Emerging Leader 2023 LEAH LOMOTEY-NAKON, PhD

Professor | Vanderbilt University

Strategic Initiatives and Research | HCA Healthcare Foundation

Dr. Leah Lomotey-Nakon is a multidisciplinary trained bioethicist with a decade of programmatic experience in academic, community, and corporate healthcare settings. Driven by her belief that authentic relationships drive transformative changes within systems, policies, and practices, she designs innovative research and evaluation approaches that drive high-quality health care as a byproduct and end product. To that end, she pairs humanistic inquiry with qualitative and quantitative social science methods to analyze the connections between organizational design, quality improvement, and health outcomes within complex health systems.

Dr. Nakon has conducted extensive research in her field. She has presented her expansive research all over the world and her publications can be found in The American Journal of Community Psychology, Non-Profit Quarterly, AmeriCorps*VISTA, and other online platforms. She has received approximately $150,000 in grants to fund her research. Dr. Nakon currently teaches at Vanderbilt University School of Medicine and School of Education. She also serves as the manager for strategic initiatives and research for HCA Healthcare Foundation.

She recently received The Hastings Center – Sadler Scholar Award. This award is awarded to a select group of nine doctoral students with research relevant to bioethics who are from racial and ethnic communities underrepresented in this field in the United States. She also received the prestigious Aspen Ideas Festival Scholar and the Robert Wood Johnson Foundation Health Policy and Research Scholar Award. Dr. Nakon’s list of honors, awards, certificates, and membership is extensive. Her dissertation investigated the root causes of inequities in maternal and infant mortality rates and identified pathways to improve the quality of clinical and community reproductive health care.

Dr. Nakon’s commitment to addressing inequities in the healthcare system is transformative, groundbreaking, and life-saving. Dr. Nakon completed her Bachelor of Arts at Emory University where she majored in Political Science and minored in African American Studies. She went on attend Vanderbilt University, Peabody College of Education, where she earned a Master of Education in community development and action with a concentration in Organizational Development. She also earned a Master of Theological Studies from Vanderbilt University Divinity School with a concentration in ethics and society. She earned her Doctor of Philosophy degree at Vanderbilt University with a concentration in Biomedical and Healthcare Ethics and a minor in Medicine, Health, and Society.