Peter Aguilar

NYU Langone Medical Center

Peter Aguilar is a seasoned hospital administrator with a varied background. Demonstrating an expertise in process improvement, quality measurement systems and substantial healthcare experience leading housekeeping, internal patient transport, Linen utilization and conservation, patient television experience as well as, logistics.

Role and responsibilities have been diverse with different assignments throughout the New York City Metropolitan area while working with an outsourced firm and most recently NYU Langone Medical Center. Entire Work experience has been in large inner city Hospitals and Nursing homes in New York City. Responsibilities include but not limited to , compliance manager specific to JCAHO for the east coast, technical support representative for New York region, safety champion for the Mid – Atlantic region and was awarded numerous awards for innovation and customer service. Recently, was directly involved in designing and implementing a frequently touched surface cleaning program that reduced Hospital acquired infection within the Medical center. In addition, collaborated with Local 1199 to design and implement a Green training program. The program provided frontline staff with an upward mobility ladder while increasing the competency of the entire workforce through worker engagement and peer training program.

Peter earned his B.S. in Business Management from Temple University in Philadelphia Pa. On a basketball scholarship he was voted captain of the nationally ranked team that was under the direction of Hall of fame basketball coach John Chaney by his peers. He has continued to give back to his community by coaching and training the Youth of New york city where he has seen 15 NCAA Division 1 Basketball and football and most notably he coached Kyrie Irving current star of the Cleveland Cavaliers.

As a Green belt has been instrumental is streamlining processes while eliminating waste. Department has conducted over 30 rapid improvement events and are in the forefront within the Medical center. Leading in innovation and being the Number one go to department at NYU Langone Medical Center.

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Gadi BenMark

Senior Vice President of Client Development and Advisory Services, NM Incite

Gadi BenMark is the SVP of Client Development and Advisory Services at NM Incite. NM Incite is a joint venture between The Nielsen Company and McKinsey & Company that helps businesses harness the full potential of social media intelligence to drive superior business performance across their organizations.

Gadi BenMark is in charge of NM Incite's global advisory business. He also manages the entire North American sales force across all of NM Incite's product offering.

Prior to NMIncite, Mr. BenMark wasChief Revenue Officer at TurnTo Networks, where he led TurnTo's sales, marketing, and business development activities. Gadi was a VP/CBE (client business executive) at Amdocs (NYSE:DOX) in charge of digital advertising and commerce, and a VP/General Manager at Intergraph where he managed Intergraph's transportation and photogrammetry global business unit. Prior to Intergraph Mr. BenMark led LocatioNet Inc's operations in the Americas. LocatioNet is an Israel based technology provider of mobile location-based service solutions. He joined LocatioNet after a number of years with McKinsey & Co.

Mr. BenMark, a Canadian, Israeli, and American by nationality, worked with the McKinsey telecom practice both in North and South America and in Europe. He was responsible for developing global mobile strategies for clients.

Mr. BenMark holds an MBA from the Harvard Business School (Baker scholar), a law degree (University of Tel-Aviv), and a BA in economics and Business (Hebrew University of Jerusalem). He was a captain in the Israeli Air-Force and is a member of the New-York legal bar. He's

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Michael Bennick, MD, MA, FACP

Medical Director for Patient Experience, Yale - New Haven Hospital

Dr. Bennick began his professional life as a sociologist interested in how individuals find meaning within the communities they reside. This led him on a journey which brought him to internal medicine, where the "realities of the body led to the mysteries of the soul." The patient has been the focus of Dr. Bennick's attention for a quarter of a century and has remained committed to training students, residents and fellows to better appreciate the power of a patient's narrative and the importance of patient and family centered care.

Dr. Bennick received his undergraduate degree from the University of Pennsylvania with an individualized major: The Concept of Community, A Study in Sociological Theory and Existential Religious Thought. He received his Master's degree also from the University of Pennsylvania and his medical degree from Temple University. Dr. Bennick did both his internship and residency at the Graduate Hospital of the University of Pennsylvania and his fellowships at Yale-New Haven Hospital.

Dr. Bennick is currently the Medical Director of the Patient Experience and Associate Chief of Medicine at Yale-New Haven Hospital. He is an Associate Clinical Professor, Department of Medicine at Yale University School of Medicine. Dr. Bennick lives in Branford with his wife and has 3 adult children. He is on the Board of the American Jewish Society for Service and an active participant of Habitat for Humanity.

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Edward Benzel, MD

Department Chair, Neurological Surgery
Cleveland Clinic

Dr. Edward Benzel, Chairman of the Department of Neurosurgery at Cleveland Clinic, is an internationally recognized thought leader in spine surgery and biomechanics. His clinical interests include cervical spondylosis, syringomyelia and Chiari malformation, complex spine instrumentation, and spine tumors. He has authored multiple textbooks in the field of spine care, in addition to several co-authored and edited texts and more than 325 chapters. In addition, Dr. Benzel has published over 220 refereed manuscripts. Besides publishing research, Dr. Benzel is frequently invited as a visiting professor, speaker, and faculty instructor at hospitals, universities, and major national and international medical meetings.

While Dr. Benzel holds multiple patents and has participated in many medical advances, he is perhaps best known as an educator. He started and directed the Neurosurgery Residency Training Program and the Spine Fellowship Programs at the University of New Mexico, and has been instrumental in the development and success of these programs at the Cleveland Clinic. His innovations in Neurosurgery Resident Education have won accolades and numerous awards. In February 2011, Dr. Benzel was chosen to receive the Paul C. Bucy Award for his exemplary efforts offering educational opportunities to his fellow neurosurgeons.

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Rodina Bizri-Baryak

Administrator, Appointment Center
Cleveland Clinic

Rodina Bizri-Baryak is the Administrator of the Cleveland Clinic Appointment Center. The Cleveland Clinic Appointment Center is the leading healthcare call center that leverages systems logic, and telephony technologies to enhance the coordination of multidisciplinary care and patient access. Rodina’s role is pivotal for change management, healthcare reform, strategic planning, access analytics and enterprise wide access strategies. Rodina has been with the Cleveland Clinic since 2005. Prior to joining the Cleveland Clinic Appointment Center, Rodina was the performance improvement for the Neurological Institute. Her areas of concentration were physicians productivity, patient access, process improvement and patient experience. Rodina received her Master of Business Administration, with a concentration in International Management from Baldwin Wallace University.

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Anne C. Boat, MD

Associate Professor Clinical Anesthesia and Pediatrics; Patient Experience Officer; Director Fetal Anesthesia, Cincinnati Children's Hospital Medical Center

Anne C. Boat, MD, is a board certified pediatric anesthesiologist and director of the Section of Fetal Anesthesia in the Department of Anesthesiology at Cincinnati Children's Hospital Medical Center. She is also an associate professor at the University of Cincinnati College of Medicine. Dr. Boat received an M.D. from the University of North Carolina Medical School and completed an anesthesia residency and a pediatric anesthesia fellowship at the University of Cincinnati College of Medicine and Cincinnati Children's Hospital respectively.

Dr. Boat has recently been appointed as the Patient/Family Experience Officer at the James M. Anderson Center for Health Systems Excellence at Cincinnati Children's Hospital Medical Center (CCHMC). She is driving the medical center's improvement work around patient/family experience and working directly with improvement teams in patient care areas on their experience projects. A goal of the CCHMC patient/family experience strategic team is to identify the behaviors that create the optimal patient/family experience and work to embed them into the culture of the medical center.

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Adrienne Boissy, MD, MA

Medical Director, Center for Healthcare Communication
Cleveland Clinic

Dr Adrienne Boissy, MD, MA is Staff at the Cleveland Clinic Mellen Center for MS and has a secondary appointment in the Department of Bioethics. She completed her medical school training at Pennsylvania State University and finished her neurology residency and neuroimmunology fellowship at the Cleveland Clinic. She was also awarded a Sylvia Lawry Fellowship grant from the National Multiple Sclerosis Society.

Dr Boissy is currently the Medical Director of the Center of Excellence in Healthcare Communication. Her team has created a comprehensive program to strengthen physician and provider communication skills throughout the Cleveland Clinic. She is also the Experience Officer for the Neurological Institute. She led the Neurological Institute Patient Advisory Council for severeal years and develops programs aimed at improving the experiences of our patients, employees, and staff. Dr Boissy has a unique and compassionate perspective which she incorporates into caring for patients and their family members.

Over the past few years, Dr Boissy increasingly focused on the ethical issues as relates to neurological disease. She served on the Cleveland Clinic Ethics Committee and is the Assistant Clinical Director in the Center for Neuroethics.

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Anita Boles

Consultant, Arts and Health

Anita Boles, MPA, served as executive director of the Global Alliance for Arts & Health (formerly the Society for the Arts in Healthcare) for six years. The Global Alliance is an international membership organization dedicated to advancing the arts and health field for the benefit of individuals and communities worldwide. During her tenure, Boles initiated a plan to better define the organization's role in the growing field and expand resources and programs. In 2009, she helped the Global Alliance launch a professional, peer-reviewed journal, Arts and Health: An International Journal for Research, Policy and Practice (Taylor &Francis). Serving as co-chair of the National Initiative for Arts & Health in the Military, Boles continues to work with partner organizations to launch a national effort to improve the availability of arts interventions for our service men and women and their families, and integrate the arts as part of the "Standard of Care" in military clinical sites (VA and military hospitals) as well as programs in community settings across the country.

Prior to her position at the Global Alliance, Boles served for over 25 years as an executive in health and human service–related nonprofit and government agencies, including those addressing arts in healthcare, health literacy, maternal and child health, and crime victimization and victim assistance. She has authored or co-authored publications on such issues as improving community responsiveness towards crime victims, cultural considerations in assisting victims of sexual assault and physical abuse, health concerns during pregnancy, and numerous topics related to arts and health. Also a visual artist, she is passionate about approaching health and healing creatively by bringing the arts to people at key moments of their lives.

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Marc Boom, MD

Chief Executive Officer, The Methodist Hospital System

Marc Boom, MD, currently holds the position of President and CEO of The Methodist Hospital System in Houston, Texas. The Methodist Hospital System is a 1000+ bed hospital network ranked nationally by US News & World Report. Methodist has affiliations with a number of academic institutions that support its teaching and research initiatives. These include Weill Cornell Medical College, New York Presbyterian Hospital, Baylor College of Medicine, University of Houston; Texas A&M and UT-Health Science Center.

Dr. Boom holds a B.S. in Biology with High Honors from the University of Texas at Austin, an M.D. with High Honor from Baylor College of Medicine, and an M.B.A. from The Wharton School of the University of Pennsylvania. He completed a residency in internal medicine at Massachusetts General Hospital, Harvard Medical School, and fellowships in geriatric medicine and general medicine at the Hospital of the University of Pennsylvania. He is board certified in both internal medicine and geriatric medicine, and is a Fellow of the American College of Physicians.

Previously Dr. Boom held the positions of Executive Vice President of The Methodist Hospital, President and CEO of Methodist Diagnostic Hospital and President/CEO/Medical Director of Baylor-Methodist Primary Care Associates, a network of primary care physicians.

Dr. Boom is married to Dr. Julie Boom, a pediatrician at Texas Children's Hospital. Dr. Julie Boom's special interests are in vaccine advocacy and research. Married for over 20 years, the Booms have three children, Kathryn (16), John (13), and Janie (6). They are active members of First Presbyterian Church. Dr. Boom enjoys travel, soccer, gardening, playing the piano and gourmet cooking.

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Linda Bradley, MD

Professor of Surgery,Cleveland Clinic Lerner College of Medicine of Case Western Reserve University / Vice Chair of Obstetrics, Gynecology, and Women's Health Institute, Cleveland Clinic

Linda Bradley, M.D. is Professor of Surgery at the Cleveland Clinic Lerner College of Medicine of Case Western Reserve University and Vice Chair of Obstetrics, Gynecology, and Women's Health Institute at the Cleveland Clinic. She is Director of Hysteroscopic Education for the Residency Program at the Cleveland Clinic Lerner College of Medicine. She is an internationally recognized gynecologic surgeon known for her expertise in diagnostic and operative hysteroscopy, endometrial ablation, alternatives to hysterectomy, hysteroscopic sterilization and the evaluation of abnormal uterine bleeding. Dr. Bradley's clinical work includes Director of the Center for Menstrual Disorders, Fibroids and Hysteroscopic Services. She served on the Board of Governors at the Cleveland Clinic from 2006-2010.

Dr. Bradley specializes in the evaluation, diagnostic testing, and surgery for uterine fibroids and menstrual disorders. She has been very active in endoscopy for over 20 years. Her expertise in endometrial ablation technology makes her an innovative leader in the field of hysterectomy alternatives. She recently was involved in several multi-center clinical trials involving endometrial ablation, uterine fibroid embolization compared to abdominal myomectomy, and hysteroscopic sterilization procedure. She performed one of the first hysteroscopic sterilization procedures in this country in 2000. With over 1000 referrals for uterine fibroid embolization (UFE), she maintains an excellent collaborative practice with the interventional radiology department for a UFE Fibroid Registry database. She has published extensively and presented internationally on this topic.

