Lisa Freeman

Lisa Freeman is the Executive Director of the Connecticut Center for Patient Safety. In 1991 at age 37 her husband experienced serious medical harm during "routine surgery" that left him paralyzed, with a MRSA surgical site infection and with hypoxic brain damage. After 18 years of living with complex medical conditions, he died when he was 56 years old, as a complication of his surgery.

Lisa is on the faculty of the Academy of Emerging Leaders in Patient Safety and is an active member in a number of other organizations including the National Quality Forum, Planetree International, the ISQua Person and Family Centred Advisory Council and Consumers United for Evidence-based Medicine (CUE).  She is a PFANetwork Advisory Board member, a public board member of the Connecticut Board of Examiners for Nursing and she is a PFAC member at the Joint Commission. Lisa's advocacy work extends to some state agencies including the CT Office of Health Strategy Quality Council, Access Health CT APCD DRC, and also to the CT Department of Public Health HAI Multidisciplinary Group.

She contributed to published works on advanced illness care, shared decision making and care coordination, and patient involvement on hospital governance boards.  She is also a peer reviewer for the Journal for Patient Safety.

Lisa is a speaker and a ​presenter of patient safety educational workshops that are offered at meetings, conferences and also at nursing schools, medical schools, colleges offering health care certificate programs and to community member groups and senior centers. Lisa is quite interested in patient and provider education, patient engagement, and person-centered care. Her work focuses on raising current awareness and knowledge about patient safety issues, patient engagement, patient empowerment. and the need for transparency.  By representing the patient voice, making sure that the patient perspective is part of all health care conversations, and by working together with all stakeholders, Lisa is committed to moving the bar and improving patient safety across the board.

My north Star:

To make high quality, safe health care accessible and available to all people.