SHELTON, WA – Mason Health’s Erica Wilson, Patient Access Supervisor at Mason General Hospital, is known for being hard-working, reliable, friendly and highly adept at working with patients and coworkers through any tough situation. Since starting in Central Registration in 2019, she has been a valuable asset to Mason Health, rising through the ranks and learning as much as she can about scheduling and patient access. Her affability and strong work ethic are main reasons why her coworkers have nominated and selected her to be the June 2024 Employee of the Month.

Wilson has lived in Shelton her whole life, graduating from Shelton High School in 2013. She attended South Puget Sound Community College, completing an associate’s degree in 2015. She was considering career paths in the medical field, such as stenography, and went back to school for pre-requisite courses in 2016 while working for Olympia Seafood.

“I always had a really hard time deciding what my career path would be,” Wilson reflected. “I wanted the stability offered in health care and I knew I wanted to help people. I really enjoyed learning the technical side of things, anatomy and physiology, but in the process of looking for a stenography school, I found out there were not very many programs, and they were competitive to get into. I would have to wait three years just to get into a school.”

Toward the end of 2018, a close family member of Wilson’s was diagnosed with a late-stage cancer, which changed Wilson’s life forever. While her family member was diagnosed at Mason Health, they received oncology care in Olympia.

“It rocked my world,” Wilson remembered. “I saw them going through the most vulnerable, terrifying experience of their life, and as a patient I saw they were not treated with the respect and care they should have been. That was hard to see, and it was a rude awakening. I decided I didn’t want to spend three years waiting for my future to happen.”

Wilson pursued a business degree, with a specialization in health care, from Western Governors’ University, graduating in 2022. During this time, she had started working for Mason Health, registering patients at Mason General Hospital. She worked in Central Registration from May 2019 to February 2020, and felt she finally had found the path she wanted to be on.

“It was my light bulb moment, realizing I can do the business side of things that I was always so interested in and get into health care to make those difficult times easier for patients,” she said. “That is what was so important to me. I loved Mason Health. I thought it was such a good environment.”

Wilson enjoys building relationships with patients and community members, especially because Mason County is such a small community, and many people she has interacted with have known her family for years. At the start of the COVID pandemic, in February 2020, Wilson moved into scheduling for Mason Clinic, which had just opened. She scheduled appointments for Primary Care and specialty care, becoming a team lead, until February 2024, when she was promoted to her current supervisory role.

“It was certainly a tumultuous time, opening Mason Clinic during a pandemic,” she said. “I certainly learned a lot about the back side of clinic operations, with a lot more focus on insurance. It was my first exposure to different specialties of health care I hadn’t seen before. As a senior scheduler, I got to take on projects of my own and work with other departments. It meant a lot to me.”

Wilson is a leader for Mason Health’s customer service training program, Bonfire, and has completed Nash leadership training and Lean for Leaders, a process improvement training class. She has also been involved in the re-development of the Employee Activities Committee. In her new role, she is supervising the department where she first started.

“The job feels big,” she said. “There are times it’s really overwhelming. It’s been a long time since I’ve been challenged like this. But it’s fun and I’m learning so much every day. I’m learning what I can to support my team as best as I can.”

Wilson enjoys cooking and spending time with her family, her fiancé and her dog, Stella.

Mason Health, Public Hospital District No. 1 of Mason County is ISO 9001 Quality Management System certified by Det Norske Veritas (DNV) and is a licensed and accredited acute care hospital with a level four emergency trauma designation. Mason General Hospital and Mason Clinic are ENERGY STAR® certified and Mason Health is the recipient of three Practice Greenhealth Environmental Excellence Partner for Change Awards, two Greening the Operating Room Awards and the Making Medicine Mercury Free Award. To learn more about Mason Health’s sustainability efforts, visit https://www.masonhealth.com/about/sustainability-environmental-stewardship. There are more than 100 physicians on staff in 19 specialties. For more information or to find a health care provider, visit www.masongeneral.com. To learn more about DNV, visit www.dnv.com/healthcare.