Jeanne M. Huddleston, MD, FACP, FHM
Hospitalist
Chairperson of Mortality Review Subcommittee
Mayo Clinic
Rochester, MN, USA

Jeanne M. Huddleston, MD, FACP, FHM, is a past President of the Society of Hospital Medicine, the founder of Hospital Medicine and past Program Director of the Hospital Medicine Fellowship at Mayo Clinic, Rochester, MN. She is Chairperson of Mayo Clinic’s Mortality Review Subcommittee, a multi-disciplinary group of providers that review every death in search of where the health care delivery system may have failed the providers and/or the patient. She received her MD degree in 1993 from the College of Human Medicine, Michigan State University. She completed her residency in internal medicine and advanced general medicine fellowship at Mayo Clinic. Dr. Huddleston is a Harvard Macy Scholar (both in the Physician Educator and the Leadership Programs) and alumnus of the Health Forum/AHA Patient Safety Leadership Fellowship. Dr. Huddleston is an industrial engineer snf her scholarly focus is the translation of systems engineering to health care delivery in an effort to improve the value of the healthcare experience for patients, their families and the providers. She has led the mortality review program of more than 10,000 patients that has led to a dramatic impact on the quality of care there and she now leads an international collaborative and has engaged multiple hospitals that are putting her innovations to work.

William Adcox, MBA
Chief of Police and CSO
The University of Texas MD Anderson Cancer Center/The University of Texas
Health Science Center
Houston, TX, USA

With 37 years in municipal and campus policing, William H. Adcox serves as the Chief of Police and CSO at The University of Texas MD Anderson Cancer Center and The University of Texas Health Science Center. Chief Adcox holds an MBA degree from UTEP and is a graduate of the PERF’s Senior Management Institute for Police and the Wharton School ASIS Program for Security Executives. He is the recipient of the IACLEA’s 2013 Award for Administrative Excellence and was named by Security Magazine as one of the “Most Influential People in Security 2013.” The agency received the IHSS Foundation’s prestigious 2015 Lindberg Bell Distinguished Program Award. Nationally, Chief Adcox received the Campus Safety 2015 Director of the Year Award in Healthcare; and locally he received the Texas Police Chiefs Association’s 2015 Leadership Award.

Vicki King, MSCJ
Inspector, Threat Assessment Unit
University of Texas Police at Houston

During her 30-year career, Inspector Vicki King served 27 years with the Houston Police Department, rising to the rank of Assistant Chief and earning a master’s degree in Criminal Justice. As Chief of Detectives, Tactical Support Commander, and Director of Forensic Services, she oversaw some of HPD’s highest-profile cases, including serial homicides, corruption, domestic violence, sexual assaults, and gangland slayings. After retiring from HPD, Inspector King served as an emissary to the Saudi Royal family; as an adjunct professor for the University of Houston system; and as Chief of Police for the City of La Marque. MD Anderson and UT-Health recruited Inspector King to head up their Threat Assessment Unit. In her new role, Inspector King works with multidisciplinary teams to identify and mitigate risks.

John J. Nance, JD
Best-selling Author and Pilot
Patient Safety Expert
Leadership Educator and Champion
Advisory Board Member, Journal of Patient Safety
Friday Harbor, WA

One of the key thought leaders to emerge in American healthcare in the past decade, John J. Nance brings a rich and varied professional background to the task of helping doctors, administrators, boards, and front-line staff alike survive and prosper during the most profoundly challenging upheaval in the history of modern medicine. Having helped pioneer the renaissance in patient safety as one of the founders of the National Patient Safety Foundation in 1997, his efforts (and healthcare publications) are dedicated to reforming American healthcare from a reactive cottage industry to an effective and safe system of prevention and wellness. A lawyer, Air Force and airline pilot, prolific internationally-published author, national broadcaster, and renowned professional speaker, John’s leadership is propelled by a deep commitment.

