Joseph team May 20. Madden said she believes in the hospital’s mission and its people.

“In some ways, it reminded me of where I was coming from in that it’s a community hospital that takes its mission seriously, and you feel that sense of community when you walk in the door,” Madden said, adding that everyone is very friendly.

Madden said she looks forward to getting to know the community, the patients and the providers, and seeing how she can help.

In her role, she will be tackling quality initiatives in the hospital, which will entail providing the best possible care, engaging in outpatient and inpatient services and making sure the hospital’s providers are giving the best care. She will also serve in both an administrative role and on the frontlines in operating rooms and emergency rooms.

While Madden is in this role, she’ll even be able to continue doing what she has done in her past career as an OBGYN: delivering babies.

Prior to working at St. Joseph Hospital, Madden came from Worcester’s St. Vincent Hospital, where she was chief of obstetrics and gynecology for four years.

She worked at the University of Massachusetts Medical Center in Worcester for eight years prior to this.

For Madden, being a doctor was not a path she always knew she would take. She graduated from Barnard College, an affiliate of Columbia University, with a Bachelor of Arts degree in art history. After this, she completed her post-baccalaureate premedical courses at Hunter College. She then went on to study medicine at Cornell University and completed her residency in obstetrics and gynecology at Cedars-Sinai Medical Center in Los Angeles.

Madden said while she studied art history, she found it hard to make a living, and she wanted to work more with people.

Her husband, who she met in college, worked as a school teacher, but was going back to medical school.

“Pre-med wasn’t something I thought of all that much,” Madden said, noting that she did not have any doctors in her family. Still, she started to think about it more as she worked in ophthalmologist and dermatologist offices. She made the choice to take sciences courses at Hunter College, where she said she did very well, and continued down a path that was once not known as an option for her.

Since then, she has served as a clinician, a researcher, a writer, a lecturer and a professor.

Madden was ultimately chosen to fill the role of St. Joseph Hospital’s vice president of medical affairs for her experience of serving as a clinician and a leader.

Senior Vice President and Chief Medical Officer Douglas C. Waite, M.D., said of Madden, “We are delighted to have someone with Dr. Madden’s breadth of expertise and experience join St. Joseph Hospital in this important role. Dr. Madden will provide excellent leadership for our medical staff in Nashua and will be a great asset as we work to provide our patients with the very best care and experience possible. In addition, she will be lending her clinical expertise to our specialty practice of OB/GYN to support her colleagues and their patients.”

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