employees helped turn the organization. They represented and advocated for the hospital to become stronger. So many people and so many little things played a role. The free coffee played a role and they were willing to give me a chance.” When Dwight first took over as the leader of Scheurer Hospital in 1990, the organization was comprised of 130 employees. By the time he retired from his full-time role in 2016, Scheurer Health had grown to 475 strong – a growth of a modest 265%. One of the biggest changes which made that possible was Scheurer’s designation as a critical-access hospital in the year 2000. It enabled cost-based reimbursement with Medicare, keeping more local dollars in the community and allowing Scheurer to plow those dollars right back into the local economy. That designation also opened the door for Scheurer to attract more doctors and establish a robust network of Primary Care clinics across the Thumb, now in Bad Axe, Caseville, Elkton, Pigeon and Sebewaing. Dwight firmly believes every expansion has been made possible by the establishment of a strong culture inside of Scheurer. “That’s what you want to instill in your employees, a defense of that culture. So first of all, they have to appreciate it. And to appreciate it,
it has to be worth appreciating. It’s a whole process; but then once you get it, it can be quickly damaged. To enrich an organization’s culture, it must be reinforced every single day with every single interaction.” Dwight retired as President & CEO at the age of 68 and was able to pass the baton of Scheurer’s success to Terry Lerash, who himself recently retired at the end of 2022, who now passes things onto Dr. Ross Ramsey – someone Dwight recruited to Scheurer more than a decade ago. All the while, Dwight has remained as a prominent figure and guidepost on the Scheurer Health Board of Trustees. Now at the age of 75, Dwight passes the torch onto the very people that he recruited and introduced to the board, which includes current board chairperson Brian Keim. At the May 2023 board meeting Brian Keim presented Dwight with an o cial board resolution and as Dwight refers to it as, “the Empire State Building in crystal” for his efforts over the last 36 years. Dwight referenced a famous evangelist for inspiration as he reflected back on his Scheurer tenure, “Billy Graham once said that the key to life is to find people you enjoy being around and then grow old together. There’s something
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An avid woodworker, Dwight has built a number of the parade floats for Scheurer Health over the years, including this year’s edition, “Back to a Healthy Future.”
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