When you talk about the rapid expansion of healthcare in San Antonio, specifically the boom on the city’s far west side, one name comes up more often than you’d expect: Jeff Bourgeois. It’s a name that carries a lot of weight in administrative circles, even though he hasn't been a fixture of the local headlines for a minute.
Honestly, the way San Antonio grows is kind of wild. One minute you've got a field of bluebells and mesquite trees, and the next, there’s a massive medical complex serving a quarter-million people. Bourgeois was the guy on the ground for one of the most pivotal shifts in that landscape.
Most people know him for his role as the former President and Administrator of CHRISTUS Santa Rosa Hospital - Westover Hills. But looking at his tenure in San Antonio as just a "job" misses the point. He basically built that facility from the dirt up. Literally. He oversaw the construction and the start-up operations, turning a blueprint into a functioning lifeline for a part of the city that was desperately underserved at the time.
📖 Related: Jim Whitehurst Red Hat: The Leader Who Proved Open Source Isn't Just for Geeks
The Westover Hills Legacy
Let’s be real: starting a hospital from scratch is a nightmare. You’ve got zoning, staffing, the actual construction, and then the fun of making sure the oxygen lines don't leak before you open the doors. Jeff Bourgeois spent nine years leading that charge.
He didn't just walk into a finished office. He was there for the "ground-up" phase. Under his watch, Westover Hills became more than just a satellite campus; it became a core part of the CHRISTUS health system in Texas.
During his time in San Antonio, Bourgeois wasn't just hiding in a boardroom. He was active in the broader Texas medical community. He served on the Texas Hospital Association Board of Trustees for about seven years. That’s where the policy stuff happens—the kind of work that determines how much you pay for a band-aid and how rural hospitals keep their lights on.
A Career Built on Texas Soil
Bourgeois isn't some fly-by-night executive. He’s got deep roots in the region.
- Education: He earned his Master of Science in Health Care Administration from Trinity University. If you know anything about healthcare in San Antonio, you know Trinity’s program is basically the Ivy League for hospital admins.
- The Hill Country Years: Before the San Antonio gig, he spent 16 years at Hill Country Memorial Health System in Fredericksburg. He climbed the ladder from COO to CEO.
- The Transition: In 2016, he left San Antonio to take the helm at San Juan Regional Medical Center in New Mexico.
What People Get Wrong About Hospital Leadership
You might think a hospital CEO is just a suit looking at spreadsheets. And sure, there’s plenty of that. But Bourgeois’s approach in San Antonio was famously about "visibility."
When he moved on to his next role in Farmington, New Mexico, he brought that same philosophy: meeting community leaders, shaking hands with stakeholders, and making sure the "medical center" actually felt like part of the community, not just a cold institution.
💡 You might also like: NCDs Explained: How a Non Convertible Debentures Example Actually Works for Your Portfolio
His exit from San Antonio marked the end of an era for Westover Hills, but the infrastructure he helped build remains. If you’ve ever had a kid at that hospital or visited the ER there, you’re experiencing the tail end of his operational strategy.
Where is Jeff Bourgeois now?
After leaving Texas, he had a significant run in New Mexico, even serving as the Chairman of the New Mexico Hospital Association Board of Directors. He led his organization through the absolute chaos of the 2020-2022 pandemic years—a time when "healthcare leadership" became a much more dangerous and exhausting profession.
He eventually stepped down from his CEO role in early 2022. Since then, the Bourgeois name in a professional context often pops up in academic and consulting circles, though many San Antonians still associate him with the rapid rise of the Westover Hills medical corridor.
It’s easy to forget the people who build the places where we get healed. We focus on the doctors and the nurses—as we should—but the guy making sure the building exists and the lights stay on is a huge part of the equation. Jeff Bourgeois’s impact on San Antonio healthcare is etched into the very foundations of the city's west side expansion.
Actionable Insights for Navigating San Antonio Healthcare:
- Research Facility History: If you’re choosing a primary hospital in San Antonio, look at when it was established. Newer facilities like Westover Hills often have more modern layouts designed for patient flow, a legacy of the "ground-up" planning Bourgeois participated in.
- Understand the Networks: CHRISTUS Santa Rosa and Baptist Health are the big players here. Knowing which executive "grew" which branch can actually tell you a lot about the hospital's culture.
- Network via Trinity: If you’re an aspiring healthcare admin in San Antonio, the Trinity University alumni network—which Bourgeois is a part of—is arguably the most powerful professional group in the city.
The growth of San Antonio isn't slowing down. As more hospitals pop up along 1604 and the I-10 corridor, they are following the blueprint for community-integrated care that leaders like Bourgeois helped standardize over a decade ago.