Attorney Earl Barnes will join Sentara Healthcare as general counsel beginning on June 2. Barnes comes to Sentara from Chicago-based Amita Health, where he served as executive vice president and chief legal officer. In that role, Barnes managed the legal, compliance, audit, and risk departments, led a 60-person team, and managed a $10 million annual operating budget.
Prior to Amita Health, Barnes was senior counsel of the Health Care Practice Group at the law firm of Drinker, Biddle & Reath. Barnes has experience in senior legal roles at complex healthcare organizations including Advocate Health Care Network, where he led the $11 billion merger of Advocate Health and Aurora Health.
Outside the office, Barnes chairs the Budget and Audit Committee of Just the Beginning Foundation, a non-profit nurturing interest in law among young people from ethnic backgrounds underrepresented in the legal profession. He also chairs the Committee on Trustees on the Lake Forest College Board of Trustees, his undergraduate alma mater. He is a board member of the Accreditation Council for Graduate Medical Education, and a member of the American Health Law and Bar Associations. He received his Juris Doctor (JD) degree from the University of Michigan Law School.