As a native Texan, John grew up in Dallas, where he earned his bachelor’s degree and a Juris Doctor degree from SMU, and is still a licensed Texas attorney. Named Distinguished Alumnus of SMU for 2002, and distinguished Alumnus for Public Service of the SMU Dedman School of Law in 2010, he is also a decorated Air Force pilot veteran of Vietnam and Operations Desert Storm/Desert Shield, and a Lieutenant Colonel in the USAF Reserve, well-known for his pioneering development of Air Force human factors flight safety education, and one of the civilian pioneers of Crew Resource Management (CRM). John has piloted a wide variety of jet aircraft, including most of Boeing’s line and the Air Force C-141, and has logged more than 13,900 hours of flight time since earning his first pilot license in 1965; he is still a current pilot. He was a flight officer for Braniff International Airlines and a Boeing 737 Captain for Alaska Airlines, and is an internationally recognized air safety advocate, best known to North American television audiences as Aviation Analyst for ABC World News and Aviation Editor for Good Morning America.

Before joining ABC, John logged countless appearances on national shows such as Larry King Live, PBS Hour with Jim Lehrer, Oprah, NPR, Nova, the Today Show, and many others. He is also the nationally-known author of 20 major books, including the acclaimed Why Hospitals Should Fly (2009), and, with co-author Kathleen Bartholomew, Charting the Course (2012). He has also written five non-fiction and 13 international fiction bestsellers. Pandora’s Clock and Medusa’s Child both aired as major, successful two-part mini-series on television. Why Hospitals Should Fly won the prestigious “Book of the Year” award for 2009 from the American College of Healthcare Executives.

John J. Nance has become one of America’s most dynamic and effective professional speakers, presenting riveting, pivotal programs on success and safety in human organizations to a wide variety of audiences, including business corporations and healthcare professionals. He and fellow author Kathleen Bartholomew (Charting the Course and Ending Nurse-to-Nurse Hostility: Why Nurses Eat their Young and Each Other) are highly sought-after for their watershed presentations to boards, senior leaders, physicians, nurses, and staff on quality and patient safety. He is a pioneering and well-known advocate of using the lessons from the recent revolution in aviation safety to equally revolutionize the patient safety performance of hospitals, doctors, nurses, and all of healthcare.

Kathleen Bartholomew, RN, MN
Best-selling Author
Leadership Educator
Friday Harbor, WA

Before turning to healthcare as a career in 1994, Kathleen Bartholomew held positions in marketing, business, communications, and teaching. It was these experiences that allowed her to look at the culture of healthcare from a unique perspective and speak poignantly to the issues affecting providers and the challenges facing organizations today.

Kathleen Bartholomew, RN, MN, has been a national speaker for the past 12 years. As the manager of a large surgical unit in Seattle, Kathleen quickly recognized that creating a culture where staff felt a sense of belonging was critical to retention. During her tenure as manager, staff, physician, and patient satisfaction reached the top 10% as she implemented her down-to earth strategies. Despite the nursing shortage, Kathleen could always depend on a waiting list of nurses for both units.

Kathleen’s bachelor’s degree is in Liberal Arts with a strong emphasis on Sociology. This background laid the foundation for her to correctly identify the norms and particular to healthcare  specifically physician-nurse relationships and nurse-to-nurse hostility. For her master’s thesis she authored Speak Your Truth: Proven Strategies for Effective Nurse-Physician Communication, which is the only book to date which addresses physician-nurse issues. In December 2005, Kathleen resigned her position as manager in order to write a second book on horizontal violence in nursing. The expression “why nurses eat their young” has existed for many years in the nursing profession (and has troubled many in the profession). In her book, Ending Nurse to Nurse Hostility (2006), Kathleen offers the first comprehensive and compassionate look at the etiology, impact, and solutions to horizontal violence. Kathleen won the best media depiction of nursing for her op editorial in the Seattle Post-Intelligencer, and in 2010 she was nominated by Health Leaders Media as one of the top 20 people changing healthcare in America.

Kathleen’s passion for creating healthy work environments is infectious. She is an expert on hospital culture and speaks internationally to hospital boards, the military, leadership, and staff about safety, communication, cultural change, and power. With her husband, John J. Nance, she co-authored Charting the Course: Launching Patient-Centric Healthcare in 2012, which is the sequel to Why Hospitals Should Fly (2008). From the bedside to the boardroom, Kathleen applies research to practice with humor and an ethical call to excellence that ignites and inspires health caregivers and leaders to unprecedented levels of excellence.