A gynecologist at the Cleveland Clinic for over 20 years, she has performed over 15,000 office flexible hysteroscopic procedures and over 2,000 operative hysteroscopic procedures including myomectomy, polypectomy, and endometrial ablation.

She has served on the Board of Trustees for the American Association of Gynecologic Laparoscopy (1997-1999) and currently serves as an Advisor for Medscape and Medscape CME. She was Chair of the OB/GYN section of the National Medical Association, 2006-2008. Dr. Bradley served as President, American Association of Gynecologic Laparoscopists (AAGL) in 2010-2011.

Dr. Bradley has been an invited lecturer at more than 1000 local, national and international symposia conferences, and meetings as an honored guest speaker. Additionally, she has performed live telesurgery for many programs. She has published numerous journal articles, book chapters, and continuing medical education films. Most recently, she is a co-author on an authoritative textbook: Hysteroscopy: Office Evaluation and Management of the Uterine Cavity, published by Elsevier, 2009. She is also a contributor to Up-to-Date, an on-line educational service for physicians. Recently she was selected to be an advisor to Medscape.

She has been named as the Cleveland Clinic Foundation Bruce Hubbard Stewart Fellow, which honors physicians with compassion and clinical care. She also received the APGO award, which honors physicians for resident and fellow teaching and has frequently been nominated as "Faculty of the Year". She is admired and respected for her clinical teaching, surgical expertise, and compassionate bedside manner. She has received "Top Doctors of America" award annually since 2002. In 2009, she was selected by Ladies Home Journal as one of the top 6 female physicians in the USA. Linda is proud to be a member of the Department of Obstetrics and Gynecology department at the Cleveland Clinic, Cleveland, Ohio which was ranked 3rd in the country by US News and World Report 2011 and 2012, and number one in Ohio.

Dr. Bradley earned a Bachelor's degree in Biopsychology from Vassar College before attending the University of Cincinnati College of Medicine for her M.D. She completed her residency training at Case Western Reserve University in Cleveland, Ohio. She has completed an executive program in practice management from the Weatherhead School of Business, Case Western Reserve and has completed the Leadership in Healthcare Academy at the Cleveland Clinic.

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Chad Brough

Executive Director, Office of Patient Experience, Cone Health

Chad Brough, the Executive Director of the Office of Patient Experience at Cone Health in Greensboro, NC, has worked in healthcare for more than 20 years. Currently, he has enterprise-wide responsibility for the patient experience at Cone Health.

His leadership experience has included work in community hospitals and in complex health systems with more than 8,000 employees. Chad has provided senior leadership in patient experience, workforce management, talent acquisition, organizational development and hospital operations. Chad has helped hospitals achieve:

• top decile employee and patient satisfaction,
• State quality awards in Indiana and Kentucky, and
• State and National recognition as an employer of choice.

Chad is committed to honoring the vulnerability of all people in need and stands for healthcare organizations that hire-support-encourage & expect caregivers to consistently provide loving care to all. In 1999, Brough was recognized in Louisville's Business First Magazine as one of 40 dynamic business leaders under the age of 40 in the Metropolitan Louisville area. From 2005-2006, Brough served on the Board of Examiners for the Malcolm Baldrige National Quality Award, which is the highest level of national recognition for performance excellence that a U.S. organization can receive.

Chad graduated from Hanover College with a degree in Business Administration, and earned an MBA at Indiana University. He and his wife, Jamie, have two children, Conner and Lilly.

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Janie Burke, MBA, BSN, RN, CPN

Clinical Nursing Director, Cleveland Clinic Children's Hospital

Janie Burke, MBA, BSN, RN, CPN is currently the Clinical Nursing Director for Cleveland Clinic Children's Hospital and Cleveland Clinic Children's Hospital for Rehabilitation. During her 24 years in the nursing profession, she has held various positions in pediatrics as both a staff nurse and in nursing leadership. She obtained her nursing degree from Youngstown State University and a Health Care MBA from Baldwin Wallace University.

Janie currently serves on the Board of Trustees at the Ronald McDonald House and chairs their Family Services Committee.

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Kirste Carlson, DNP, CNS

Member, Caring for Caregivers, Cleveland Clinic

Dr. Carlson has 27 years of experience in nursing and psychotherapy. In her current position, she is a member of the Caring for Caregivers team within the Cleveland Clinic Health System. She is a graduate and faculty member of the Gestalt Institute of Cleveland, Kent State and Case Western Reserve Universities and an advanced student of Developmental Somatic Psychotherapy as well as the martial art of aikido. Dr. Carlson's certifications include Adult Psychiatric and Mental Health Clinical Nurse Specialist from the American Nurses Credentialing Center, Diversity Management from Cleveland State University, and 2nd kyu in aikido.

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Paul Alexander Clark

Founder & CEO, SmartPatient

Inspired by his own experience as a patient over a 20-year period, Paul Clark founded SmartPatient to apply mobile technology to improve the patient experience and strengthen patient-provider relationships.

Prior to SmartPatient, Paul served as Vice President of Research & Education at The Health Management Academy leading a survey benchmarking research agenda and educational development for America's leading health systems.

Previously, Paul developed patient satisfaction improvement solutions as Director of Knowledge Management at Press Ganey Associates, where he led a team of researchers conducting quantitative and qualitative research to determine best practices for improving health care quality. He also managed the Internet presence for the American Association of Pharmaceutical Scientists and launch of two leading peer-reviewed scientific journals.

Paul's extensive patient experience research includes two books, two book chapters, over a dozen peer-reviewed original research articles and hundreds of conferences. Paul serves on the editorial board of the Journal of Hospital Administration and the board of directors of the non-profit Bioethics International.

Paul earned a Bachelor of Arts from the University of Pittsburgh, a Master of Public Administration in Science and Technology Policy from George Mason University, a Master of Arts in Bioethics and Healthcare Policy from the Loyola University Chicago, and a Masters of Healthcare Administration from the University of North Carolina. He is a doctoral candidate in Public Health at Johns Hopkins University and a Fellow in the American College of Healthcare Executives.

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Sue Collier, MSN, RN, NEA-BC

Chief Nursing Officer, Hillcrest Hospital

Sue was tapped to be the Chief Nursing Officer of Hillcrest Hospital in 2011. This year marks Sue's 36th year in Nursing. She spent the first half of her career at Huron Hospital; the next half at South Pointe Hospital; and one year as the Associate Chief Nursing Officer of Care Management, a new enterprise role charged with integrating case management across the Cleveland Clinic hospital system, before coming to Hillcrest. One of the highlights of Sue's career was her participation in the Johnson & Johnson – Wharton Fellows Program in Management for Nurse Executives at the University of Pennsylvania. Sue was proud to receive the "Best of the Best" nurses in Cleveland award, from the Cleveland Plain Dealer in 2001. She's also been recognized as a Woman of Professional Excellence, by the YWCA of Cleveland, Greater Cleveland Women of Achievement. Sue was awarded the Lifetime Achievement Award this year from the Center for Health Affairs, Northeast Ohio Nursing Initiative. Sue graduated from the Huron Road School of Nursing, then went on to earn a BA in English and a BSN from Cleveland State University, and an MSN from Ursuline College, and is now pursuing her Doctor of Nursing Practice at Case Western Reserve University.

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Delos "Toby" Cosgrove, MD

President & Chief Executive Officer
Cleveland Clinic

Delos M. Cosgrove MD, is president and chief executive officer of Cleveland Clinic. As CEO, Dr. Cosgrove presides over a $6 billion healthcare system comprised of the Cleveland Clinic, nine community hospitals, 16 family health and ambulatory surgery centers, Cleveland Clinic Florida, the Lou Ruvo Center for Brain Health in Las Vegas, Nevada, Cleveland Clinic Toronto, and Cleveland Clinic Abu Dhabi. His leadership has emphasized patient care and patient experience, including the re-organization of clinical services into patient-centered, organ and disease-based institutes. He launched major wellness initiatives for patients, employees and communities. Under his leadership, Cleveland Clinic has consistently been named among America's top four hospitals (U.S. News & World Report) and one of only two hospitals named among "America's 99 Most Ethical Companies" (Ethishpere Insitute). Dr. Cosgrove received his medical degree from the University of Virginia School of Medicine in Charlottesville and completed his clinical training at Massachusetts General Hospital, Boston Children's Hospital, and Brook General Hospital in London. His undergraduate work was at Williams College in Williamstown, Massachusetts. He was a surgeon in the U.S. Air Force and served in Da Nang, Republic of Vietnam as the Chief of U.S. Air Force Casualty Staging Flight. He was awarded the Bronze Star and the Republic of Vietnam Commendation Medal. Joining Cleveland Clinic in 1975, Dr. Cosgrove was named chairman of the Department of Thoracic and Cardiovascular surgery in 1989. Under his leadership, Cleveland Clinic's heart program was ranked number one in America for ten years in a row (U.S. News & World Report).

He has published nearly 450 journal articles, book chapters, one book and 17 training and continuing medical education films. He performed more than 22,000 operations and earned an international reputation for expertise in all areas of cardiac surgery, especially valve repair. As an innovator, Dr. Cosgrove has 30 patents filed for developing medical and clinical products used in surgical environments.

Dr. Cosgrove is a sought-after speaker worldwide. He has addressed the World Economic Forum Annual Meeting at Davos, Switzerland, and the Senate Health, Education, Labor and Pensions Committee, in Washington, D.C. He is regularly quoted and featured in national magazines and newspapers, including a cover story in Time, and major articles in Newsweek, the New York Times, and the Washington Post. He has appeared on CNN, Fox, MSNBC, NBC, CBS, "The Charlie Rose Show" on PBS, and other national media outlets.

The recipient of Cleveland Clinic's Master Clinician Award, Innovator of the Year Award and Lerner Humanitarian Award, Dr. Cosgrove is also a member of Cleveland Medical Hall of Fame and Cleveland Business Hall of Fame. In 2007 he was named Cleveland Business Executive of the Year by the Sales and Marketing Executives of Cleveland, and Castle Connolly's National Physician of the Year. He also received the Woodrow Wilson Center Award for Public Service as well as Harvard Business School's Award from HBS Alumni, Cleveland, and the Humanitarian Award of the Diversity Center of Northeast Ohio. Dr. Cosgrove topped Inside Business's "Power 100" listing for Northeast Ohio, and is highly ranked among Modern Healthcare's "100 most powerful people in healthcare" and "most powerful physician executives."

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Brian Donley, MD

President, Lutheran Hospital

Dr. Donley is the President of Lutheran Hospital of the Cleveland Clinic Health System and the Director of the Center for Foot and Ankle within the Orthopaedic and Rheumatologic Institute at the Cleveland Clinic. He joined the Cleveland Clinic in 1996 and has previously served as the Vice Chairman of the Department of Orthopaedics, the Director of the Foot and Ankle fellowship and currently is Chairman of the Professional Conduct Committee for the Cleveland Clinic. Most recently, Dr. Donley served as Vice President of Surgical Operations at Lutheran Hospital prior to becoming President of the Hospital on January 1, 2012. Dr Donley graduated with distinction from the University of Michigan Medical School and performed his undergraduate work at the University of Notre Dame where he graduated Phi Beta Kappa. He serves as an orthopaedic foot and ankle consultant for the Cleveland Browns, Cleveland Indians and the Cleveland Cavaliers. In addition to his clinical responsibilities, Dr Donley is very active with research, education and innovation. He teaches medical students, orthopaedic residents, and orthopaedic foot and ankle fellows. He has published over 75 scientific articles and has made over 200 presentations internationally, nationally and regionally. Dr Donley serves as Editor in Chief of Arthritis Advisor and has served as Assistant Editor for both Foot and Ankle International (FAI) and Knee Surgery Sports Traumatology and Arthroscopy(KSSTA). He also is a previous member of the Board for the American Orthopaedic Foot and Ankle Society. Dr Donley served on the development team for the Salto Talaris ankle replacement and performed the first surgery in the world with this ankle implant at the Cleveland Clinic in 2006. He has 3 patents granted and presently works on the development of a novel intra-osseous minimally invasive implant fixation system for the distal extremities.

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Heidi Crooks, RN, MA

Chief Nursing Officer, UCLA

Current Responsibilities

Ms. Heidi Crooks is currently the senior associate director, operations and patient care services, and chief nurse executive at UCLA Health System in Los Angeles, CA,. She reports to the CEO UCLA Health System and is responsible for patient services at Ronald Reagan UCLA Medical Center Westwood, Santa Monica/UCLA Medical Center and Orthopedic Hospital, and Resnick Neuropsychiatric Hospital at UCLA. As senior associate director of the medical center, Ms. Crooks serves as a member of the Senior Executive Team and principal advisor to the associate vice chancellor in all matters pertaining to nursing and patient care. Ms. Crooks is also the assistant dean of the UCLA School of Nursing in Los Angeles, CA.

