Why Nurses Must Lead Healthcare Innovation: My Perspective as Chief Nursing Executive

When I walked onto the stage at the HLTH conference, I felt a deep sense of responsibility. As Chief Nursing Executive at Joint Commission—and, perhaps more importantly, as a nurse who started at the bedside—I know how critical it is to keep nurses’ voices at the center of healthcare transformation. This isn’t just a professional stance; it’s personal.

I began my career in a small critical access hospital, moved through emergency and ICU nursing, and eventually into leadership roles overseeing accreditation and clinical safety. None of this was planned, but every step reinforced one truth: nurses are the backbone of healthcare—and they’ve always been innovators.

Nurses Have Always Been Innovators

People often ask why nurses should be involved in innovation. My answer? They already are. Every day, nurses create real-world solutions for patient care. These solutions may be part of an innovation pathway, a planned solution for a clinical issue, or a safe workaround to deliver care safely and efficiently. These aren’t shortcuts—they’re solutions born from necessity and deep clinical insight.

Nurses are central to innovation because they are at the bedside delivering care. Nurse-engaged or nurse-driven innovation is essential. Even in the realm of everyday innovations that some may consider workarounds, there’s a safe space for these to occur, and that’s where true innovation happens. The challenge is that these real-world innovations too often stay informal. We need systems to capture, validate, and scale nurse-driven ideas, turning them into formal improvements that benefit patients everywhere.

The Barriers We Must Break

Despite their creativity, nurses face real obstacles to participating in structured innovation. The biggest? Time. Nurses are busy—often overwhelmed by patient care demands and administrative tasks. Without leadership structures that carve out space for innovation, their ideas remain untapped.

We also need clear pathways for nurses to lead beyond their organizations, collaborating with technology vendors and industry partners. Innovation shouldn’t be confined to boardrooms; it should start where care happens—at the bedside.

Technology and AI: Giving Time Back to Nurses

One area that excites me is how technology, especially artificial intelligence (AI), can reduce cognitive load for clinicians. Nurses spend enormous amounts of time documenting care, managing administrative tasks, and monitoring patients. AI can help:

• Ambient listening tools can automate documentation, freeing nurses from repetitive charting.

• AI-assisted triage systems can support decision-making without replacing human judgment.

• Predictive analytics can flag early warning signs for conditions like sepsis, prompting timely interventions.

Imagine AI in the background saying, “Go check on your patient.” That’s powerful. And these tools aren’t about replacing nurses, they’re about giving time back to nurses, so they can focus on what matters most: compassionate, patient-centered care.

Data Matters—But So Does Humanity

Data is essential for improving care quality. It helps us identify trends, reduce variation, and drive better outcomes. But I always remind my team: data alone doesn’t heal patients.

Care goes far beyond just data. It’s about those daily moments where we deliver compassionate, patient-centered care. As we embrace analytics and AI, we must never lose sight of empathy. Technology should enhance—not replace—the human connection that defines nursing.

Nurses Voices, Shaping Change: Accreditation 360

I had the opportunity to shadow nurses in various settings to understand their challenges, uncovering issues like unclear policies and overinterpretation of requirements. At Joint Commission, we prioritize listening to organizations to inform our performance. That’s why we launched Accreditation 360, an initiative to simplify standards and align them with clinical realities by:

• Adding clarity: Consolidating scattered requirements into clear, clinically relevant guidance.

• Providing resources: Offering tools to help organizations address risks and adopt best practices.

• Recognizing excellence: Launching the Survey Analysis For Evaluating Strengths (SAFESTTM) Program in 2026 to highlight high-performing practices across 23,000 accredited programs.

This isn’t just about compliance—it’s about supporting clinicians and amplifying what works well in healthcare.

Looking Ahead: Nurses as Leaders of Change

Healthcare is evolving rapidly, and nurses must be at the forefront—not just as caregivers, but as leaders, innovators, and advocates for patient safety. My message to every nurse: your voice matters. Your ideas matter. And the future of healthcare depends on both.

Key Takeaways

• Nurses have always been innovators; now is the time to formalize and scale their contributions.

• AI and technology can reduce cognitive load, enabling nurses to spend more time with patients.

• Data is essential for improvement but must be balanced with compassion.

• Nurses were critical in developing Joint Commission’s Accreditation 360 initiative to simplify standards and recognize excellence.

The bottom line: Innovation in healthcare isn’t just about technology, it’s about people. And no group is better positioned to lead this change than nurses.