Former Head of Walter Reed National Military Medical Center Becomes Chesapeake Regional's New COO

Chesapeake Regional Medical Center is pleased to announce and welcome retired Rear Admiral Alton L. Stocks, M.D., as its new chief operating officer after an extensive executive search.

The newest member of the executive leadership team has more than forty years of dedicated military service with the bulk of that time spent in medicine, including time as the commander of Walter Reed National Military Medical Center and Navy Medicine National Capital Area from 2011-2013. During his tenure, he oversaw the merger of Walter Reed Army Medical Center and the National Naval Medical Center.

“Dr. Stocks’ extensive experience in military health care and leadership will be instrumental to overseeing and expanding the operations of Chesapeake Regional Medical Center,” said President and Chief Executive Officer Peter F. Bastone. “We are honored that he will be joining our leadership team and excited to learn from him as he assists us in moving toward a successful future.”

After studying mathematics at the U.S. Naval Academy in Annapolis, Md., Stocks earned his medical degree from the Georgetown School of Medicine in Washington, D.C., and completed a fellowship in pediatric nephrology at the University of Florida in Gainesville, Fla. Stocks also attended the University of North Carolina Kenan-Flagler Business School Executive Development program in Chapel Hill, N.C.

His career includes appointments as Naval Forces Europe & U.S. 6th Fleet surgeon and U.S. Fleet Forces Command fleet surgeon, where he was deployed as the Joint Task Force Haiti surgeon in January 2010. There he coordinated U.S. military medical support to the country after the devastating earthquake. In May 2010, he was promoted to commander of Naval Medical Center Portsmouth in Portsmouth, Va., and Navy Medicine East. Most recently he served as deputy chief of the Navy Bureau of Medicine and Surgery for the Wounded, Ill and Injured Program where he oversaw the expansion of arts and writing therapy programs and assisted in establishing policies and procedures for mental health conditions.

Stocks retired from the military in April 2014 as the longest-serving member of the Naval Academy class of 1972. He and his wife, Joyce, who also served in the Navy as a Nurse Corps officer and retired as a commander, have two children.

Stocks started at CRMC on May 26, 2015.

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