Amidst a broad range of experience in healthcare administration, Tom Andrews stumbled across a novel program in 1988. He had begun working at Saint Joseph’s hospital as an office admin and by fate his desk was next to Nancy Paris, the then-president of Mercy Care. She invited him to experience a new service that brought basic healthcare to the under-served population of Atlanta. Mercy Care was then at its budding grassroots; and Tom joined the small teams of volunteers who loaded and unloaded crates of medical records, equipment and medications from the back of a van into nearby shelters. He helped set up tented areas for privacy, and met with shelter residents to announce medical care was there for them. A chord was struck, and he became a dedicated volunteer for several years – ultimately returning as the president of Mercy Care in 2003 and graduating to the CEO in 2019. On behalf of Mercy Care, Tom formed lasting partnerships across Atlanta and slowly built a network of resources, evermore elaborate, for the population he once pitched tents for.

A visionary, building permanent structures that would one day host thousands of uninsured patients, Tom saw Mercy Care from the back of a van to the vast network of service sites across Atlanta that it is today.

“My first night, I’d never been in a homeless shelter before. I thought I couldn’t do as much, because I was just the hospital-admin type at the time. But walking around, gathering people, and letting them know doctors and nurses were there to take care of them — that’s how I fell in love with Mercy Care’s mission.”
— Tom Andrews, CEO