Maria J. Fernandez, RN, BSN, MSHA, Elected to Serve as a Affiliate Board Member of the American Heart Association, Greater Southeast

Maria J. Fernandez, RN, BSN, MSHA, was elected to serve as a AHA Greater Southeast Affiliate Board member for a two year term. Maria has been working closely with AHA and especially the Greater Southeast Affiliate with the Get With the Guidelines program and helping the hospitals achieve award status. She is a member of the Strategic Health Initiative Committee for AHA since 2009 and the Committee’s charge is to provide leadership, guidance and direction in Emergency Response, Disease Management and Treatment and Prevention.

Maria is a National Director Clinical Quality Improvement for Tenet Healthcare Corporation since 2007. As part of Tenet’s quality improvement initiative, Commitment to Quality, her role is the ongoing implementation and operation of the CTQ initiative to improve the clinical outcomes and processes of Tenet’s hospitals. Prior to her national role, Maria was the Regional Director of Clinical Quality Improvement for the Florida region where she worked closely with the FL Tenet hospitals to implement the quality initiatives. She also served for Tenet in other roles such as Director Case Management at Tenet’s Palmetto General Hospital. Fernandez earned her BSN from the University of Miami, Florida, in 1984 and her MSHA degree from Barry University, Florida, in 2005.