OU Health names Brent Smith chief operating officer
The Lawton hospital CEO will join OU Health in November, overseeing hospital and clinic operations and several major expansion projects.
OU Health named Brent L. Smith its chief operating officer, bringing the leader of Memorial Health System of Southwest Oklahoma to the state’s academic health system in November.
Smith will oversee operational performance across OU Health’s hospitals and clinics, including patient safety, access to care, and transfers and referrals from hospitals throughout Oklahoma.
His responsibilities will also include the Pediatric Behavioral Health Center scheduled to open in December 2026, the Pediatric Heart Center in 2027, and the Stephenson Cancer Center in Tulsa in 2028.
A Lawton native and University of Oklahoma graduate, Smith returned to Oklahoma in 2014 after financial leadership roles in Florida and Pennsylvania. He led the 2025 combination of Comanche County Memorial Hospital and Southwestern Medical Center into Memorial Health System of Southwest Oklahoma.
“When a patient needs more than you can provide, the question isn’t whether you transfer — it’s how fast, to whom, and whether someone picks up the phone,” Smith said. “I’ve been on that end of the call for more than a decade.”