J. Michael Henderson, MD
Chief Medical Officer, University of Mississippi Medical Center
Jackson, MS, USA

Dr. Henderson is Chief Medical Officer at the University of Mississippi Medical Center and the former Chief Quality Officer at the Cleveland Clinic. His interest in quality was initially triggered in the surgical arena, implementing standardized approaches to preoperative processes, and becoming a champion for the National Surgical Quality Improvement Program of the American College of Surgeons. In 2005, he embarked on an expansion of Quality and Patient Safety for the Cleveland Clinic. His leadership support in establishing the Quality and Patient Safety Institute has provided a central coordinating quality focus across the more than 20,000 employees. This Institute collaborates with the clinical and support departments to align quality outcomes and patient safety into daily practice for the entire healthcare team. The focus of this work is to make daily practice patient-centric, clinically relevant, operationally effective, regulatory compliant, and academically appealing.

Dan Ford, MBA, LFACHE
Retired Vice President, Furst Group (Rockford, IL, healthcare executive search)
Spectrum Health EPFAC and Hospital Group Board Quality & Safety Committee
Telluride Patient Safety Learning Experience Faculty, CO, MD and CA
TMIT Patient Advocate Team Member
Patient Safety Advocate
Rockford, Michigan

Dan Ford developed a deep passion for patient safety as a result of medical errors experienced in Illinois by his first wife, Diane, and the treatment he experienced when he started asking logical and genuine questions. The mother of three children (11, 14, and 17 at the time) and age 47, Diane was pursuing her second master’s degree, and suffered a morphine-induced respiratory arrest following a hysterectomy. She has permanent brain damage/short-term memory loss and a poor quality of life, and resides in an independent living facility.

Jennifer Dingman 
Founder, Persons United Limiting Substandards and Errors in Healthcare (PULSE), Colorado Division
Co-founder, PULSE American Division
TMIT Patient Advocate Team Member
Pueblo, CO

Jennifer Dingman realized, after her mother’s death in 1995 due to errors in medical diagnoses and treatment, that there is little to no help available for patients and their families in similar situations. This life-changing experience left her feeling vulnerable, and she decided to dedicate her life to help prevent medical tragedies from happening to others.

In 1996, Jennifer founded PULSE of Colorado, now a national organization, as a platform to support patients and their families who had experienced medical errors and other adverse medical outcomes. Within two years, PULSE became a national force when PULSE of New York paved the way for many other state chapters to be born. Additionally, Jennifer became an active member of the National Patient Safety Foundation and served on numerous committees, including the Board of Governors.

For more than 15 years, she has volunteered her time to improve the quality of the healthcare system in the U.S. She believes that patient involvement, and promoting an equal partnership between the doctor and the patient, is the most effective way to achieve better quality in the healthcare industry.

Jennifer is a TMIT Patient Advocate Team Member. She has co-authored patient safety articles in peer-reviewed medical journals.

She is a member of Champion for Patient Safety, and represented the organization at the 2005 Patients for Patient Safety Workshop in London and the 2006 Pan American Health Organization Workshop in San Francisco to discuss patient safety and empowerment. Jennifer also served on the board of directors for a local Colorado-based community health center for six years and currently sits on the local school district’s health advisory board.

An avid patient advocate, Jennifer Dingman joined the Cautious Patient Foundation as an Advisory Board member. In this position, Jennifer offers input, ideas and expert advice on the Foundation’s key issues in order to bring changes to the current healthcare system.

Since 2009, Jennifer has served as a faculty member of The Patient Safety Clinical Pharmacy Collaborative, a groundbreaking patient safety initiative that has changed the face of healthcare delivery with measurable positive outcomes for patients. For her tireless efforts, she has won national recognition, including the 2004 Patient Safety Award given by the Colorado Patient Safety Coalition, where Jennifer is a member, and the 2007 Pete Conrad Patient Safety Award. Her invaluable input from a patient’s perspective is widely sought by healthcare groups that are addressing patient-safety issues. Jennifer’s energy and compassion help both patients and doctors alike.

Becky Martins
Founder, Voice4Patients.com
TMIT Patient Advocate Team Member
Warren, ME

Becky Martins‘ advocacy spirit derives from the days when she was driving a family member 150 miles round-trip, three days a week, to dialysis treatments. She spent countless hours at the unit visiting with patients and their families. It was through their stories that she learned of the many challenges faced by patients living with chronic illness. It was by their example that she learned of the resilience of the human spirit to face health and health-related challenges head-on. The unit was her classroom, and her teachers were the patients and families, along with the unit staff who cared for them. The experience became the impetus for her advocacy on behalf of end-stage renal disease patients. In 1996, Becky was the recipient of the Kidney Foundation of Maine Board of Trustees’ Service Award for 10 years of service.