Prior Experience

From 1980-1989, Ms. Crooks served as vice president for nursing at the Michael Reese Hospital and Medical Center in Chicago, IL. Prior to this role, she was the assistant administrator and director of nursing at St. John's Hospital in Oxnard, CA and assistant director of community health nursing at Multnomah County Division of Health in Portland, OR. She began her career as a staff nurse at Helsinki University Hospital in Helsinki, Finland on the Dialysis/Renal Transplant Unit. She was also a public health nurse in the Nigerian Red Cross in Nigeria and Matron at Emmanuel Hospital in Eket, South Eastern State, Nigeria. Education, Awards and Professional Affiliations

Ms. Crooks attended the University of Washington School of Nursing, Seattle, WA, where she obtained an M.A. in nursing administration, with a minor in public health and health care administration. She also attended the University of Turku, Turku, Finland, where she obtained an approbatur in sociology, educational psychology, political science and economics. She attended Turku College of Nursing, Turku, Finland for public health administration and nursing service administration. Ms. Crooks received her nursing diploma and public health nurse practitioner training at Helsinki Swedish College of Nursing, Helsinki, Finland. She has taken additional course work in health systems management at Harvard School of Public Health, Boston, MA and Yale School of Organization and Management, Hartford, CT.

Ms. Crooks is an active member of the American Nursing Association, the American Organization of Nurse Executives, the American Public Health Association, and the California Nurses Association. She is a current member of Sigma Theta Tau National Honor Society of Nursing. She received the "Most Innovative Patient Focused Care Award" from the Hospital Council of Southern California in 1994 and the 2001 Caregiver of the Year Award.

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Janet Cross, MEd, CCLS

Director of Patient & Family Centered Care, Monroe Carell Jr. Children's Hospital at Vanderbilt

Janet Cross is the Director of Patient- and Family-Centered Care at the Monroe Carell Jr. Children's Hospital at Vanderbilt. She is responsible for oversight of patient- and family-centered care initiatives and oversight of Child Life Services, Volunteer Services, Pastoral Care, Family Resource Center, Hospital School Program, Music Therapy, Art Therapy, Patient and Family Advisory Councils and Patient Education. Janet obtained her Master of Education from Vanderbilt University and her Bachelor's degree from Mississippi State University. She is a certified Child Life Specialist through the Child Life Council, Inc. Janet was awarded the 2012 Distinguished Service Award from the Child Life Council, is the recipient of the 2011 Judy Koonce Family-Centered Care Award, and was named a finalist as a "Woman of Influence" by the Nashville Business Journal in 2012.

For the Child Life Council, she served as chair for the Child Life Certifying Committee (1996-98). From 2007 to 2009, she served in the roles of President-Elect, President, and Immediate-Past President. She chaired the Nashville Conference Host Committee in 2005, and has been a member of a wide array of CLC committees and task forces over the years, including the Ethics Committee and Governance Task Force. She is one of five leaders selected as a program reviewer for the CLC Program Review and Development Service. Janet's written contributions to the child life field include a chapter on child life administration in Richard Thompson's Handbook of Child Life (2009). She is also a member of the Nashville Ronald McDonald House Corporate Board.

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Susan Dentzer

Former Editor-in-Chief, Health Affairs
Senior Policy Adviser, Robert Wood Johnson Foundation

Susan Dentzer is Senior Policy Adviser of the Robert Wood Johnson Foundation, the nation's largest health and health care philanthropy, based in Princeton, New Jersey. In this role, she works closely with foundation leaders to improve the health and health care of all Americans. One of the nation's most respected health and health policy thought leaders and journalists, she is also an on-air analyst on health issues on the PBS NewsHour.

Dentzer is an elected member of the Institute of Medicine and the Council on Foreign Relations, and a fellow of both the National Academy of Social Insurance, a nonprofit, nonpartisan organization made up of the nation's leading experts on social insurance, and a fellow of the Hastings Center, a institution dedicated to bioethics and the public interest. She is also a public trustee of the American Board of Medical Specialties, the not-for-profit organization that oversees 24 approved medical specialty boards in setting standards for board certification and maintenance of certification for the nation's physicians.

Dentzer is a frequent guest and commentator on such National Public Radio shows as This American Life and The Diane Rehm Show. From May 2008 to April 2013, Dentzer was the Editor-in-Chief of Health Affairs, the nation's leading journal of health policy. Prior to joining the journal, she was on-air correspondent on health and health policy for the PBS NewsHour with Jim Lehrer. She was formerly chief economics correspondent and economics columnist for US News & World Report and a senior writer for Newsweek.

Dentzer is a member of the board of directors of Research!America, which advocates for increased US investment in biomedical research. She is also a member of the Board of Overseers of the International Rescue Committee, a humanitarian organization providing relief to refugees and displaced persons around the world. She chairs the IRC board's Program Committee, which oversees the organization's activities in resettling refugees in the United States and in dealing with refugees and displaced persons in roughly 25 countries. Dentzer has served on IRC commissions examining the problems of domestic violence against women in West Africa and, in 2007, the situation of Iraqi refugees in Syria and Jordan.

A graduate of Dartmouth and holder of an honorary master of arts from the institution, Ms. Dentzer is a Dartmouth trustee emerita and chaired the Dartmouth Board of Trustees from 2001 to 2004. She serves on the Board of Overseers of Dartmouth Medical School. 


Dentzer, her husband and their three children live in the Washington, DC area.

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Marilyn Dubree, MSN, RN, NE-BC

Executive Chief Nursing Officer, Vanderbilt University
Medical Center

Ms. Dubree is the executive chief nursing officer for Vanderbilt University Medical Center providing oversight for strategic initiatives and planning related to the provision of quality patient care for Vanderbilt University Hospitals and Clinics. She also serves as associate dean for Clinical Practice for Vanderbilt University School of Nursing. Ms. Dubree is a member of the Clinical Enterprise Executive Committee which has oversight for strategic direction and planning for the medical center. Under Ms. Dubree's leadership, Vanderbilt became the only Magnet designated medical center in middle Tennessee. Magnet designation is the highest achievement an organization can attain in recognition of caliber of the nursing staff and what that professionalism means in terms of patient care and health care services to the community.

Ms. Dubree has been at Vanderbilt University Medical Center since 1976. Prior to this she worked in clinical positions in Kentucky and in Georgia. Since her arrival at VUMC, she has held positions as Clinical Nurse Specialist, Director of Surgical Nursing, Director of Operational Improvement, Associate Hospital Director and CNO, and her current position as Executive Chief Nursing Officer. She also serves as Associate Dean for Clinical Practice for Vanderbilt University School of Nursing. She is widely recognized for her leadership in nursing and healthcare, she is a board certified nurse executive through the American Nurses Credentialing Center.

Ms. Dubree earned her Masters Degree in Nursing from Vanderbilt University, her Baccalaureate degree from the Medical College of Georgia and her ADN from Western Kentucky University.

Ms. Dubree is a Wharton Nurse Executive Fellow, a member of the American Nurses' Association, Tennessee Nurses' Association, American Organization of Nurse Executives, and Sigma Theta Tau. She was also appointed by Governor Phillip Bredesen to the Tennessee Board of Nursing. Ms. Dubree serves on the board of directors of Special Olympics, Middle Tennessee Girl Scouts and Renewal House.

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Ioan Duca, MSA, BSA

Healthcare Consulting Partner Press Ganey Associates Inc.

Ioan Duca serves as a Press Ganey Associates Inc. Consulting Partner focusing on process improvement, health services enhancement and patient experience strategy. Duca has extensive expertise to work closely with clients to apply diagnostic assessment and deep analytics, identify critical operations factors, and design the unique approach and strategic plans to drive and implement change.

Duca has a MSA in Healthcare Administration from the Central Michigan University, and a BAS in Interdisciplinary Studies from the Dallas Baptist University. A defining element of Duca's career has been his emphasis on teamwork. According to Duca, "Teamwork is the key to everything; great teamwork depends on the effective practice of diversity, professionalism, and mutual respect".

Prior to joining Press Ganey, Duca led a dramatic transformation of The University of Toledo Medical Center as its Chief Experience Officer. During his tenure, UTMC won the Press Ganey "National Success Story of the Year Award" and was named "Best Hospital in the Region" by U.S. News & World Report. UTMC also experienced its best ever Joint Commission accreditation survey during that time.

Duca also worked as the corporate director of service excellence at Oakwood Healthcare System and has extensive background in the hospitality industry. Having held senior leadership positions with leading customer service organizations such as the Hilton Hotels & Resorts, The Ritz Carlton and the Marriott Hotels & Resorts, Duca has transitioned his expertise to the healthcare arena to lead successful cultural transformations within healthcare organizations.

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Rick Evans, MA

Senior Director, Service, Massachusetts General Hospital

Rick Evans is the Senior Director for Service at the Massachusetts General Hospital and Massachusetts General Physicians Organization in Boston, MA, where he coordinates the organization's effort to improve the patient experience. He also has responsibility for the organization's Referral Management Office, the Physician Leadership Program and the Visitor Education Program.

Prior to coming to MGH, Rick served as the Vice-President of Support Services and Patient Centered Care for NewYork-Presbyterian Hospital, where he oversaw support services functions including housekeeping, food service, patient escort and laundry departments and where he also led the organization's successful strategy to improve the patient experience called "We Put Patients First."

Prior to joining NYP, Rick served as the Vice-President of Mission Services for the Bon Secours and Canterbury Partnership for Care in Hudson County, New Jersey and also as the Director of the St. Francis Hospital Foundation in Wilmington, Delaware. He also served in leadership roles in local and national not-for-profit organizations before moving into healthcare.

Rick holds a Masters Degree in Theology from Christ the King Seminary in East Aurora, NY and a Bachelor's Degree in Philosophy from Wadhams Hall Seminary College in Ogdensburg, NY.

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Iva Fattorini, MD

Chair, Global Arts and Medicine Institute, Cleveland Clinic

Iva Fattorini, MD, M.Sc. is Chair of Global Arts & Medicine Institute at Cleveland Clinic. Dr. Fattorini received her M.D. at the University of Zagreb Medical School in Zagreb, Croatia. She undertook postgraduate study in Biology and Biomedicine at the University of Zagreb, and received a Master of Science there. Dr. Fattorini completed her residency in Dermatology at the University of Zagreb Hospital Center. She completed the International Training Program at the Department of Dermatology at Harvard Medical School in Boston, Massachusetts. Dr. Fattorini was also a visiting physician at Virginia Mason Medical Center and University of Washington in Seattle, Washington. Dr. Fattorini specialized in the use of lasers in Cosmetic Dermatology and served as Director of the Laser Center at the University Hospital in Zagreb. Since coming to Cleveland Clinic in 2004 and until her appointment as Chair, Arts & Medicine Institute, Dr. Fattorini has served as Executive Director of Arts & Medicine Institute and Director of International eHealth. At Cleveland Clinic, she was also involved in initiatives related to international patients, wellness programs, and arts & cultural activities. Dr. Fattorini is an arts and music enthusiast and is committed to incorporating these into the medical environment. Dr. Fattorini currently resides in Abu Dhabi, building an international arts and medicine global landscape, as well as continuing the expansion of domestic programs.

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Jennifer Fragapane

Senior Director, Patient & Provider Relations
Office of Patient Experience, Cleveland Clinic

Patient & Provider Relations was created within the Office of Patient Experience in 2012 to ensure that referring physicians and designated patients have a simple, seamless experience when interacting with Cleveland Clinic. Under the leadership of Jennifer Fragapane, the Referring Physician Center, Ombudsman, and Patient Facilitated Services teams aim to deliver exceptional service that is inherent to the Office of Patient Experience. Key functions of the group include relationship management, ease of access, visit support and post-visit communication. When service issues arise, the group conducts thorough investigations and enacts clear resolutions to ensure Cleveland Clinic is continually bettering our health system for future patients and providers.

Jen has been with Cleveland Clinic for three years. Prior to joining Cleveland Clinic, she spent 10 years in the medical device industry leading global healthcare operations with a focus on change management and process simplification. In addition, she has had various consulting roles focused on business transformation and enterprise program management for global companies.

Jen received a Bachelor's degree in Business Administration from Georgetown University and a Master's degree in Management from MIT's Sloan School of Management. She is also a certified Six Sigma Black Belt.

