Health PEI Executive Leadership Team

Chief Executive Officer

Melanie Fraser

Melanie is an accomplished senior Public Sector executive with 20+ years' experience building, leading and empowering growth in organizations and systems. Throughout her career with the public service, she has led large organizations and systems to deliver results for the benefit of the public.   

She has a track record of successfully leading in complex, multistakeholder environments and is known for delivering results. Melanie is highly regarded for her strategic and very collaborative approach and is known as a compelling communicator who confidently gains buy-in from stakeholder. She is a calm and thoughtful people leader who takes pride in building high-functioning, diverse teams and values-based culture. 

Melanie was formerly the Associate Deputy Minister for Health, for the Province of Ontario with leadership of numerous portfolios including, the creation of the Ontario Health Agency, Mental Health & Addictions, Data and Digital Transformation, Hospital Operations & Capital Development, Home & Community Care, Agency Oversight, Health Human Resources, Labour Relations and Ambulance Services. Prior to that she held executive positions including the Corporate Chief Information Officer for Ontario, the Chief Administrative Officer at Treasury Board and the Director of Operations, for the Ontario Death Investigation System. 

Melanie received an Honours BA, Master of Arts and the Presidents Gold Medal from Wilfrid Laurier University and an Executive MBA from the Ivey Business School at Western University. Melanie reflects that her work ethic and passion for community service comes from her family who are farmers and Dutch immigrants. She and her husband, who is from the East Coast, have two beautiful children and enjoy golfing, watersports and time spent at the barn. 

Chief Operating Officer

Corinne Rowswell, MPA, BSc, RN

Corinne is a registered nurse with over 35 years of health care experience. She has worked as a front-line nurse in acute care, home care, palliative care and public health in Nova Scotia, PEI, Quebec and Ontario. Throughout her career she has worked with patients, families, health care providers and community programs towards safe and supportive transitions in care, particularly from acute care settings to home based care. Corinne credits working with people and their families, particularly at their most vulnerable time of life, as fundamentally shaping how she practiced nursing in a collaborative inter-disciplinary team and working towards patient-centred care.

In 1998, Corinne moved home to PEI with her family and put those skills to use leading program and policy development for home care and palliative care before joining the Chief Public Health Office where she worked as part of the team to develop healthy public policy for a stronger public health system in PEI. In 2018, Corinne transitioned to working with the broader Health and Wellness team, leading key strategic initiatives and played a leadership role in the COVID-19 response before returning to operations with Health PEI in 2021.

Corinne holds a Bachelor of Science in Nursing from St. Francis Xavier University and a Master of Public Administration from Dalhousie University.  She lives near Hunter River with her husband and they have launched three adult sons.

Chief Financial Officer

Kellie Hawes, BBA, CPA, CMA 

Kellie is a chartered professional accountant with over 28 years of financial experience. Kellie started her career in the private sector and joined government in 2000. Her public sector career began with the Department of Finance. From there she moved to the Public Service Commission and then to Health in 2005. 

Throughout her career in health, Kellie has held the positions of fiscal analyst auditor, director of Planning, Evaluation and Audit, and executive director, Corporate Services.

Kellie is a trustee with the Public Sector Group Insurance Plan. She holds a seat on the Provincial Medical Advisory Committee as a representative of Health PEI senior management. Kellie was a member of the Physician Resource Planning Committee for over 10 years.

Kellie earned her Bachelor of Business Administration degree from the University of Prince Edward Island and her Certified Management Accountant designation from the Society of Management Accountants of Prince Edward Island. 

Chief Nursing and Professional Practice Officer

Marion Dowling RN, BScN, MScN

Marion graduated from the first class of the New Bachelor of Science Degree program in Nursing from the University of Prince Edward Island (UPEI) in 1996. She also completed her Certificate in Public Administration from UPEI in 1997. She completed her Master of Science in Nursing from the University of Ottawa in 2008.

Marion was honoured in June 2008 by receiving the Canadian Nurses Association Order of Merit for Nursing Policy, as well as one of the CNA Centennial Awards.

Marion has worked in various nursing roles throughout her 20-plus year career as a registered nurse on Prince Edward Island. She has worked in acute care medical; rural emergency department; nursing management and administrative roles in acute care as director of Nursing; and as principal nursing advisor for the Province. Since beginning her role as chief of nursing, Allied Health & Patient Experience in July 2016, she has had the opportunity to regain some brief clinical practice time as a front-line home care registered nurse.