In 2002, Becky founded Voice4Patients.Com: an initiative to empower patients to be their own health care advocates. The site advocated building partnerships between patients and providers – and provided information and tools to strengthen consumer skills.

Becky Martins is a champion of patient- and family-centered care, effective communication in health care, and patient and family involvement: from the board room to examining room. She is a TMIT Patient Advocate Team Member; a Patients for Patient Safety Champion of the World Healthcare Organization’s World Alliance of Patient Safety; and a past member of National Patient Safety Foundation’s Patient & Family Advisory Councils. She was a contributor to “Opportunities for Patient and Family Involvement” – Chapter Nine of the National Quality Forum’s Safe Practices for Better Healthcare – 2009 Update: A Consensus Report.

The 121st Maine Legislature presented Ms. Martins with a Special Sentiment for her patient safety advocacy. She is a recipient of the Pete Conrad Patient Safety Excellence Award.

Mary E. Foley, RN, PhD, is the Director in the Center for Nursing Research and Innovation at the University of California, San Francisco (UCSF). She has worked with the Center as Associate Director since 2004 in partnership with three Bay Area academic medical centers. Mary has worked with the Collaborative Alliance for Nursing Outcomes (CALNOC) since 2004, and in 2009 was appointed Director, Education Services for CALNOC. In that role, Mary has developed an area of expertise in nursing sensitive care measures, with special emphasis on medication safety. Mary was president of the American Nurses Association from 2000-2002. She was employed for 19 years at Saint Francis Memorial Hospital in San Francisco where she worked as a staff nurse, Director of Nursing, and Safety Officer.A registered nurse for more than 35 years, Foley has been active in the healthcare policy arena. She continues to write and lecture about healthcare policy, improving the workplace, and promoting safe care for workers and patients. She completed a six-year term as a member of the National Patient Safety Foundation Board of Directors, and is an advisory member of the Partnership for Patient Safety (p4ps). She is a member of the TMIT Patient and Family Advisory panel. She also continues to work with TDICT as a project consultant with expertise in needle stick injury prevention device evaluation.Foley received her nursing diploma in 1973 from New England Deaconess Hospital School of Nursing; her BSN in 1976 from Boston University School of Nursing in Massachusetts; and her Master’s of Science in Nursing Administration and Occupational Health from the University of California in San Francisco in 1994. She completed her doctoral studies at UCSF in the spring of 2010 with an emphasis on policy and occupational health.

Arlene Salamendra 
Former Board member and Staff Coordinator, Families Advocating Injury Reduction (FAIR);
TMIT Patient Advocate Team Member
Plano, IL

Arlene Salamendra is a former Board member and Staff Coordinator of Families Advocating Injury Reduction (FAIR). A number of years ago, she was the subject of a preventable medical error. Since that time, she has devoted a portion of her time to giving support to other patients who have been injured or have lost a loved one, and rectifying the systems errors that lead to preventable medical errors. She is a member of the TMIT Patient Advocate Team.

Christopher R. Peabody, MD, MPH
Emergency Physician
Director, UCSF Acute Care Innovation Center, University of California San Francisco
Clinical Instructor, University of California San Francisco
San Francisco, CA

Christopher R. Peabody, MD, MPH, is a practicing Emergency Physician in California and Clinical Instructor at the University of California, San Francisco. He is also the Director of the UCSF Acute Care Innovation Center, an initiative of the UCSF Department of Emergency Medicine, which develops novel ways to deliver Emergency and Acute Care reliably and safely by developing new technology and validating best practices. He has a strong commitment to public service and healthcare delivery to vulnerable populations. Dr. Peabody completed his residency at one of the busiest safety-net hospitals in the country, Los Angeles County Hospital, and was the Chief Resident in Emergency Medicine at the University of Southern California. He attended medical school at the University of California San Francisco, and completed an MPH at Harvard University on a Zuckerman Fellowship. Dr. Peabody’s current interests lie in quality improvement and patient safety, especially related to underserved populations. He has extensive experience in emergency care and disaster response internationally, having served in Haiti and China. He is a member of the content leadership development team for CareUniversity and applies his expertise in emergency care, public health, and international healthcare performance improvement to meeting the needs of both consumers and caregivers.