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David Feinberg, MD

Chief Executive Officer, UCLA Hospital System

Dr. David T. Feinberg was appointed President of UCLA Health System effective July 1, 2011. As President, Dr. Feinberg oversees all aspects of UCLA Health System, which includes the campuses of UCLA Hospital System -- Ronald Reagan UCLA Medical Center, Stewart and Lynda Resnick Neuropsychiatric Hospital and Mattel Children's Hospital UCLA in Westwood and UCLA Medical Center, Santa Monica – as well as the UCLA Faculty Practice Group. More than 80,000 patients are treated each year in UCLA hospitals, which are consistently ranked among the top in the nation by U.S.News & World Report, and 1.5 million are seen in the more than 80 community-based clinics of the UCLA Faculty Practice Group.

In addition to his role as President, Dr. Feinberg has been CEO and Associate Vice Chancellor since 2007, after having served as Medical Director of the Resnick Neuropsychiatric Hospital and head of the NPH Faculty Practice Group. Dr. Feinberg also is a Clinical Professor of Psychiatry on the faculty of the David Geffen School of Medicine at UCLA.

Along with his commitment to upholding the highest clinical standards for patient care and safety, Dr. Feinberg's primary goal is to ensure patient satisfaction. Under his leadership, patient satisfaction has increased dramatically, and stands in the 99th percentile in many areas, according to independent national surveys.

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Debbie Fischer, BSc, MHA, CHRP, ICD.D

Senior Vice President Strategy and Organizational Development, Mt. Sinai Hospital

Debbie Fischer is SVP, Strategy and Organizational Development at Mount Sinai Hospital. In her current role, she is responsible for the organizational development, diversity, diagnostic, corporate planning, communications and marketing and community partnerships departments. While continuing to maintain an active role at Mount Sinai she took a three - year secondment to Ontario's Ministry of Health and Long-Term Care as Assistant Deputy Minister, Transition to lead a major transformation initiative of the entire Ministry. Previously, Debbie held a number of senior positions in international professional services firms including Ernst and Young where she was part of the Health Care and Life Sciences Group and led strategic projects in the health care, biotechnology and pharmaceutical industry. She has extensive experience in strategy, organizational development and leadership, restructuring and integration, performance improvement and change management. She has led innovative transformations in both the health care and corporate sectors.

Debbie is currently Chair of Plexxus, a member organization which undertakes back office shared services for major hospitals in Toronto and a Board member of the Ontario Centres of Excellence Inc. She is also a member of the Genetics Secretariat, an organization representing the key constituents involved in genetics in Ontario.

Debbie has a BSc (Neurobiology and Comparative Physiology) from McGill University and MHA from the University of Ottawa. She also holds a CHRP designation and an ICD.D designation from the Institute of Corporate Directors.

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Michelle Frietchen, BBA, MA

Manager, Market Research, Cleveland Clinic

Michelle has worked at Cleveland Clinic, one of the largest and most reputable health systems in the nation, for 20 years in the Market Research & Analytics Department. In her role, she has managed the Market Research Department since 2001 and has been involved in strategic initiatives such as improving the patient experience, business development and branding. Michelle holds a bachelor's degree in Marketing and Quantitative Business Analysis and a master's degree in Consumer / Industrial Research.

Michelle is versed in both qualitative and quantitative research methodologies, including ethnography with physicians, consumers, patients, employees and key stakeholders. She is a professionally trained focus group moderator and has moderated more than 100 focus groups and one-on-one in depth interviews for a range of service lines and business units, from new concept testing to branding research to patient satisfaction research. Michelle has also conducted several positioning, advertising tracking and image & awareness studies.

Cleveland Clinic supports 8 community hospitals, 18 family health centers in the local market as well as facilities in Florida, Las Vegas, Canada and Abu Dhabi. Michelle consults for several internal areas within Cleveland Clinic, such as Operations and the Office of Patient Experience. She also serves on multiple committees within the Cleveland Clinic and is the Co-Chair of Women in Search of Excellence (WISE), an Employee Resource Group which strives to provide opportunities for personal and professional growth for Cleveland Clinic female caregivers.

Michelle is on the board of a Marketing Insight Management course at Case Western Reserve University, in which she guest lectures and aides the students with case studies and presentations. Additionally, Michelle mentors and lectures at the Edge Fellows Summer Intern Program, which unites MBA students from local colleges and business leaders to explore new business ideas.

Michelle, her husband and two daughters reside in Brunswick Ohio.

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Cindy Hundorfean

Chief Administrative Officer, Clinical Services
Cleveland Clinic

Ms. Hundorfean is a healthcare executive with over 30 years of diverse experience in hospital management, group practice management, strategic planning, system integration, physician acquisition and integration, acute and ambulatory start ups, corporate quality/safety, patient experience, business development, employee engagement, diversity, and leadership development.
She has direct responsibility for the administrative, operational and financial activities for 28 institutes which encompasses over 100 sites and 20,000 employees. This includes oversight of 16 Family Health Centers and all regional physician office sites. Clinical volume includes over 4.2 million patient visits/year, 53,000 hospital admissions and 81,000 surgical cases. In her role, she is responsible for hiring the senior administrative leaders for the Clinical Institutes and organizing leadership development activities and succession planning.

She is also responsible for physician acquisition and integration activities for the Cleveland Clinic Health System.

Ms. Hundorfean oversees patient access into the Cleveland Clinic Health System, including direct responsibility for the Cleveland Clinic Appointment Center, where patient appointments are made.

She is involved in physician recruitment and responsible for the development and management of recruitment packages for senior physician leadership positions.

Ms. Hundorfean holds a BS in Healthcare Management from Robert Myers College and an sMBA from the Weatherhead School of Management at Case Western Reserve University.

Ms. Hundorfean is a member of the American College of Healthcare Executives, the American Hospital Association and the Medical Group Management Association. In addition, she is a Board Member of the Hospice of the Western Reserve.

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Cynthia Galbincea

Executive Director, Marketing Communications, Cleveland Clinic

Cynthia Galbincea is the Executive Director of Marketing Communications at Cleveland Clinic. She leads advertising, branding, digital marketing, sports marketing, print content and video production. She has launched major national advertising campaigns for Cleveland Clinic, and oversees all internet initiatives, including an award-winning website, health features blog, and integrated social media presence. Cynthia also manages Cleveland Clinic's affiliations with NFL, NBA and MLB teams, and oversees content, design and production for print marketing. She is a speaker, presenter and panelist at professional meetings and symposia nationwide.

Cynthia came to Cleveland Clinic from General Electric Corporation, where she was vice president of Global Advertising and Branding for GE Money. Her career portfolio includes marketing and advertising positions at GE lighting, Johnson & Johnson, and Ogilvy & Mather.

A cum laude graduate of Williams College in Williamstown, Massachusetts, Cynthia Galbincea holds a master's degree in International Affairs and Public Policy from Columbia University in the City of New York. She lives in Shaker Heights, Ohio, with her husband Steve and daughter Holly. .

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Julia Gometz

Founder, The Brandful™ Workforce

Julia Gometz is a global thought leader and practitioner in people strategy. Her focus is "How can employees best contribute to bottom-line business results?" She recently founded The Brandful™ Workforce, a company that provides expertise to organizations on how a workforce can work "for" the brand, rather than "against" it. Her book, The Brandful™ Workforce, introduces a first-ever roadmap for organizations on how to create and sustain the brand internally. It also inspires individuals to be part of an organization whose products or services truly match their passions.

Prior to her current venture, Julia successfully built and led three critical People functions at JetBlue Airways over her eight year tenure: Employee Relations, People Analytics and Employee Engagement. An expert in making people the top competitive advantage for any organization, she has collaborated with colleagues at Fortune 100 and Fortune 500 companies, as well as public and nonprofit organizations. Julia is an accomplished speaker engaging audiences internationally on the topic of people strategy.

Julia received a B.A. in International Relations from Emory University and is fluent in both French and Spanish. She received her Master's degree in Conflict Analysis and Resolution from George Mason University. Previously, she worked in Equity Research at Morgan Stanley and served as a mediator and arbitrator on Wall Street. Julia lives in Forest Hills, New York with her husband and four children.

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Suzanne Gordon

Journalist  /  Author  /  Patient Safety Advocate

Suzanne Gordon is an award winning journalist and author who writes about healthcare delivery and health care systems. Her 15 books include, Nursing Against the Odds: How Healthcare Cost-Cutting, Medical Hubris, and Media Stereotypes Undermine Nurses and Patient Care and Safety in Numbers: Nurse Staffing Ratios and the Future of Healthcare. In the spring of 2012, Cornell University Press published her book, co-edited with Ross Koppel, entitled First Do Less Harm: Confronting Inconvenient Problems in Patient Safety. Her latest book is Beyond the Checklist: What Else Healthcare Can Learn from Aviation Safety and Teamwork. Beyond the Checklist was written with pilot Parick Mendenhall and medical educator, Bonnie O'Connor. Captain Chesley "Sully" Sullenberger wrote the foreword.

Ms. Gordon's books on healthcare have been published by the Culture and Politics of Healthcare Work Series at Cornell University Press, which she co-edits. She has been a radio commentator for CBS Radio and National Public Radio's Marketplace. Her articles have appeared in Harper's, The Atlantic, The New York Times Magazine, The Boston Globe, The New York Times, the Los Angeles Times, the Toronto Globe and Mail, and many others.

In the course of doing her work on teamwork in healthcare, she developed the concept of Team Intelligence and does consulting and training on teamwork in healthcare all over the world.

She is co-author of the play about team relationships in healthcare entitled Bedside Manners. The play has been performed at numerous venues included the Institute for Healthcare Improvement, The Hospital of the University of Pennsylvania, Cedars Sinai Medical Center, and is being used in Interprofessional Education programs in the US and Canada, including the University of Tortonto and The University of California at San Francisco. The play and accompanying workbook will be published by Cornell University in the fall of 20112.

Ms. Gordon Ms. Gordon has lectured all over the world on healthcare issues and has appeared frequently on radio and television. She is also a Visiting Professor at the University of Maryland School of Nursing and Assistant Adjunct Professor at the University of California at San Francisco School of Nursing. She is also an Affiliated Scholar at the Wilson Centre at the University of Toronto's Faculty of Medicine and at the Center for Innovation in Interprofessional Education at UCSF. She is an editorial board member of the Journal of Interprofessional Care.

Ms. Gordon is at work on a new book on how to create and sustain Team Intelligence in Healthcare with sociologist and IPE expert Scott Reeves and with physician and former patient safety officer David Feldman, she is editing a book of team stories in healthcare.

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Jeanette Hodge

Director, Guest and Volunteer Services,
Yale - New Haven Hospital

Jeannette Hodge is the Director of Patient Relations, Volunteer and Guest Services at Yale-New Haven Hospital. With more than 35 years experience as a professional administrator of volunteer programs and working in the field of advocacy, Ms. Hodge has been responsible for the creation of many patient and family centered services since her arrival at Yale-New Haven Hospital in 1992.

In her role at Yale-New Haven, Ms. Hodge is responsible for the five operational departments within the patient experience structure, including the Volunteer Services Department. Yale-New Haven Hospital has one of the first organized hospital volunteer services departments to be structured with professional leadership. Yale-New Haven Hospital recently acquired The Hospital of Saint Raphael and is now the fifth largest hospital in the US, with more than 2000 volunteers annually. Yale-New Haven Hospital has many innovative volunteer programs that focus on improving the patient experience.

Ms. Hodge is a graduate of West Virginia Wesleyan College and also holds certification in volunteer administration.

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Judy Jourdan, MSA, OTR

Rehabilitation Manager, Memorial Home Care

With over 30 years of experience as an occupational therapist, Judy has committed the last 17 years to growing programs and improving the patient experience at Memorial Home Care. As an author and international educator, Judy has combined her background in clinical practice with years of leadership positions to become a driving force behind Memorial Home Care's multiple achievements, including named to the Home Care Elite for the past three consecutive years, ranked among the top 5% of Home Health Providers in the country for 2012, receiving Press Ganey's 2010 Success Story and the 2007 OCS Vision Award. Judy earned her Master of Science in Administration from the University of Notre Dame and her Bachelor's degree in Occupational Therapy from Indiana University.

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K. Kelly Hancock, MSN, RN, NE-BC

Executive Chief Nursing Officer, CCHS and Chief Nursing Officer, Cleveland Clinic Main Campus

K. Kelly Hancock is Chief Nursing Officer, CCHS and Chief Nursing Officer, Main Campus. She oversees the Chief Nursing Officers at Cleveland Clinic's ten regional hospitals and Cleveland Clinic Florida, along with currently serving as Chief Nursing Officer at Cleveland Clinic's Main Campus since July 2011. She is responsible for directing the clinical, academic and operational activities of the nursing staff throughout the health system, as well as the focus of nursing throughout the various institutes on the main campus. She administers and directs nursing integration and operations, as well as the financial, regulatory and business activities throughout the Nursing Institute. Prior to her position, Kelly served as the Chief Nursing Officer at Main Campus. She has simultaneously been the Senior Nursing Director of Critical Care and the Nursing Director of the Heart and Vascular Institute, where she led the nursing practice in the Heart and Vascular Institute for seven years. During that time the Heart and Vascular Institute was selected #1 in Cardiac Care for 17 consecutive years by the US News and World Report. Kelly's 20 years of nursing experience began at the Cleveland Clinic, where she continues to dedicate excellence, professionalism, and compassion to the nursing profession. She provides a strong administrative and clinical atmosphere that promotes staff education, staff development, and cohesion between all disciplines, professional nursing care and world class patient care throughout the health system.

