ATHENS, Ga. – The American Hospital Association has announced that D. Montez Carter, president and CEO of St. Mary’s Health Care System, has been elected to the AHA Board of Trustees, the highest policymaking body of the AHA and the organization’s ultimate authority for the governance and management of its directions and finances.

The AHA is a national organization that represents and serves all types of hospitals, health care networks, and their patients and communities. Nearly 5,000 hospitals, health care systems, networks, other providers of care, and 43,000 individual members form the AHA.

In announcing Carter’s election, AHA noted his service on the Georgia Hospital Association board of trustees, including serving as its chair in 2018. In addition, he is co-chair of the Athens Area Chamber of Commerce board of directors, on which he has served since 2018, and is a member of the board of directors of the Georgia Alliance of Community Hospitals.

Carter previously served as a delegate to AHA’s Regional Policy Board (RPB) 4, which covers several Southeastern states. In his new role as an AHA board member, Carter will now chair RPB 4. His three-year term will begin Jan. 1, 2021.

Carter joined St. Mary’s in 2010 as vice president of operations. In 2012 he was named President of St. Mary’s Good Samaritan Hospital in Greensboro, and in March 2017 became President of St. Mary’s Hospital in Athens. In December 2017, he was named President and CEO of St. Mary’s Health Care System, leading some 2,300 colleagues across three hospitals, a medical group, home health care/hospice agency, outpatient facilities and a retirement community.

Prior to coming to St. Mary’s, Carter served at Greenwood Leflore Hospital in Greenwood, Miss., where he was director of pharmacy services and then as Associate Director of Performance Improvement and Patient Support Services. He earned his master’s degree in business administration from the University of Alabama and his doctoral degree in pharmacy from the University of Mississippi.