Sharon Rossmark, MBA
Vice Chairman, Board of Directors, Sinai Health System
Board Chair, Patient Safety
Chicago, IL

Sharon Rossmark is vice chairman of the board of directors for the Sinai Health System and serves as board chair for Patient Safety. As a board member she has participated in legislative advocacy meetings with Congressional leaders on Capitol Hill and at the White House. Ms. Rossmark is also president and CEO of Zayos Global Ventures, LLC, a liquidation and distribution consulting business for excess inventory.

Additionally, she serves on the American Hospital Association’s Midwest Regional Policy Board and has been appointed to serve as a governance expert on the editorial advisory board of the Journal of Patient Safety, a global peer-reviewed publication. Her current board appointments include the National Children’s Center in Washington, DC, and the College of Business Advisory Council at Illinois State University.

Ms. Rossmark’s business experience includes 30 years in the financial services and insurance industry for a Fortune 100 company. As an executive for the Allstate Insurance Company, she led a division responsible for business support of the organization’s agency distribution channel.

Ms. Rossmark has been a frequent panel facilitator and panelist on the topics of board governance, patient safety, mentoring, and leadership for a number of organizations, including Texas Medical Institute of Technology (TMIT), the American Hospital Association, Loyola University, the Adler School of Psychology, and Grainger, Inc.

She has an undergraduate degree from Illinois State University and received her MBA from the University of Illinois – Chicago.To honor her parents and her father’s WWII D-Day service, Ms. Rossmark has established an endowed scholarship to support U.S. military soldiers and veterans majoring in business at Illinois State University.She is a member of the National Association of Corporate Directors and the American Hospital Association Trustee Leadership Network. She is also an executive mentor alumna for the Menttium Corporation.

Sharon Rossmark, MBA
Founder and Chairman, Conrad Foundation
Seabrook, TX, USA

Nancy Conrad is a tireless champion for patient safety and innovation through innovation in education. She is an advisor to CareUniversity and Med Tac in the area of outreach to children and youth. She is our liaison with NASA.  Shecreated the Conrad Foundation in 2008 to energize and engage students in science and technology through unique entrepreneurial opportunities. By enabling young minds to connect education, innovation, and entrepreneurship, the Foundation helps provide a bold platform for enriching the innovative workforce of the future. Ms. Conrad’s interest in patient safety began as a result of the death of her husband, astronaut Charles “Pete” Conrad. On July 8, 1999, while motorcycling, Pete ran off the road and crashed. His injuries were first thought to be minor, but he died from internal bleeding about six hours later. Ms. Conrad’s compelling story serves to personalize the need for patients and their families to take responsibility for their care, as well as to highlight the need for systemic changes in the quality of care. Ms. Conrad was co-founder and co-chairman of fundraising of the Community Emergency Healthcare Initiative. This program was designed to measurably affect preventable injury and death occurring in emergency departments. She established the Pete Conrad National Patient Safety Award to recognize global contributors in patient safety.

Matthew Listiak Senior Producer
TMIT/Health Care Concepts
Austin, TX 

Matthew Listiak is the Senior Producer for TMIT and Health Care Concepts. As producer of the documentary Chasing Zero: Winning the War on Healthcare Harm, which aired on the Discovery Channel worldwide, he travelled the country capturing compelling stories of triumph and tragedy, spinning them into an acclaimed piece that has inspired positive change in the healthcare industry. He also produces major events such as the TMIT High Performer Workshops, managing both the multimedia aspects and logistics. Prior to working at TMIT, he produced, photographed, and edited documentaries for PBS, the Guggenheim Museum, ABC’s Emmy-winning show Extreme Makeover: Home Edition, and other major media outlets.

Pablo Pulido, MD 
Executive Director, PanAmerican Federation of Associations of Medical Schools
Caracas, Venezuela

Dr. Pulido is a Venezuelan physician with specialties in cardiology and internal medicine. He is currently the Executive Director of the PanAmerican Federation of Associations of Medical Schools, Caracas, and also a 2009 Fellow of the Harvard Advanced Leadership Initiative. He has participated in the dynamic evolution of a leading technical university in Caracas. In Public Policy, as Minister of Health and Social Welfare, he initiated the restructuring of the Ministry and the decentralization of operations towards the Venezuelan States. In International Medical Education, as the Executive Director of the PanAmerican Federation of Associations of Medical School, PAFAMS, he has focused on the modernization and involvement of medical schools in healthcare reforms using the new information technology, management, and curricular updating as basic instruments.