Kelly obtained her MSN from Breen School of Nursing at Ursuline College in Pepper Pike, Ohio. She is a board certified Nurse Executive through the American Nurse Credentialing Center, a member of the American Organization of Nurse Executive , the American Association of Critical Care Nurses, and the Honor Society of Nursing - Sigma Theta Tau International. Kelly was awarded the ANCC Circle of Excellence Award in 2012, the 2010 Maria and Sam Miller Professional Excellence Nurse of the Year Award, is a recipient of the "Bruce Hubbard Stewart Fellow Award," and was awarded "The Abbie Porter Leadership Award" which highlights Nursing Leadership in 2002 and 2009.

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Barb Johnson, RN

Director, Healing Services
Cleveland Clinic

Barb Johnson is a registered nurse with a passion for creating the best possible patient experience and work environment for her Caregiver colleagues, patients and their families. Spending the majority of her career at Cleveland Clinic, beginning in 1994, she has a history of providing care as a staff nurse for Neurology/Neurosurgery, Medical Surgical Telemetry VIP as well as being a Quality and Accreditation Nurse and Quality Manager before embarking on a new vein in her career.

In 2009 she was the first Nurse Coordinator for the newly established Healing Services team providing holistic care experiences for patients, family members and staff; becoming the director in late 2010. With training such as Healing Touch, Reiki, holistic nursing and holistic stress management, Barb provides not only service to her team as a leader and mentor but also as Caregiver to the Cleveland Clinic Caregiver teams by providing training enhancement such as "Non Pharmacologic Pain Management", "Self Care for the Care giver", "Holistic approach to HS care rounding" and many more educational opportunities.

Currently Barb leads and continues to develop the Healing Services and Code Lavender team. Her passion is not only to provide a patient experience which addresses the whole person as well as their families, but to also educate and support the caregivers in their roles and workplace about self care, holistic practice and healing modalities which may enhance their own well being as well as their patient's.


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Maria Jukic, JD

Executive Director, Arts and Medicine, Cleveland Clinic

Maria Jukic, JD, is Executive Director, Arts & Medicine at Cleveland Clinic. She has worked in the Arts & Medicine Institute with Dr. Iva Fattorini since its creation in 2008. She is involved in the growth and development of the Institute including program development, administration, and strategic planning. She oversees the music therapy and art therapy programs, as well as the performing arts, research and community relations.

Ms. Jukic received a Bachelor of Arts degree, cum laude, from the University of Notre Dame. She has a Certificate in Nonprofit Management from the Weatherhead School of Management at Case Western Reserve University. She received a Juris Doctor, magna cum laude, from Cleveland-Marshall College of Law. Ms. Jukic was a Fulbright Fellowship recipient in 1992.

Ms. Jukic has pursued a career in nonprofit administration for the last twenty years including international humanitarian aid, community relations, and most recently, in healthcare, where she served as a hospital marketing and public relations director prior to joining the Cleveland Clinic Arts & Medicine Institute.

Ms. Jukic has presented at various meetings including at the Society for the Arts in Healthcare; the American Association of Medical Administrators, and Mozart and Science, the 3rd International Congress for the interdisciplinary research on the effects and the experiences of music, in Krems, Austria.

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Carmen Kestranek

Senior Director of Intelligence, Office of Patient Experience, Cleveland Clinic

Carmen Kestranek is the Senior Director of Intelligence within the Office of Patient Experience at Cleveland Clinic. Within this role he and his team support the administration of surveys and dissemination of survey results throughout the 11 hospital health system. Furthermore, Carmen oversees research activities merging administrative, clinical and perception of care measures to discover key drivers or levers of care associated with reported patient experiences. These findings are used to guide efforts to improve specific aspects of patient care.

Carmen has worked at Cleveland Clinic for 15 years in numerous administrative positions including most recently as the administrator of a 13 physician regional orthopaedics and rehabilitation department. He attended The Pennsylvania State University where he received a Bachelor of Science degree in Health Policy and Administration and later attended the David Myers University where he achieved his MBA.

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Scott Knoer, MS, PharmD, FASHP

Chief Pharmacy Officer, Cleveland Clinic

Scott J. Knoer, M.S., Pharm.D., FASHP is the Chief Pharmacy Officer at the Cleveland Clinic where he is responsible for all pharmacy services at twelve hospitals, 17 family health centers and 17 retail pharmacies in Northeast Ohio, Weston, Florida and Abu Dhabi, United Arab Emirates. He is also responsible for medication use at the Cleveland Clinic Lou Ruvo center for brain research in Las Vegas, NV and the Cleveland Clinic wellness center in Toronto, Ontario, Canada. Dr. Knoer leads a department with a half billion dollar drug budget and 750 pharmacy Full Time Equivalents (FTEs) across the Cleveland Clinic pharmacy enterprise.

Before coming to Cleveland, Dr. Knoer led pharmacy services at the University of Minnesota Medical Center for a decade.

Dr. Knoer received his B.A. in psychology from Creighton University and his Pharm.D. from the University of Nebraska. He completed a two year administrative residency and received an M.S. degree in hospital pharmacy from the University of Kansas. Doctor Knoer was installed as an ASHP Fellow in 2012.

Dr. Knoer is a past chair of the American Society of Health‐System Pharmacists (ASHP) Practice Managers Section where he also served as Director‐at‐Large. He has served in the ASHP House of Delegates, as Chair of the Section Advisory Group on Leadership Development, as a member of ASHP's Commission on Affiliate Relations and on a number of ASHP task forces and specialty panels. Dr. Knoer also serves as Executive Committee Member at Large for the Pharmacy Council of the University Health‐System Consortium (UHC). Dr. Knoer has served in multiple capacities in local and state affiliate affiliates in Minnesota, Texas and Ohio. Dr. Knoer has published a variety of articles related to the pharmacy practice model, leadership development, pharmacy management, process improvement and benchmarking. Dr. Knoer is a frequent invited lecturer. He has presented to nearly 100 local, state, national and international audiences in the United States, Canada, Abu Dhabi, United Arab Emirates and Saudi Arabia on a broad variety of topics including change management, pharmacy operations and automation, process improvement, leadership development and disaster preparedness.

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Kathryn Kraft Leonhardt, MD, MPH

Vice President, Patient Experience and Patient Safety
Aurora Health Care

Kathy Leonhardt, MD, MPH, is the Vice President, Patient Experience and Patient Safety at Aurora Health Care, a large integrated health system in eastern Wisconsin. Her research and publications have included epidemiologic investigations, clinical trials, quality improvement, patient safety and patient experience. Research topics have included patient-and family- centered care, women's health, medication safety, and infection prevention in both ambulatory and hospital settings. She was the Principal Investigator and author of an AHRQ- funded guide on patient advisory councils. Dr. Leonhardt is a preventive medicine/public health physician, with a BA from Williams College, an MD from the University of Michigan and an MPH in Epidemiology from the University of California- Berkeley.

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Sanjay Malaviya

Chief Executive Officer, RL Solutions

Sanjay Malaviya is President and CEO of RL Solutions, a Toronto based patient safety software company. Since founding the organization in 1997, he has transformed it from a one product company born out of a hospital IT department, to a leading provider of risk management, patient feedback, claims management and infection surveillance software to over 1,100 healthcare organizations around the world.

Sanjay's continued leadership and vision has been instrumental to the growth of RL Solutions, culminating with an exclusive endorsement from the American Hospital Association for the company's incident management solution, RL6:Risk, as well as 9 of the top 10 hospitals in the US counting themselves as RL Solutions clients.

A graduate of the University of Waterloo, Sanjay has leveraged both his degree in Computer Engineering, as well as his almost decade of experience in a hospital setting, to offer a truly unique perspective on healthcare IT. To this day, he continues to be driven by his passion for making healthcare software not only cutting-edge, but also intuitive and easy to use for even the most casual user.

While guiding the company to more than ten consecutive years of profitability, Sanjay has never lost focus on the importance of positive employee engagement. In addition to implementing concepts such as unlimited vacation for all staff, Sanjay's leadership has resulted in RL Solutions being named one of the best employers in Canada for three years running.

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Paul Matsen

Chief Marketing Officer, Cleveland Clinic

Paul Matsen joined the Cleveland Clinic in 2006. He is responsible for all marketing and communications programs at the Cleveland Clinic including global development of the brand, marketing of key clinical lines of service, regional and international locations and digital marketing. Paul also leads employee communications and public relations.

Prior to joining the Cleveland Clinic, Paul was most recently the Executive Vice President and Chief Marketing Officer of Delta Air Lines. At Delta, his accomplishments included the launch of the airline's first website, the launch of the SkyMiles frequent flyer program and the joint Delta/American Express credit card. He played a pivotal role in creating one of the leading airline alliances, SkyTeam, which included partners such as Air France, Continental and KLM Royal Dutch Airlines.

Paul began his career in New York working at a number of leading advertising agencies, including Grey and Young & Rubicam. Paul is a graduate of Rutgers University and is active in the community serving as a member of the Board of Trustees of Hathaway Brown School and Positively Cleveland. He resides in Shaker Heights with his wife, Leslie, and their three daughters.

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Marquita L. Rockamore, BA, GCDF

Program Manager, Job Link Services
Cuyahoga Community College

Marquita Rockamore, a program manager in the college's Workforce and Economic Development Division (WEDD) has more than 12 years of experience in workforce development in governmental and higher education sectors. In her position as a member of the Job Link Services team, she focuses on employer engagement to ensure that workforce training graduates make the connection to full-time unsubsidized employment at an 80% placement rate. Rockamore is also a lead trainer for various job readiness courses that prepare individuals specifically for employment in Healthcare and IT. Her experience of than 13 years as a licensed social worker and 10 years in behavioral health has been beneficial in developing curriculum and programs designed to help job seekers modify behaviors to job retention and career advancement. Prior to her work in workforce development, Rockamore put herself through college as a sitter in long-term and acute-care setting and as a home health aide serving clients of all ages. She currently trains students in WEDD's healthcare programs to mitigate barriers to successful employment.

In her spare time, Rockamore lends her talents to assisting ecumenical organizations in grant writing and establishing outreach ministries to support those with chemical dependencies. She holds a BA in Sociology from the University of Akron and is a Certified Global Career Development Facilitator. Rockamore is married to Leon Rockamore and together they have three children ranging in ages 11 to 14. She resides in the city of Cleveland and is very active in her community.

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Pam & Steve McCary

Patient

After experiencing shortness of breath for 2 years, Pam McCary was confirmed to have Idiopathic Pulmonary Fibrosis in fall of 2011. Doctors believed the disease would cooperate and provide enough time to enter lung transplant consultation at nearby Vanderbilt Hospital. It didn't. Through a series of miraculous events, Pam was referred to Cleveland Clinic in critical condition for emergency evaluation and ultimately, a successful, single lung transplant.

Pam and Steve McCary have been married for 43 years and are life-long residents of Chattanooga, Tennessee. Pam McCary is a giver. She gives of herself to son, Ben and daughter, Anne and to their spouses. She is the beloved "Mimi" to their three grandchildren, Lillian McCary 7, Elliott McCary 4 and Abbie Buckley 2. She gives of herself by personally investing into the lives of younger women. Long before her own medical crisis, Pam taught three friends the craft of quilting, as together they hand-made "Quilts of Love" for cancer patients.

Steve McCary has served as an Associate Pastor at the 1700 member Woodland Park Baptist Church in Chattanooga for 23 years. When faced with the likelihood of losing Pam to IPF, Pastor Steve, who had ministered to others for years, became the recipient of the flocks' prayer, love and sacrifice as he stayed by his wife's side for 121 consecutive days of hospitalization. Together, Pam and Steve were blessed by the caring Cleveland Clinic staff.

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Stephen Meldon, MD

Vice Chair, Emergency Services and Director of Emergency Department
Cleveland Clinic

Dr. Meldon is the Director of the Cleveland Clinic Main Campus Emergency Department and the Vice-Chair, Emergency Services Institute, Cleveland Clinic Health System. He also serves as the Patient Experience Officer for the Emergency Department. Prior to joining the CC, he served in leadership roles for a national EM staffing group, Emergency Medicine Physicians LTD; as part of that experience he served as faculty for the Patient Satisfaction Academy, a two and a half day course for staff, that utilized simulated patients, lectures and workshops to improve patient experience skills for emergency physicians. Dr. Meldon has also served as EM faculty at MetroHealth Medical Center, where his academic interest was in geriatric emergency care.