Chief Administrative Officer 

Belinda White, BBA, MPA

Belinda has 33 years of experience in the federal public service, the last 10 years as a senior executive in various federal departments and the Privy Council Office. Her most recent position was chief of staff to the deputy minister of Health Canada where she helped coordinate the federal response to the COVID-19 pandemic. She has extensive experience in senior administrative roles having served as the corporate secretary in several federal departments where she was responsible for senior executive governance, Cabinet and Parliamentary Affairs, portfolio coordination, the departmental briefing process, ministerial and executive correspondence, and access to information requests.

Belinda has experience in leading cross-functional, multidisciplinary teams, establishing partnerships with governments and stakeholders as well as significant expertise in strategic and operational management.

She has a Bachelor of Business Administration from Acadia University and a Master of Public Administration from Carleton University. 

Belinda’s roots are in PEI having grown up in Charlottetown where her father still lives.

Chief Performance and Innovation Officer

Karen McCaffrey, BSc, MHSA

Karen has 15 years of experience working in the PEI health care system, most recently as the executive director of Performance and Innovation in Health PEI. She started as a program analyst with Planning and Evaluation before moving to the Quality and Risk team where she held the positions of patient safety coordinator and quality and risk manager. From 2019-2021 she worked as the director of Social Programs with the PEI Department of Social Development and Housing before returning to Health PEI.

Karen has experience and knowledge in several corporate areas within the health system, including quality and safety, policy, planning and evaluation, health analytics, privacy and information management, eHealth clinical operations, business continuity and emergency management, and board governance.
Early in her career, Karen completed a Research Fellowship in Health Outcomes Management at Dalhousie University, and worked as a Chronic Diseases and Health Promotion program assistant at the World Health Organization in Geneva, Switzerland prior to coming home to PEI.

Karen holds a Bachelor of Science from the University of Prince Edward Island and a Masters of Health Services Administration from Dalhousie University.  She is also trained as a Black Belt in Lean Six Sigma. 

Chief Communications Officer

Everton McLean, MA, BA

Everton is a communications professional with 15 years of experience in journalism, health care communications and marketing in various roles across the Atlantic provinces. Everton holds a Bachelor’s degree in Journalism and English from St. Thomas University, as well as a Master of Arts degree in English Literature from Memorial University. He is currently completing an MBA with a specialization in leadership at Dalhousie University.

Everton’s career began in 2005 as a newspaper reporter, first in Fredericton and then with The Telegram in St. John’s, NL. In 2010 he joined the new Horizon Health Network in New Brunswick as the communications officer for the Moncton area, where he also led strategic communications planning for the health authority. 

In 2013, he joined Capital Health in Halifax as a senior communications advisor, focusing on media relations and digital content development. He continued in this role during the amalgamation of all Nova Scotia health authorities into one provincial health authority in 2015. During this time, Everton also taught communications to undergraduate and graduate students as a sessional instructor at Mount St. Vincent University.

Everton’s family chose PEI as their new home in 2016. He worked as the manager of content marketing for UPEI before joining Health PEI in late February, 2020. 

Everton has three young children, a dog, and a cat. His wife, Dr. Karen McLean, practices dentistry in Charlottetown.

Chief Academic Officer

Dr. Preston Smith

Dr. Smith holds dual roles as the Dean of the Faculty of Medicine, UPEI, as well as Chief Academic Officer and an Executive Leadership Team member for Health PEI.

A highly regarded medical educator and administrator, Dr. Smith completed his medical education at Dalhousie University and is a Certificant and Fellow of the College of Family Physicians of Canada. In 2010, he completed a Master of Education from Mount Saint Vincent University focused on medical education.

Dr. Smith's career has been marked by his dedication to developing medical education programs. He spent 25 years as a family physician in Moncton, during which he served as VP of Medicine in Moncton, New Brunswick, during the transition from the province’s 52 hospitals to eight regions and then down to 2 health regions. This experience provided him with significant expertise in health system reform and administration. He also held the position of Senior Associate Dean of Education within the Faculty of Medicine at DAL, where he played a key role in developing and overseeing the Dalhousie medical education program launched in Saint John. He was instrumental in starting new family medicine residency programs in PEI, New Brunswick, and Nova Scotia. His most recent role as Dean of the College of Medicine at the University of Saskatchewan saw his team lead a significant restructuring of the College of Medicine.