It was announced in the February 27, 2007, edition of Soap Opera Digest that Carlivati was promoted to Co-Head Writer of One Life to Live alongside Dena Higley.
[citation needed] However, the show's ratings continued to slide, a problem that all daytime soap operas have been experiencing in recent years.
In an effort to bring over fans of One Life to Live, who were now without a soap to call their own, Carlivati brought over Kristen Alderson (Starr Manning), Kassie DePaiva (Blair Cramer), Michael Easton (John McBain), Roger Howarth (Todd Manning) and Florencia Lozano (Tea Delgado) to bring their signature roles to General Hospital.
In addition to casting the former One Life to Live actors shortly after his arrival, Carlivati also made a point of re-introducing a wide variety of fan favorite veterans to the canvas, including Tristan Rogers (Robert Scorpio) Genie Francis (Laura Spencer), Lynn Herring (Lucy Coe), Finola Hughes (Anna Devane), Sean Kanan (A.J.
Many of them helped make the 50th anniversary a success during the aforementioned transitional absence of the contracted actors brought over from One Life to Live.
On July 24, 2015, ABC announced their decision to replace Carlivati as head-writer of General Hospital with Shelly Altman and Jean Passanante.