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James Merlino, MD

Chief Experience Officer, Cleveland Clinic

James Merlino, MD, is the Chief Experience Officer of the Cleveland Clinic health system, and is a practicing staff colorectal surgeon in the Digestive Disease Institute. He is also the founder and current president of the Association for Patient Experience. As a member of the Clinic's executive team, he leads initiatives to improve the patient experience across the Cleveland Clinic Health System. In addition to his work in patient experience, he also leads efforts to improve physician-patient communication, and referring physician relations. Partnering with key members of the Clinic leadership team, he helps to improve communication with physicians and employees, and to drive employee engagement strategies. Along with the Clinic CEO, he is co-chairperson of the Cleveland Clinic Diversity Council, and also sits on the professional affairs committee. He is a recognized world leader in the emerging field of patient experience. Dr. Merlino's wife, Amy, is a maternal-fetal medicine specialist at Cleveland Clinic.

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Joshua Miller, DO, FACP

Medical Director, Internal Medicine, Strongsville Family Health and Surgery Center
Cleveland Clinic

Joshua Miller, DO, has been Medical Director of the Strongsville Family Health and Surgery Center since 2008, where more than 200,000 patient visits and 6,500 surgeries are performed each year. His passion for improving the patient experience led to his role as the Regional Operations Experience Officer for 26 sites in Northeast Ohio and to his involvement in training physicians in relationship building through the Center for Excellence in Healthcare Communication. He's also a member of the Medina Hospital Board.

As the son of a physician, Dr. Miller strives to model his father's compassionate treatment of patients. He is a strong supporter of innovation that increases access for patients and welcomed the opportunity to have the Strongsville facility serve as a pilot site for the Medicine Institute's medical home initiative. He also brought Express Care to the center, which provides care for walk-in patients. His efforts have earned him a spot on the "Top Doctors" list in Cleveland Magazine every year since 2006.

Dr. Miller's treatment interests include metabolic syndrome, preventive medicine and obesity. He received his medical degree from the Ohio University College of Osteopathic Medicine. He completed his internship at Saint Vincent Mercy Medical Center in Toledo and his internal medicine residency at Cleveland Clinic.

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Sue Omori

Executive Director, Regional Marketing
Cleveland Clinic

Sue Omori has over 25 years of healthcare marketing and communications experience, which includes 18 years at Cleveland Clinic. As executive director of the Regional Marketing Department in Cleveland Clinic Division of Marketing and Communications, Sue oversees the marketing function for Cleveland Clinic's eight community hospitals and 16 family health centers managing fully integrated marketing plans for the regional facilities including robust advertising—newspaper, radio and TV, direct marketing campaigns, digital marketing, and community outreach tactics. Earlier in her Clinic career, Sue was in charge of Cleveland Clinic publications.
Previously, Sue held leadership positions at University Hospitals Case Medical Center (Cleveland) and Bethesda Hospitals in Cincinnati. She holds Bachelor's and Master's degrees from Bowling Green State University. After busy days meeting at regional facilities anywhere between Lorain, Ashtabula and Medina, she comes home to her family and faithful dog Max, who is happy to add steps to her pedometer. s

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Rita Pappas, MD

Medical Director, Hospital Operations
Cleveland Clinic

Rita M. Pappas, MD, FAAP, FHM is the Medical Director, Hospital Operations within the Division of Medical Operations at the Cleveland Clinic. She has direct oversight of the following areas within Hospital Operations: Admission and Transfer Center, Main Campus Hospital Throughput, Care Management, and the Resource Center.

Dr. Rita Pappas is a Staff physician in the Department of the Pediatric Hospital Medicine, located on the main campus of Cleveland Clinic. She was appointed in 2004.

Dr. Rita Pappas has been appointed as a fellow in the American Academy of Pediatrics and Society of Hospital Medicine. She is board-certified in Pediatrics. She currently serves as a member of the Corporate Compliance Committee, Strategic Space Committee, and RAC Steering Committee. Her other roles include: Vice Chair, Education Institute; Chair of the Pediatric Institute Education Committee, Chair of the Editorial Board for Cleveland Clinic Children's; Her specialty interests include medical operations, throughput, pediatric hospitalist medicine, residency education, patient safety, and care paths.

She is committed to family-centered care and is a physician leader in family-centered rounds -- listed as a "Best Practice" by the Joint Commission on Accreditation of Healthcare Organizations (JCAHO) at a recent site visit. Since 2007, she has been awarded the recognition as a physician recognized in Best Doctors in America. Dr. Rita Pappas participates readily in resident education and medical education at the Cleveland Clinic Lerner College of Medicine of Case Western Reserve University.

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William Peacock, III

Chief of Operations, Cleveland Clinic

Bill has served as the Chief of Operations at the Cleveland Clinic since 2009. In this role he is responsible for the Clinic's Buildings and Property, Supply Chain, Clinical Engineering, Patient Support Services, Protective Services, Hotels, Office of Sustainability and International Operations. Bill first joined the Clinic in 2005. He was instrumental in leading efforts to deliver 3 million square feet of new construction including Miller Pavilion, Glickman Tower, and supporting projects. He also delivered the Cleveland Clinic Canada, and the Lou Ruvo Brain Institute projects. He is the Clinic executive responsible for overseeing international operations including the relationship with Abu Dhabi's Mubadala Development Corporation and the public health organization; SEHA.

Before joining Cleveland Clinic, Bill served 24 years in the United States Navy, retiring as a Captain in the Civil Engineer Corps. He held two major commands; one in Japan where he managed the facilities, construction and real estate needs of Navy and Marine Corps forces across the Pacific Rim. He also lead a battalion of naval construction force "Seabees" in several deployments to Pacific, Middle East, and Central and South American nations. Bill was on the Chief of Naval Operations staff at the Pentagon during 9/11 and was involved in key mobilizations of forces to the Middle East. His earliest Navy assignment was piloting the A7E Corsair. He earned a Legion of Merit from the U.S. Department of Defense.

Bill is a member of the American Society of Healthcare Executives, the American Society of Healthcare Engineers. He graduated with a Master's of Science in Electrical Engineering from Purdue University and a Bachelor of Science in Electrical Engineering from the US Naval Academy. He attended the Kellogg School's Advanced Executive Program.

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Alicia D.H. Monroe, MD

Vice Dean for Educational Affairs, University of South Florida College of Medicine

Alicia D.H. Monroe, MD, is the Vice Dean for Educational Affairs at the University of South Florida College of Medicine. She joined USF in July 2008 after being selected in a nationwide search. Prior to her move to Tampa, FL, Dr. Monroe was at Brown University where she served as Associate Dean for Diversity at Brown's Warren Alpert Medical School.

A professor of family medicine, Dr. Monroe is well known for her publications and innovations in physician-patient communication, cross-cultural communication, and mentoring students and faculty. Dr. Monroe is an expert in creating educational programs and courses to support the professional development of students, residents and junior faculty. She has taught physician-patient communication and counseling skills to medical students and residents for more than 20 years. At Brown, she designed and helped lead a new two-year required course, "Doctoring," for first and second-year medical students. The course combines traditional aspects of medical education with contemporary content such as the impact of culture on medicine, patient safety and "health care civics" – the social, bureaucratic and economic aspects of the health care system. She was also the principal investigator for an initiative to train faculty leaders how to redesign health care delivery to improve quality and access to diverse patient populations.

Dr. Monroe earned her MD degree from Indiana University School of Medicine, and completed an internship in psychiatry at Georgetown University Medical Center in Washington, DC, and a residency in family medicine at Methodist Hospital in Indianapolis. She recently completed the Executive Leadership in Academic Medicine Program (ELAM), as well as the Macy Mentorship Program in Health Communication. ELAM is a core program of the Institute for Women's Health and Leadership at Drexel University College of Medicine, Philadelphia, PA.

She has received numerous teaching awards. Dr. Monroe was a three-timer winner of Brown Medical School's Faculty Teaching Award and received the Faculty Teaching Award for Excellence in Multicultural Education 10 times. Other awards included Outstanding Faculty Mentor from Brown University/Women & Infants Hospital, the NBI Healthcare Foundation Humanism in Medicine Award, and Residency Teacher of the Year. Dr. Monroe has published extensively in peer-reviewed journals, books and other media such as DVDs. She is a member and past president of the Association for the Behavioral Sciences and Medical Education, a national organization of medical educators dedicated to creatively and innovatively applying social and behavioral science knowledge to medical education.

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Deirdre Mylod, PhD

Vice President, Hospital Services
Press Ganey

As vice president of hospital services at Press Ganey Associates, Inc., Dr. Mylod is responsible for the overall strategy, growth and client service goals for the hospital services group. She joined Press Ganey in 1997 and in prior roles was vice president of acute services and vice president of public policy.

As vice president of public policy, she was responsible for representing Press Ganey clients in national discussions regarding health care quality measurement issues from a policy perspective. Dr. Mylod developed and oversaw Press Ganey's launch of the Hospital Consumer Assessment of Healthcare Providers & Systems Initiative and is Press Ganey's representative on the National Quality Forum, where she currently acts as secretary to the Quality Research Measurement and Improvement Council. She has participated on National Quality Forum technical expert panels for projects related to the evaluation of measures and guidelines for public reporting of health care quality data.

Before joining Press Ganey, Dr. Mylod participated in a variety of longitudinal studies investigating the development of children at risk for developmental disabilities. Her training included experience in both clinical and research hospital settings. Additionally, she has extensive experience in experimental design and research methodology. Dr. Mylod is a member of the American Psychological Association and AcademyHealth. She received her PhD in developmental psychology from the University of Notre Dame.



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Marc Nivet, EdD

Chief Diversity Officer, Association of American Medical Colleges

In his role as chief diversity officer, Dr. Nivet provides strategic vision for all AAMC diversity and inclusion activities through his leadership of the association's Diversity Policy and Programs department, which focuses on initiatives designed to increase diversity in medical education and advance health care equity. Dr. Nivet and his staff are responsible for analyzing policy and regulatory activities related to diversity and inclusion, assisting medical schools and teaching hospitals with their diversity goals, and serving as liaison for diversity initiatives to membership organizations, government entities, and other health organizations.

Dr. Nivet served most recently as chief operating officer at the Josiah Macy, Jr. Foundation, where he oversaw the day-to-day operations of the foundation, and as special assistant to the senior vice president of health at New York University. Previously, Dr. Nivet was president of the National Association of Medical Minority Educators, Inc., and adjunct professor in the School of Education, Health, and Human Services of Hofstra University. Dr. Nivet holds an Ed.D. degree in higher education management from the University of Pennsylvania Graduate School of Education and an M.S. degree in higher education and student development from Long Island University, C.W. Post Campus. Dr. Nivet earned his B.A. degree in communications studies from Southern Connecticut State University.

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Tammy Richards RN, MSN

Corporate Director of Clinical Engagement, Intermountain Healthcare

Tammy has responsibility for system-wide strategy and initiative implementation related to Patient Engagement, Service Excellence and Clinical Education. Ms. Richards has over 30 years of experience in health care systems, working as nurse, educator, consultant, writer and clinical leader. She works closely with the Chief Nursing Officers, Medical Group, SelectHealth and Homecare leaders in implementing the full vision of system-wide collaborative care across the continuum.

She is a member of American Organization of Nurse Executives, Utah Organization of Nurse Leaders, Sigma Theta Tau International/Nu Nu Chapter, American Nurses Association, Utah Nurses Association. Ms. Richards earned her Masters Degree in Nursing Administration from University of Phoenix, her Bachelor's Degree in Nursing from Weber State University and has recently completed an 18-month CNO Leadership Development Fellowship program at Intermountain Healthcare.

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Mary Linda Rivera, RN, ND

Senior Director, Best Practices, Office of Patient Experience
Cleveland Clinic

As Executive Director, Mary Linda is responsible for the strategic oversight and operations for the Office of Patient Experience at the Cleveland Clinic. Her leadership responsibilities include defining tactics and initiatives to improve the patient experience throughout the Cleveland Clinic Health System across various aspects of the continuum of care. As part of her role, Mary Linda is also responsible for creating partnerships with system leaders to assure coordination and support of all initiatives related to patient experience. Under her leadership, several programs have been developed and implemented that have been proven to positively impact the patient experience and related patient experience measures.

