Name: Hayley Park
New title: Senior vice president and chief pharmacy officer, Blue Shield of California
Previous title: Vice president of pharmacy operations and services, Kaiser Permanente Northern California
BSCA has tapped Park to lead its prescription drug programs, focusing on making medications more affordable, the California-based nonprofit insurer said in a press release Monday.
She’ll also work on the health plan’s Pharmacy Care Reimagined initiative, a new pharmacy management model launched in 2023 that aims to provide more transparent and affordable prescription drug services, BSCA said.
Park joined the large Blues plan, which serves 6 million beneficiaries across commercial, Medicaid and Medicare plans, from major California-based health system and insurer Kaiser Permanente.
While at Kaiser, Park worked to lower drug costs by changing how medications were selected and managed, particularly for complex and expensive treatments, according to BSCA. She also worked on vaccine deployment during the COVID-19 pandemic.
Park’s appointment comes as BSCA has doubled down on tackling drug costs, an expensive line item for payers as the use of high-cost specialty and obesity drugs increase.
The insurer replaced its sole pharmacy benefit manager, CVS Caremark, nearly three years ago as part of its Pharmacy Care Reimagined plan. Instead, BSCA decided to dole out the contract to five separate companies, in a bid to save money and assume direct oversight of its pharmacy benefits.
In addition, in 2024 the health plan struck a deal directly with a drugmaker to buy a cheaper biosimilar of Humira, an expensive medication that treats several autoimmune and inflammatory conditions.
BSCA’s leadership also changed last year. In early 2025, the insurer restructured, creating a parent company called Ascendiun to oversee the health plan and its clinical and health services businesses. The insurer’s long-time chief executive moved to lead the parent company.
Mike Stuart, who had served as interim CEO of the insurer since March, took on the permanent position last summer.
