President/CEO
MA Dawson & Associates
Louisville, KY
Martha A. Dawson, RN, BSN, MSN, FACHE obtained her undergraduate and graduate degrees from the University of Alabama in Birmingham, and completed her hospital administration residency at Gaston Memorial Hospital in Gastonia, NC. Ms. Dawson has over 30 years of experience in health care leadership roles in academic medical centers, teaching hospitals and large size community hospitals. Most recently she served as the Vice President of Clinical Operations and Chief Nursing Officer at the University of Louisville Health System. Prior to this appointment, Ms. Dawson was the Associate Chief Operating Officer at Duke University in Durham, North Carolina. Currently, she is working as an independent consultant in health care and with non-profit community organizations, and completing a doctorate degree in Nursing Practice at Case Western Reserve University at the France Payne Bolton School.
Honors include: Fellow in the American College of Healthcare Executives, Robert Wood Johnson Nurse Executive Fellow, Johnson and Johnson Wharton Fellow, Leadership Louisville Fellow, Who's Who in America Nursing, Sigma Theta Tau, and Two Thousand Notable American Women, and many others. She lectures extensively at the local, national and international level on issues relating to leadership, work design, organizational systems, staff development and fiscal and human resource management. She has provided over 200 lectures during her career. She is published and is a strong supporter of research and evidence-based practice. She promotes evidence-based practice from the bedside to boardroom, and her idea of evidence-based practice extends clinical practice to include fiscal management, human resources and facility planning.
She holds and has held adjunct nursing faculty/assistance positions at the University of Alabama in Huntsville, Duke University, University of North Carolina, University of Louisville, Spalding University, University of Kentucky, and many other schools of nursing. She also serves on many advisory boards for schools of Nursing and local high schools. Her work as an independent consultant includes the following areas: staffing, scheduling, financial management, leadership development, and design of patient care systems. Ms. Dawson is active in professional organizations such as, the National Black Nursing Association, (Board Member, Trust Committee and 1st Vice President), American Organization of Nurse Executives, American Nursing Association, American Hospital Association, National Coalition of Ethnic Minority Nurse Associations (Board Member) National Association of Healthcare Executives, American Association.