Mary Linda's experience includes more than 20 years as a healthcare executive in the field of home healthcare, with progressing roles of responsibility. In her most recent roles as Executive Vice President and Chief Operations Officer with a large home healthcare organization in Connecticut, then as Chief Operations Officer with a home infusion and home healthcare network in Ohio, she has been continually invested in improving patient outcomes. Her role as Executive Director of the Office of Patient Experience has allowed her to draw on her operational, quality and clinical leadership in this new and evolving role.

Mary Linda recieved a Bachelor's degree in Biology and a Doctor of Nursing from Case Western Reserve University.

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Mark Rothwell

VP, Marketing & Communications, Dean Clinic

With over 17 years of marketing and communications experience in the consumer package goods industry, he recently made the transition into the evolving world of healthcare. After receiving his MBA from the University of Wisconsin, he has led successful marketing and rebranding efforts at many Fortune 500 companies; including Oscar Mayer, The Coca-Cola Company, Miller Brewing Company, and Famous Footwear.

Mark leads all of the strategic marketing and communications efforts for Dean Clinic. Since joining Dean in August 2009, Mark has championed the successful repositioning of this 100 year old brand. The multifaceted effort included the development of a patient segmentation study, creation and launch of new system-wide branding standards, creation of a social media strategy highlighted by the launch of a new deancare.com website. He has also led the development and launch of Dean's first online patient panel "Dean Listens", as well as an organizational engagement initiative "Purple for a Reason", a new Dean image advertising campaign, a co-branding strategy plan and many other marketing and communication enhancements.

RESULTS TO DATE:

• Dean has ascended to the #1 spot in the marketplace on 12 of 14 key brand health measures and is currently #2 in Net Promoter Score (NPS), 1 pt. behind the market leader on this measure.
• Dean has achieved budget every year since 2008 and recorded record performance in 2009 & 2010.

Mark possesses a high level of energy, passion and curiosity for marketing, but the things he holds most dear are his wife Julie, their children; Brandon, Jordyn, Hailey and 4 legged child River.

Dean Health System Overview:

Dean Clinic was established in 1904 in Madison Wisconsin by Dr. Joseph Dean. Dean Health System is one of the largest healthcare delivery systems in the country serving 18 counties in south central Wisconsin and amassing over $1.3B in revenue.

Dean Health System is privately held, is physician owned and governed, and has over 5,000 employees and 793 medical staff. Dean Health System is comprised of Dean Clinic, Dean Health Plan, St. Mary's /Dean Ventures (rural primary care clinics), Davis Duehr Dean (Provider of specialty eye care) and Navitus, a national pharmacy benefit management company with almost 2 million covered lives.

Dean Clinic is currently the top rated care delivery system in quality across the state of Wisconsin (2011 Wisconsin Collaborative for Healthcare Quality). Dean Clinic is also a leader in healthcare innovation by becoming one of the first adopters of EMR and was the first in the nation to launch the Apple MyChart application.

Dean Health Plan is the market share leader and with over 309,000 members is also the largest HMO in Wisconsin. It was recently awarded its' 4th straight JD Powers Award for top member satisfaction in the Midwest region.

Dean Health System provides its care delivery services and health insurance products in partnership with SSM Healthcare, the first recipient of the prestigious Malcolm Baldridge Quality Award. SSM Healthcare, which is based in St. Louis MO, owns 15 hospitals, across 4 states including St. Mary's in Madison and Janesville Wisconsin and St. Clare in Baraboo Wisconsin.

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Johanna Rian, PhD

Director, Center for Humanities in Medicine
Mayo Clinic

Dr. Johanna Rian directs the Center for Humanities in Medicine at Mayo Clinic in Rochester, MN. She received her Ph.D. in Drama and Humanities from Stanford University. At present, she develops and implements programs in humanities and arts for patients, staff, students and visitors. She has published and presented on the use of theatre in arts in health care, and currently teaches courses for Mayo Medical School students in the application of theatre in improving skills in patient case presentations, and creative and reflective writing for improving patient/physician relationships and easing medical school burnout. Johanna has worked extensively with Twin Cities arts non-profit organizations in strategic planning and development. She is a former board member with Minnesota Citizens for the Arts, frequently participates as a grants review panelist for the Minnesota State Arts Board, and currently serves as secretary to Global Alliance for Arts & Health Board of Directors. Johanna joined the staff at Mayo Clinic in 2008.

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Sandy Rush, BSN, MA

Director, Patient Experience, Dignity Health

Sandy Rush is an RN and the Corporate Director - Patient Experience for Dignity Health. She has been in healthcare for over 30 years with a BSN and Masters in Management/Human Relations, and Organizational Behavior.

In her current role, Sandy develops the Dignity Health strategy and goals around the patient and family experience, including patient and family centered care, patient experience, and HCAHPS. She has helped to lead to organization to substantial improvements in the patient experience, including the implementation of Patient and Family Advisory Boards across the organization.

She has presented Dignity Health's work at several national conferences, and was recently published in Nursing Management and Nurse Leader with our work surrounding Bedside Report and Discharge Phone Calls. Sandy is a fellow in the American College of Healthcare Executives, an executive advisor for the Nevada Organization of Nurse Leaders, and a member of the American Organization of Nurse Executives.

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Patrick Ryan

Chief Executive Officer, Press Ganey

Patrick T. Ryan has been in the health care field for more than 30 years and is driven by a passion to continuously improve the safety, quality and accessibility of care for patients. Ryan has a proven track record of transforming a variety of health care organizations.

In February 2012, Ryan joined Press Ganey as chief executive officer. Ryan is responsible for the overall direction of Press Ganey and ultimately aims to enhance the company's efforts to help providers improve the patient experience in today's changing landscape. Prior to joining Press Ganey, Ryan served as chairman and CEO of The Broadlane Group, a leading provider of cost management and supply chain solutions to the acute, post-acute and outpatient service markets. In November 2010, The Broadlane Group was acquired by MedAssets Inc., where Ryan served in the interim role of president of spend and clinical resource management through the completion of the integration.

Previously, Ryan served as CEO and a director of PolyMedica Corporation, until its acquisition by Medco Health Solutions in October 2007. Operating under the well-known Liberty Medical Supply brand, PolyMedica was the nation's largest direct-to-consumer provider of blood glucose testing supplies and related services for more than 1 million active patients throughout the United States.

Ryan also served as the chairman and CEO of Physicians Dialysis, Inc., CEO of Principalcare Inc., president and CEO of ImageAmerica Inc., and president of R.B. Diagnostics. He began his career working for American Hospital Supply Corporation.

Throughout his career in health care, Ryan has served on numerous public, private and charitable boards. Ryan currently serves on the board of trustees of the Lahey Clinic, a physician-driven medical center and teaching hospital of Tufts University School of Medicine, as well as the board of Atrius Health, one of the largest physician groups in the nation. Ryan also serves on the board of directors of Avon Old Farms School in Connecticut and is a director of Affiliated Managers Group, Inc.

Ryan holds a bachelor of arts in political science and sociology from the University of Rochester.

About Press Ganey

Recognized as a leader in performance improvement for more than 25 years, Press Ganey partners with more than 10,000 health care organizations worldwide to create and sustain high performing organizations, and, ultimately, improve the overall health care experience. Press Ganey offers a comprehensive portfolio of solutions to help clients operate efficiently, improve quality, increase market share and optimize reimbursement. Press Ganey works with institutions from across the continuum of care — hospitals, medical practices, home care agencies and other providers — including 50 percent of all U.S. hospitals.

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Nina Setia

Chief Patient Experience Officer, NYU Langone Medical Center

Nina Setia is the inaugural Chief Patient Experience Officer at NYU Langone Medical Center, comprising three hospitals with more than 1,000 beds and extensive outpatient services. Nina was appointed in 2011 to develop, oversee and align strategies to create a world-class experience for patients and families. Her successful track record of formulating strategies in service excellence and patient satisfaction is assisting NYU Langone create the optimal patient experience. In her first year, Nina worked closely with leadership to significantly improve their HCAHPS results across all composites through launching key tactics, increasing awareness of patients experience and hands on coaching. Nina joined NYU Langone after sixteen years at Hackensack University Medical Center in NJ. As the Administrative Director of Service Excellence, her focus was on total customer satisfaction—including patients, employees, and physicians.

Nina has presented at several national conferences including the Cleveland Clinic Summit last year. She also published an article in the Journal of Nursing Administration on discharge calls and leader rounding on patients, and has contributed to several books including Planetree's Putting Patients First.

Nina received her bachelor's degree in broadcast journalism from Syracuse University and her master's in advertising strategy and communications from Virginia Commonwealth University. She is a member of the American Hospital Association's Society for Healthcare Strategy & Market Development and the American College of Healthcare Executives. She also has a private pilot's license and is a certified Zumba instructor.

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Elaine Sims

Director, Gifts of Art
University of Michigan Health System

Elaine Sims is director of the University of Michigan Health System Gifts of Art program. Recognized as a best practices model program by the National Endowment of the Arts, Gifts of Art brings the worlds of art and music to the University of Michigan Health System. . Working in arts in healthcare since 1990, Sims' areas of expertise include the visual and performing arts, healing gardens, caring for the caregiver initiatives as well as the full spectrum of arts in healthcare offerings at U-M, including an art cart program; bedside music, art and writing programs; medical school arts curriculum and running a full medical center orchestra.

Gifts of Art is one of the first and most comprehensive arts in healthcare programs in the nation. Gifts of Art is one of the founding members of the Global Alliance for Arts and Health (formerly the Society for the Arts in Healthcare) and Sims is a past president of the board. Sims currently serves as an Ambassador and consultant for the Global Alliance, and has been recognized as a Distinguished Fellow for her contributions to the field. She was a charter member of the Ann Arbor Commission for Art in Public Places. An accidental artist, her work has appeared in the New Yorker magazine and museums around the world such as the State Tretyakov Gallery.

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Sandra Siedlicki, PhD, RN, CNS

Senior Nurse Researcher, Cleveland Clinic

Sandra Siedlecki serves as a Senior Nurse Scientist in the Office of Nursing Research & Innovation. She serves as a research consultant with expertise in design and analysis. Dr Siedlecki also teaches research and biostatistics at the graduate level, publishes, presents, and maintains her own program of research. Her primary research interest is the impact of the healthcare environment on patient and family outcomes. She believes that an organization is only as strong as its "weakest Link", and that there is a need to identify and understand those individuals and practices that enhance the healthcare environment and improve patient and family outcomes.

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Meghan Snow, MHA

Administrator, Medicine Institute
Cleveland Clinic

Meghan Snow, MHA is the Administrator for the Cleveland Clinic Medicine Institute, which houses the Departments of Community Internal Medicine, Family Medicine, General Internal Medicine, Hospital Medicine, and Infectious Diseases at Cleveland Clinic. She received her undergraduate degree and a Master of Healthcare Administration from St. Louis University. In her role, she supports the development and implementation of models of care that increase value to the patient, fosters employee engagement, and drives population management strategies. She is particularly interested in Patient Centered Medical Homes and the transformation of care delivery systems that prepare organizations for the changing healthcare landscape.

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Gaye Smith

Chief Patient Experience & Service Officer, Vanderbilt University Medical Center

Gaye Smith is the Chief Patient Experience & Service Officer at Vanderbilt University Medical Center. In her current role, she drives strategy and operations for enhancing a culture of patient and family centered service excellence across the Vanderbilt clinical enterprise. She also serves as the Privacy Official for the medical center. She joined Vanderbilt in 2004 and has over 35 years of management experience in health care operations, health care information systems, regulatory compliance and accreditation, ambulatory network development, and as a hospital Chief Operating Officer in two Catholic health care systems. She holds Bachelor of Science in Health Services Administration and Master of Business Administration degrees.

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Diane Stover Hopkins

Chief Marketing and Experience Officer, Beacon Health System

Diane Stover Hopkins is a Certified Experience Economy expert and is the Chief Marketing and Experience Officer at Beacon Health System in South Bend Indiana, a not-for profit community owned system serving Northern Indiana and Southern Michigan. Beacon includes Elkhart General Health System and Memorial Hospital of South Bend. Diane is also a certified WOW Project expert with the Tom Peters Company. She's had an extensive career in the health care industry including time with Medical College of Pennsylvania in Philadelphia, Brookwood Medical Center in Birmingham and with the U S Department of Health and Human Services. She is co-author, (with Beacon CEO Phil Newbold) of the book, Wake Up and Smell the Innovation. In addition to her leadership at Beacon, she is lead faculty at the Pfeil Innovation in South Bend and guest lecturer at Saint Mary's College, Indiana University and the University of Notre Dame. She received the Professional Excellence Award from the Society of Healthcare Strategy and Market Development and the Athena Award for Community Leadership from the Saint Joseph County Chamber of Commerce.

