On a mission; Patricia Cahill took unlikely path to be first CEO at Catholic Health Initiatives.(Biography)

Byline: Joe Carlson

When a fresh-eyed Patricia Cahill entered the workforce in 1960 as a middle-school teacher outside Boston, there was scarcely any hint in her lessons on French-speaking skills that she could go on to one day head up the nation's largest integrated Roman Catholic health system.

"I was a French major, and I went into teaching French. I loved teaching,'' Cahill says. "I had no plan in any way or form that matched what eventually became my life.''

Now at age 69 and deep in a busy post-retirement, Cahill can look back and smile about her work as the first person ever to sit behind the desk in the chief executive officer's suite at Catholic Health Initiatives in Denver. Though it was a gamble at the time, the system is widely seen today as a pioneer in how to combine the talents, assets and institutional gravitas of disparate Roman Catholic systems into a whole stronger than its parts. Her success has landed her a nod as one of four inductees this year into the Health Care Hall of Fame.

Was it the hand of God that led her to CHI? Fate? Destiny? "The truth is, my career was one of being in the right place at the right time,'' she says. "I did not plan this.'' Yet, somehow a woman with a law degree who never practiced law rose to the top of what was …