Tami Merryman is Chief Quality Officer for the University of Pittsburgh Medical Center (UPMC), an integrated health care delivery system in Pittsburgh, PA with over 19 hospitals and $7.0 billion in revenue. UPMC Health System also operates the UPMC Health Plan with over 1,000,000 covered lives. The primary mission of the Center for Quality Improvement and Innovation is to partner with hospital leadership to change care delivery systems in support of the UPMC vision of creating the health system of the future – whereby the right patient gets the right care, at the right time…every time.

Ms. Merryman has worked for UPMC and UPMC Shadyside Hospital for 15 years. Her most recent position was the Vice President of Patient Care Services/Chief Nursing Officer at UPMC Shadyside, a 510-bed tertiary care hospital, including the NCI-designated comprehensive Hillman Cancer Center. While at UPMC Shadyside, Ms. Merryman created the Clinical Design Initiative, the goals of which were to provide clinicians more time with their patients, create excellent care delivery systems, and enhance patient satisfaction. The Clinical Design Initiative resulted in millions of dollars being reinvested back into patient care. In part due to its success, the IHI and RWJ Foundation selected UPMC Shadyside as one of three pilot hospitals nationally to participate in the Transforming Care at the Bedside Initiative (TCAB). TCAB, as a model for rapid redesign, has played a vital role in reinvesting vitality and satisfaction into the patient units at UPMC Shadyside, and is in the process of being spread to all of the UPMC hospitals.

Many of the care delivery improvements Ms. Merryman brought to the UPMC have gained national and international recognition, including: Condition H -- a patient-family initiated rapid response team, the patient-controlled liberalized diet, and bringing patients and families into the evaluation and redesign of programmatic health care delivery services.

Ms. Merryman is also the UPMC Liaison to the Peter M. Winter Institute for Simulation Education and Research (WISER) and President of Sim Medical, a UPMC subsidiary with expertise in the creation and management of integrated healthcare simulation training programs

She has her BSN and MSN from University of Pittsburgh; she is a fellow in the American College of Healthcare Executives. Ms. Merryman has studied the Toyota Production System, Lean Manufacturing and other business improvement applications to healthcare. A nationally known speaker, Ms. Merryman has been published in the Journal of Nursing Administration, Modern Health Care, Healthcare Leaders, Reflections by Sigma Theta Tau and Newsweek.