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Vicente Velez, MD

Director of Advanced Curriculum, Center for Healthcare Communication, Cleveland Clinic

Vicente Jose Velez, MD, FACP, FHM, is a hospitalist at the Cleveland Clinic Department of Hospital Medicine. He completed degrees in Biology and Medicine at the University of the Philippines. He finished post-graduate residency training and served as Chief Resident at the St. Vincent Charity Campus of Case Western Reserve in 2007. He is an advocate for Quality, Patient Safety and Experience and serves in his appointed positions as both the Quality Improvement Officer and Institute Experience Officer for his department.

He has special interest in healthcare communication and has delivered lectures on the subject matter at the local and national level. He has since been a Foundations of Healthcare Communication course facilitator for the Cleveland Clinic since 2011 and helped develop its curriculum. He is a member of the leadership team and Director for Advanced Curriculum Development at the Center for Excellence in Healthcare Communication, an arm of the Cleveland Clinic Office of Patient Experience whose goal is to provide educational resources for healthcare communication institutionally.

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Nicholas Watkins, PhD

Director of Research
BBH Design

Nicholas Watkins, Ph.D., is BBH Design's Director of Research. His professional work focuses on those interactions between humans and their built environments that reflect excellence in design and contribute to physical and psychological well-being. His research findings on healthcare environments and other settings can be found in several publications and venues including Environment & Behavior, Health Environments Research and Design Journal, the Handbook of Environmental Psychology, Evidence-Based Healthcare Design, Place Advantage, Journal of Nursing Administration, ANCC Magnet conference proceedings, Healthcare Design conference proceedings, Pebble Conference proceedings, and the Environmental Design Research Association (EDRA) publications and conference proceedings. He was recently recognized as one of the most influential people in healthcare design with an HCD 10 award for 2013. He has served as Chair of EDRA and currently serves on EDRA's Board of Directors

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Amy Windover, PhD

Director of Faculty Development, Center for Healthcare Communication, Cleveland Clinic

Amy Windover is a Clinical Psychologist and Director of Faculty Development for the Center for Excellence in Healthcare Communication in the Office of Patient Experience at The Cleveland Clinic. She is Director of Communication Skills Training and Assistant Professor of Medicine at the Cleveland Clinic Lerner College of Medicine of Case Western Reserve University.

Dr. Windover earned her PhD from Kent State University and completed health psychology postdoctoral fellowships at Akron General Medical Center and The Cleveland Clinic. Dr. Windover's primary research interests currently focus on relationship-centered communication.

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Nelita Zytkowski

Associate Chief Nursing Officer, Office of Nursing Informatics
Cleveland Clinic

Marianela "Nelita" Zytkowski is the Associate Chief Nursing Officer for the Office of Nursing Informatics for the Cleveland Clinic Health System. Nelita has been a nurse at The Cleveland Clinic for the past 13 years. Her clinical nursing background is in intensive care, preoperative and recovery room nursing. Much of Nelita's current work is focused on the adoption and the integration of clinical technology solutions for caregivers and patients at the bedside. Nelita has recently focused on innovation with nursing staff to address the impact of technology on: healthcare reform, wireless device solutions, mobile computing, electronic documentation, data mining, system design & analysis, distance learning, project management and functional unit design.

A nationally recognized leader in nursing informatics, Nelita serves on several top‐ranked nursing informatics committees and as an adjunct professor at several local Universities. She has also authored and published journal articles, research studies and book chapters on various nursing informatics topics. Nelita received her Doctorate in Nursing Practice (DNP) degree from Case Western Reserve University, where she studied the impact of electronic nursing documentation on the patient experience. She also completed her Master's degree in Nursing Informatics from the University of Maryland, and a Bachelor's degree in Nursing from Case Western Reserve University. Additionally, she maintains dual board certifications through the American Nursing Credentialing Center (ANCC) in Nursing Informatics and as an Advanced Nursing Executive. Nelita also achieved Fellow level status as a member of the Healthcare Information Management Systems Society (HIMSS).

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Lucia D. Wocial, RN, PhD

Nurse Ethicist, Program Leader for the Fairbanks Program in Nursing Ethics, Indiana University

Dr. Wocial received a Bachelor's Degree in Psychology from Macalester College in Saint Paul, MN and her Bachelor's, Master's and Doctorate degrees in Nursing from the Oregon Health Sciences University in Portland, OR. She has been in clinical practice for more than 20 years. Her clinical background is in neonatal intensive care. Her doctoral dissertation, Life Support Decisions Involving Imperiled Infants, examined parents' experience with the ethical dilemma of considering withdrawing or withholding treatment from their newborns.

Prior to joining the Fairbanks Center in July, 2007, Dr. Wocial worked in a variety of health care organizations from small private hospitals to large academic teaching centers. She is highly regarded as a lecturer, educator, researcher, consultant and practitioner in the field of medical ethics, particularly as it applies to the nursing profession. Wocial comes to the Fairbanks program from the Cleveland Clinic Children's Hospital, where she served as a Neonatal Clinical Nurse Specialist. She has been a Nursing Thought Expert Consultant for Web-based product development for Elsevier Publishing in St. Louis, MO. She has also served as a member of the Ethics Consultation service for the Mayo Clinic in Rochester, MN, and was a special assistant for the Commission on Determining Nursing Workforce Policy with the National League for Nursing.

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Linda D. Woodard, MBM

Executive Director, Workforce Economic Development Division
Cuyahoga Community College


Linda Woodard, MBM, has over 19 years of experience in workforce and career development and currently serves an executive director in Cuyahoga Community College's Workforce and Economic Development Division (WEDD). As a member of WEDD's leadership team, Woodard is responsible for quality assurance, resource development and outreach & recruitment as well as the facilitation of work readiness training that supports the division's manufacturing, healthcare and information technology training programs. The readiness services, delivered by the Job Link Services team, include life skills and soft skills, case management /career coaching, job readiness workshops, coordination of targeted job fairs, job placement assistance and retention services. This team created a curriculum designed to modify behaviors of frontline hospital workers in an effort to help them understand how they impact the overall patient experience. This program has been very successful as data shows reductions in turnover and improvements in attendance and attitude for those that have taken the course. In addition to these positive outcomes, it has served a way to identify individuals for management opportunities; and now is a mandatory professional certificate course for frontline workers in that hospital and has expanded to other healthcare facilities in NE Ohio.

In addition to her work at Cuyahoga Community College (Tri-C), Woodard owns a small business that focuses on providing career development training and services to practitioners in the field. She is also an adjunct instructor at Tri-C and adjunct faculty at Cleveland State University's Center for Educational Leadership Program. Woodard holds a BS in Mechanical Engineering and MS in Business Management as well as several certifications in workforce development and facilitation. She resides in Cleveland, Ohio and is married 27 years to Charles Woodard; they have one daughter, Jennifer, a 2007 graduate of Cleveland School of the Arts and a 2012 graduate of SC State University.

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Michael Yang

President, CNS, Janssen Pharmaceuticals, Inc.

Michael Yang serves as President, Central Nervous System (CNS) for Janssen Pharmaceuticals, Inc. Michael oversees the psychiatry and pain franchise in the United States, which includes anti-psychotic long-acting therapies (INVEGA® SUSTENNA® and RISPERDAL® CONSTA®) and pain medications (NUCYNTA® and NUCYNTA® ER). Michael also serves as a member of the North America Leadership Team (NALT). With more than 20 years in sales, marketing and general management, Michael is recognized for being a strategic and entrepreneurial leader who focuses on driving sustainable growth, talent development and increased organizational performance.

Prior to joining CNS, Michael served in the Johnson & Johnson Medical Device and Diagnostics business segment as Worldwide General Manager, Cellular Technologies, a business unit comprised of Therakos, Inc. and Veridex, LLC. While leading this integrated organization, Michael expanded both clinical and research use of the CELLSEARCH® circulating tumor cell test, developed strategies to expand the clinical indications of Therakos' immune cell therapy products, and drove growth in global markets.

Earlier in his career, he was the Vice President of Sales and Marketing, Oncology Franchise, where he led the business through challenging times, growing market share for PROCRIT® and successfully driving top-line growth for the company's oncology therapeutic products, including DOXIL® and the DOXIL®/VELCADE® co-promotion.

Michael joined the pharmaceutical segment of Johnson & Johnson in 1997 where he assumed roles of increasing responsibility, including Product Director and Regional Business Director for LEVAQUIN® and FLOXIN®, achieving record sales and market leadership in respiratory infectious disease.

Michael started his career in health care as a sales representative at Pfizer. He holds a B.S. degree in Marketing & Business Administration from San Diego State University. He resides in New Jersey with his wife and three children.

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Rebecca Zuccarelli, MPH

Chief Marketing and Experience Officer, Beacon Health System

Rebecca Zuccarelli is the Senior Director for Service Excellence for the Johns Hopkins Health System. In this role, which she has held since 2006, Rebecca is responsible for measuring and improving patient satisfaction and leading the effort to create a more patient and family centered environment throughout the Johns Hopkins Health System. During her tenure at Hopkins, inpatient satisfaction at The Johns Hopkins Hospital has improved from the bottom to the top quartile.

Before joining Hopkins, Rebecca served in various positions at OhioHealth in Columbus Ohio including, System Vice President of Customer Service and Vice President of Post Acute Services. Rebecca began her administrative career over 25 years ago at Summa Health System in Akron, Ohio in a role in quality management and medical staff services.

Rebecca received her Bachelor of Science degree in Physical Therapy and her Master of Public Health in Health Administration from the University of Pittsburgh in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania. She has authored several publications regarding customer service and patient relations and has spoken at numerous conferences regarding improving patient satisfaction in hospitals.

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Ariel Clayton

Cleveland Clinic Musicians in Residence

Since graduating with her masters' degree from the Cleveland Institute of Music in 2011, violinist Ariel Clayton enjoys an active life teaching and performing throughout northeast Ohio. She appears frequently at the Cleveland Clinic as a soloist, in various ensembles, and in collaboration with guest artists. Aside from the dozens of private events for which she performs yearly, Ms. Clayton has performed with CityMusic Cleveland, currently serves as guest concertmaster of the Suburban Symphony Orchestra, and has held that seat in numerous other area ensembles. Her chamber ensemble, Opus 216, performed on Tremont's A.R.T concert series in 2011, and gave the inaugural public performance at the first evening event in the Cleveland Museum of Art's new atrium in the fall of 2012. Committed to bringing classical music to new audiences, Ms. Clayton also performs monthly with Classical Revolution Cleveland, a collective of musicians committed to bringing music to unconventional Cleveland venues. Ms. Clayton maintains a large independent violin studio of students throughout the Cleveland area. Her students perform in area youth orchestras, and participate in multiple outreach projects each year. Ariel adores the versatile, thriving musical climate in Cleveland, and loves opportunities to reach new audiences in new ways.

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Marshall Griffith

Cleveland Clinic Musicians in Residence

Marshall Griffith is on the Faculty of The Cleveland Institute of Music (CIM) where he teaches Theory and Jazz Improvisation. He received a Bachelor of Music and Master of Music degrees in composition from CIM, as well as a Doctor of Music degree from Indiana University. He studied composition with Eugene O'Brien, Donald Erb and John Eaton, and was the recipient of The Music Teachers National Association Award in composition in 1976. His works have been published by Theodore Presser and Belle Press, and recorded on Crystal Records. He served as chairman of the Cleveland Composers Guild from 1991 until 1995. His music has been performed by the Baton Rouge Symphony, the Amici, Bel Arte and Coleridge String Quartets, the 20th Century Consort and the Black Earth Percussion Group. Active as a jazz and classical pianist, he has also been soloist with the Canton Symphony, Ohio Chamber Orchestra, Cleveland Pops, Suburban Symphony, CIM Orchestra, CIM Woodwind Ensemble, Cleveland Youth Wind Symphony and the Case Jazz Band. He performed in a professional two-piano team, the Fine Arts Duo, from 1980 until 1990.

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Mary Beth Ions

Cleveland Clinic Musicians in Residence

For over twenty-five years violinist Mary Beth Ions has been one of Cleveland's most active musicians. She received her Bachelor of Music degree from Baldwin Wallace Conservatory of Music and did graduate studies at Pennsylvania State University. She plays in many local groups including the Cleveland Pops Orchestra, Blossom Festival Orchestra, Trinity Cathedral Chamber Orchestra, and Playhouse Square productions of touring Broadway shows. She regularly provides back-up music for Mannheim Steamroller, Barry Manilow, Johnny Mathis, Rod Stewart, Smokey Robinson, Yanni, Sarah Brightman, Jewel, Clay Aiken and Josh Groban. Other notable performances include performing with Scott Hamilton and Kristi Yamaguchi at Quicken Loans Arena for the Scott Hamilton CARES Initiative, a performance for President George W. Bush as a member of RED {an orchestra}, and a performance for Hilary Clinton. She has developed versatile programs to bring to schools and nursing homes and is a founding member of Amethyst, a versatile string quartet that provides music for churches, synagogues, parties, weddings, and high profile events.

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