Nurse Executive, Labor Leader Reappointed to Joint Commission Board

OAKBROOK TERRACE, Ill. -- Nurse executive Marilyn P. Chow and labor leader Gerald M. Shea have been reappointed to the board of commissioners of the Joint Commission on Accreditation of Healthcare Organizations (JCAHO) for additional three-year terms.

Chow holds the at-large nursing seat on the board and was first appointed to the Joint Commission Board in 2001. Shea is one of six public members on the board and has served since 1997.

Chow, who holds a doctor of nursing science degree, is vice president for patient care services in the national offices of Kaiser Permanente. She also holds a leadership position in the Robert Wood Johnson Foundation Executive Nurse Fellows program, and is a senior fellow at the UCSF Center for the Health Professions.

Chow is a long-time member of and has held leadership posts in the American Academy of Nursing and American Nurses Association. She also served on the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services National Advisory Committee for Nursing Education and Practice.  She earned her doctoral, masters and bachelors degrees from the University of California, San Francisco. 

Shea is assistant to the president for government affairs at the AFL- CIO, a position he has held since 1995.  Before joining the AFL-CIO, he was with the Service Employees International Union as an organizer and local union official in Massachusetts and was also on the staff at the national unions headquarters.

Shea is a member of the board of directors of the National Quality Forum.  He was also a member of the Advisory Council on Social Security and is today a member of the current Social Security Advisory Board.  Shea is a former member of the Prospective Payment Advisory Commission (PROPAC), the Congressionally-appointed advisory board for the Medicare program, and its predecessor advisory committee, MEDPAC.  He is also a founding member of the Foundation for Accountability, a national leadership coalition whose mission is to help consumers make health care choices based on quality.  He is a graduate of Boston College.

Marilyn Chow and Gerry Shea bring to the Joint Commission a wealth of knowledge and experience regarding the most pressing issues in health care today, says Dennis S. OLeary, MD, president of Joint Commission.  I have every expectation that they will both continue to be driving forces in keeping the Joint Commission on the cutting edge of efforts to improve patient safety and healthcare quality.

The Joint Commission board consists of 29 individuals and includes physicians, healthcare executives, academicians, and other health care professionals, as well as individuals with in-depth knowledge about health insurance, bioethics, quality improvement, and patient safety.

Source: Joint Commission