Opposite page: Xavier Villarreal, the new vice president and chief operating officer of CHRISTUS Spohn Hospital Corpus Christi-Memorial and Shoreline, has deep ties to the community, having been born at then-named Memorial Medical Center and graduating from Mary Carroll High School. This page (bottom): Xavier Villarreal; his wife, Tiffany; and their children, Michael and Isabella, during Michael’s first communion
health center on the Memorial campus focused on providing chronic disease management, wellness and prevention in support of the west side community. The CHRISTUS Spohn Shoreline campus will be transformed into the region’s premier hospital housing the region’s only Level II trauma program, family practice and emergency medicine residency programs and advanced acute care services. This proposal to bring state-of-the-art, personalized medicine to South Texas is a $325 million investment for which no taxpayer dollars are needed. CHRISTUS Spohn has committed $275 million of financial support – the company’s largest investment in the region ever. The remaining $50 million will be raised through philanthropic support. Villarreal is excited about the opportunity to be part of ensuring the best health care is provided for generations to come. “Being born in Memorial, having worked there, that’s really where my dream of health care began,” he says. “I understand the history of what that location means. The potential models we are looking at for the two hospitals will really transform health care in the region.” And it’s not just the buildings that are changing; the health care industry as a whole is in a state of transition and improvement, according to Villarreal. The industry looks not only to provide care inside the four walls of hospitals, but also to provide preventative care in family health clinics and even at patients’ homes. “We’re seeing a lot of changes to the traditional model of the past, where hospitals were just waiting for patients to get sick and treating them there,” Villarreal says. “We really need to cater to our patients’ needs before they get sick and look at how we can best do that.” But for now, Villarreal is adjusting to his new position and getting his family settled in in Corpus Christi. He and his wife, Tiffany, a labor and delivery nurse, are set to celebrate their 10-year anniversary and are expecting their third child (a boy) in October. They also have an 8-year-old son and a 5-year-old daughter. In his spare time, Villarreal enjoys taking wine-tasting trips to Napa Valley and the Texas Hill Country with friends, and he is very active in Boy Scouts, having earned the rank of Eagle Scout in high school. He enjoys camping trips and sporting events with his son, who is now a Cub Scout. Villarreal says he feels blessed to be working in his new role with CHRISTUS Spohn in his hometown, serving the people of the community where he grew up not too long ago. He has deep ties to the community; his mother was a nurse at Memorial Medical Center and a school nurse for CCISD, while his father worked for years as an electrical engineer at the Corpus Christi Army Depot. Having been raised Catholic in Corpus Christi, where he attended Most Precious Blood Catholic Church, Villarreal says it feels good to return home to work for a Catholic organization. “I’m really looking forward to this opportunity,” he shares. “I’m excited to work alongside our medical staff and associates to continue to make improvements and provide high-quality care to our community.” For additional information, visit www.christusspohn.org. I N S P I R E C O A S TA L B E N D M A G . C O M
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