BIO

Dr. Catherine Bernard is Chief Medical Officer at Aspen Valley Health, responsible for oversight and management of physicians and medical staff. As a member of the health system’s executive team, she serves as the liaison between senior management and the physicians, nurses and other clinical staff members. In addition to her staff supervision responsibilities, Dr. Bernard is tasked with supporting organization-wide quality improvement and patient-safety programs to assure the best possible patient outcomes. Dr. Bernard has spent her entire career at Aspen Valley Health, practicing emergency medicine since 2002. She studied medicine at the University of Texas Health Sciences Center at San Antonio, graduating in 1999. She completed her residency in emergency medicine in 2002 with the Christiana Care Health Services in Newark, Delaware. As an emergency medicine doctor, she has treated people of all ages with all types of conditions, and interacts with all the providers in our system of care on a regular basis. Dr. Bernard was the Chief of Medical Staff from 2015 to 2023, and served in numerous other administrative positions over the years. She played a key role in helping the hospital and the community navigate the COVID-19 pandemic. Dr. Bernard loves the climate and the cultural and outdoor opportunities that Aspen offers and says she couldn’t have asked for a better place to live, work and raise her two sons. In her spare time she enjoys hiking, stand-up paddleboarding, snowboarding, yoga, painting, writing and playing her harp. She is also an avid gardener.