Heather Higgins

About Heather Higgins

Heather Higgins is the CEO of TGH Rehabilitation Hospital, an 80-bed freestanding inpatient rehabilitation hospital located in the Tampa Medical & Research District.

Higgins has more than 25 years of clinical and management experience across several complex environments, including for-profit systems, academic medical centers, and government-run systems. She will be responsible for the operations, management, and clinical resources of TGH Rehabilitation Hospital and its more than 140 team members and caregivers, including transitioning Tampa General’s inpatient rehabilitation hospital and team from the main campus to the new facility when it opens.

She most recently served as the director of rehabilitation at Kessler Institute for Rehabilitation in West Orange, N.J., since 2014. Prior to that, she was the operations manager for the Rehabilitation Medicine Department at New York-Presbyterian Hospital/Weill Cornell Medical Center in New York, N.Y., for over 10 years. In these roles, she directed inpatient therapy services, fostered growth of clinical programs across all subspecialties, and facilitated rehabilitation operations in areas spanning inpatient, outpatient, and physician practices. Higgins began her career as an occupational therapist and her clinical background is in adult physical disabilities.

Higgins has also served as a program surveyor for the Commission on Accreditation of Rehabilitation Facilities (CARF) since 2007. CARF is an independent, non-profit accreditor of health and human services.

Higgins received a Bachelor of Science in Occupational Therapy from the Medical College of Virginia/Virginia Commonwealth University and a Master of Business Administration from Baruch College of The City University of New York. She is a member of the American College of Healthcare Executives.