You don’t have to have been a nurse to run a successful hospital, but it can help. That’s certainly true of Beata Mastalerz, president at Northwell’s Phelps Hospital, whose focus on those receiving care is fundamental and who is now being presented with the 2026 Women in Business Success Award by the Business Council of Westchester
Mastalerz had been a nurse in Poland and became a nursing attendant in the U.S. when she arrived at age 21. Asked now which factors helped her win the award, she commented: “I believe it was based on the performance of the hospital. Since I started, I have been really focusing on improving our quality of care and recentering everything we do around the patient.”
Now two years into her role, Mastalerz took on the job with no specific mandates from Northwell Health, which owns and operates Phelps, and decided on her own order of priority, starting with: “Elevating everything that we do to the next level, that’s the expectation of the expert physicians, expert staff and our community. So, looking at all of the avenues, what can we do better, starting with quality? What are our opportunities?”
Over the last 10 years, Northwell has invested more than $200 million in the hospital, encouraging renovations and upgrades. Last year saw Phelps’ recertification as an Advanced Thrombectomy-Capable Stroke Center. “Growing in volume, hiring physicians, providing opportunities and technology that is needed to care for patients with strokes and making sure that they can go home as well as possible,” is how Mastalerz describes these advances.
And recognition has followed. “Only last year we were recertified by the Magnet Recognition Program, which is a distinction where the nursing staff and physicians partner to create an environment of the highest quality. It was a lot of work to get us there, a collaboration with everyone in the hospital. Magnet is huge.” Indeed it is, with fewer than 10% of U.S. hospitals achieving Magnet status since its inception 40 years ago.
Under Mastalerz’s management, change has come at both macro and micro levels. A new computer system, EPIC, was introduced in November, a first step in uniting all of Northwell’s 28 hospitals with shared medical records. Meanwhile, in the cafeteria, environmental progress has been made with the arrival of re-usable plates and cutlery.
And on the horizon? Mastalerz sees centers of excellence as the future, including a digestive health hub starting construction this year, “where patients can have any diagnostics that they need but they can also see their GI doctor, nutritionists, a surgeon if needed, and anything else that the patients might require on one site.” Similarly, a comprehensive cancer center is planned. “We are looking to create a concierge approach to anything patients might need – a calming environment, a wellness center where patients can get acupuncture, Reiki, they can speak to psychiatrists if required, or any other services for their wellbeing.”
The emphasis on patients is further underlined by the 2025 creation of a patient experience team, visiting every patient newly admitted to the hospital, connecting them to what matters most as they enter this new environment.
Northwell’s Phelps is part of a big system but also a community hospital, where being intentional and transparent matters. Mastalerz is tireless in this focus: “Quality and safety is at the core of everything we do.”
