Megan is the Director of Patient Experience for Geisinger Medical Center in Danville, Pa. She has her Master’s from Drexel University and was among the first to receive her CPXP, the certification for patient experience professionals. With a background and understanding including community practice, university health, and inpatient, she has led collaborative practices to improve employee and patient experience. She is a member of the Geisinger speaker’s bureau, and a national speaker for patient experience.

Melissa is extremely passionate about the experience that patients, families and staff receive. As Director of Patient Experience for Steward Health Care, she oversees corporate initiatives to drive quality, safety and patient experience within Steward’s hospitals and collaborates with Steward’s ambulatory practices to enhance the patient’s entire journey.

Alongside her experienced team, Melissa works closely with Steward’s Northeast Region of 9 hospitals where they are using qualitative and quantitative data to sustain compassionate communication techniques, hardwire bedside rounding and enhance employee engagement. Nationally, Melissa is helping to develop the Patient Experience strategy for Steward’s recently acquired 25 community hospitals under the direction of the Chief Medical Officer.

Before working with hospitals, Melissa joined Steward in 2015 working as a Performance Improvement Advisor for Steward Health Care Network where she helped drive outcomes and achieve some of the largest increases in key patient experience domains for the Network’s ambulatory practices. For more than a decade, Melissa’s career has consisted of roles in performance improvement, operations and marketing. She lives in Lakeville, MA with her husband and two girls, ages 7 and 3.

Janet (Jodi) Larson, M.D. is the Chief Quality and Experience Officer (CQXO) at NWH and is part of the Strategic Leadership Team. She has oversight of Newton-Wellesley Hospital’s quality, safety, performance improvement, patient outcomes, accreditation activities, Medical Staff office, and experience/service excellence for our patients, their families, and NWH employees. The CQXO serves as a change agent at the center of driving service culture transformation and unifying quality, safety and experience strategies to improve care delivery. Prior to that, Dr. Larson had been serving as the Acting Associate Chief Medical Officer. Dr. Larson works clinically as a hospitalist on the adult medicine inpatient service.

Deborah Pesanka is a Senior Corporate Improvement Specialist for the Clinical Improvement Department at the Wolff Center at UPMC. Since January 2007, she has served as an internal consulting resource for quality, safety and process improvement in enterprise-wide initiatives. Deborah assesses operations and processes in a comprehensive current state analysis and leads interprofessional teams in the development of clinical outcomes that drive quality patient outcomes, optimize patient experiences and reduce resource utilization.

Deborah began her career as a critical care nurse in the cardiothoracic ICU at UPMC Mercy Hospital. With an early interest in improvement of care delivery, she moved into a newly- created cardiac outcomes management role. Deborah was in nursing leadership for many years and this operational role drove her passion for patient safety. Clinical expertise and project management experience came together in the 2004 development of a new in-patient cardiac surgical service line.

Deborah graduated from the Mercy Hospital School of Nursing in 1989 and completed her Bachelor of Science in Nursing from Carlow University in 1993. She obtained her Masters of Science in Management and Technology from Carlow University in 2001. She holds a green belt in Six Sigma methodology and teaches quality courses across UPMC. Deborah has presented both nationally and internationally on quality.

Berny is the National Senior Director at Kaiser Permanente and is responsible for Quality, Hospital Oversight and Equitable Care. Within the Department of Care and Service Quality, Berny is responsible for the implementation and oversight of national programs to promote health equity and reduce clinical outcomes in health disparities. She also partners across the Kaiser program working on the quality and hospital oversight program, assisting the Kaiser Foundation Health Plan/Hospitals Board of Director's Quality Health ImprovementCommittee in its fiduciary responsibilities, as well as coordinating Kaiser’s annual National Quality Conference. Prior to this role, Berny was the Assistant Administrator for Quality & Compliance at Kaiser Foundation Hospital—Fresno Medical Center. Before joining Kaiser Permanente she held the position of Nurse Executive and Quality Leader. She has her Masters in Nursing Administration and participated in the Disparities Leadership Program offered by Massachusetts General Hospital.

Juan is responsible for company-wide diversity efforts to identify and implement strategies to grow Tufts Health Plan's presence in diverse communities, comprising members, providers, brokers, employers, employees and vendors. Previously, Juan was the company's director of health care services where he led various strategic initiatives, including medical cost management and provider contracting strategy and analytics. Prior to joining Tufts Health Plan in 2010, Juan held management positions at Blue Cross Blue Shield and Deloitte Consulting. He serves on several boards including The State of Massachusetts Latino Advisory Commission, The Dimock Center Foundation Board, The Boston Foundation Latino Legacy Fund, ALPFA Boston's Corporate Advisory Board, the State of Massachusetts Health Information Technology Council and Quality Interactions Corporate Advisory Board. Juan's leadership has not gone unnoticed as he has received several recognitions including the 2017 Boston College John A. Dinneen, S.J., Alumni Community Service Award, 2017 Get Konnected's 50 Most Influential People of Color in Health Care, 2016 El Planeta's Powermeter: Most Influential People for the Hispanic Community, 2015 Boston Business Journal's 40 Under 40, 2015 Whittier Street Health Center's Men's Health Champion, ALPFA's National 2013 Most Promising Business Professional and the 2011 Medical Law Report's Rx for Excellence Leader in Quality. Juan earned a B.S. from the School of Management at Boston College. He is originally from Medellin, Colombia and resides in Waltham, MA.