Covenant Health announces new Chief Medical Officer

LUBBOCK, Texas (NEWS RELEASE) - Dr. Lara Johnson has been named the Covenant Health Lubbock Service Area Chief Medical Officer.

As the Chief Medical Officer, Dr. Johnson will work with other Covenant Health leaders and members of the medical staffs to help ensure the highest quality of care for patients and families. The Lubbock service area includes Covenant Medical Center, Covenant Children’s, Covenant Specialty Hospital, and Covenant Health Grace Surgical Hospital.

Dr. Johnson was born and raised in Lubbock, graduating from Lubbock High School before attending Texas Tech University where she earned a degree in Cell and Molecular Biology. She has a medical degree from Baylor College of Medicine and completed her residency in pediatrics at Texas Tech University Health Sciences Center.

After starting the pediatric hospitalist program at TTUHSC in 2005, she joined the Covenant medical staff as a physician in 2007. She then completed a fellowship in health policy and health services research at Yale College of Medicine.

She is board certified in general pediatrics and pediatric hospital medicine and has been a faculty member in the department of pediatrics at TTUHSC for more than 16 years with leadership roles in medical education and clinical care. Dr. Johnson served as Chief of Staff at Covenant Children’s Hospital from 2020-2022.

She will retain her position at TTUHSC as fellowship director and will continue to be a clinical professor taking shifts as a hospitalist.

Dr. Johnson has been married to her husband, Michael, for 20 years and they share two children, Keegan, 18 and Gwendolyn, 13. Dr. Johnson loves to travel and is often found camping in her free time. She and Michael both enjoy working with local youth and are volunteers with the Boy Scouts of America.

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