Board of Directors

Nick J. Jouriles, MD, FACEP – President Board Member

Nick J. Jouriles, MD, FACEP, is the Vice Chair of Faculty Development at USACS and Professor & Chair, Emergency Medicine at Northeast Ohio Medical University. He has served on and led many regional, national and international emergency medicine committees and boards, including ACEP. He has designed emergency medicine education programs and curricula for medical students, residents and post training learners around the world. His publications are focused on education, policy and operations, particularly freestanding emergency departments. He is Past President of the American College of Emergency Physicians and an examiner for the American Board of Emergency Medicine.  He has served on and led many regional, national and international emergency medicine committees.  He has designed emergency medicine education programs and curricula for medical students, residents and post training learners.

John Lyman, MD – Treasurer and Board Member

John Lyman, MD, is a residency trained, emergency medicine boarded physician.  He completed his emergency medicine residency training at Wright State University in 1983, having completed undergraduate school at the University of California and medical school at Wright State University. He currently serves as a Regional Medical Officer and the Director of Emergency Medicine Residency Relations with Premier Physician Services, an E M management group based in Dayton, OH.   He additionally is a clinical professor with the Wright State University School of Medicine. Current affiliations include The Wright State University Foundation Board (trustee), & the Wright State University Academy of Medicine (trustee and past Chairman), the Ohio Chapter of the American College of Emergency Physicians (board member & President-Elect).  Dr. Lyman is a member of the American College of Emergency Physicians, the American Medical Association, the Montgomery County Medical Society, the American Academy of Emergency Physicians, & the Society for Academic Emergency Medicine.  Additional affiliations include the Emergency Department Practice Management Association (past Board Chairman) and the Aeromedical Section of the American College of Emergency Physicians (Founding Chairman). Dr. Lyman continues as an active member of Rotary International.

Maame Yaa A.B. "Maya" Yiadom, M.D. - Board Member 

Dr. Yiadom's research focuses on applications of evidence-based medicine to optimize clinical operations function with patient pathophysiology for time sensitive conditions. ST-Segment Elevation Myocardial Infarction is her prototype disease. Her work includes clinical process and performance measurement in a diversity of emergency care environments. Her research is supported by a the Doris Duke Foundation and a K23 award from the National Heart Lung and Blood Institute (NHLBI). She is the Founding Director of the ED Operations Study Group (EDOSG, www.edopsstudygroup.org), and Principal Investigator for the Emergency Care Health Services Research Data Coordinating Center (HSR-DCC).Dr. Yiadom's emergency medicine training was completed at Harvard in Mass General and Brigham and Women’s Hospitals. She was first trained in health care policy in Princeton University’s Woodrow Wilson School of Public and International Affairs. She subsequently worked as a healthcare industry management consultant for CSC Global Health Solutions Group, and as the Dean’s Office Chief of Staff at Drexel Medical School. She completed her medical education at Robert Wood Johnson Medical School (MD), a Masters in Public Health (MPH) at Harvard, additional health policy training at Johns Hopkins, and a Masters of Science in Clinical Investigation (MSCI) at Vanderbilt University. 

As Vanderbilt faculty she works in the Vanderbilt University and the Nashville Veteran's Administration hospitals. Prior clinical experiences include: staffing emergency departments on Arizona reservations for the Indian Health Service (IHS); volunteer faculty at the Komfo Anokye Teaching Hospital Emergency Department in Kumasi Ghana; and practicing at Cooper University Hospital (Camden, New Jersey)

Bruce D. Janiak, MD, FACEP, FAAP - Board Member 

Professor

Department of Emergency Medicine and Hospitalist Services. Dr. Janiak earned his Doctorate of Medicine at the University of Cincinnati and completed his internship and residency in emergency medicine at Cincinnati General Hospital before spending three decades at The Toledo Hospital. He currently serves as a Professor of Emergency Medicine at the Medical College of Georgia at Augusta University in Augusta, Georgia.  His experience offers a broad understanding of adult and pediatric clinical emergency medicine and the administration of emergency medicine, including telemedicine. National leadership has earned Dr. Janiak much respect in the industry.  He served as President of the American Board of Emergency Medicine, President of the American College of Emergency Physicians, and President of the Emergency Department Benchmarking Alliance, an organization that defines the best clinical and administrative practices. He is a lecturer and instructor, as well as an author, and has been published through out numerous articles in the Annals of Emergency Medicine, Emergency Medicine News, Topics in Emergency Medicine, Emergency Medicine, Ohio State Medical Association Journal and many others. Dr. Janiak is a general emergency consultant and also specializes in medical legal consulting and is considered an expert witness in Emergency Medicine.

Deb Richey, RN – Board Member 

Deb Richey, BS, MPA, is an RN with over 25 years of leadership experience.  She completed her nursing degree at St. Joseph School of Nursing in Fort Wayne, IN where she became an experienced clinician in multiple nursing specialties resulting in her promotion to ER Manager in 1982.  She completed her BS in Health Arts at St. Francis University in 1991, and her Master of Science in Public Administration with Concentration Public Health Management at IPFW in 2003.  She received her Certificate from Harvard Business Design in 2007. Opened state of art Emergency Department 2012. She has been leader for a number of ER's from 14,000 to 99,000 visits.  She has worked with both NE IN major local health systems and the Allen County EMS System in a variety of roles, including EMS Coordinator, ER Nursing Director and ER/EMS Service Line Nursing Leader.  Served as Interim CNO for Parkview Health Allen County Hospitals.  Adjunct Faculty for IU SPEA @ Fort Wayne Campus.  VHA IN/OH/MI Emergency Department (Chairman).  Mayor's Commission on Rape, DV, and Sexual Assault (Board Member).  ENA Chapter 365 (Past President/Secretary). FW/Allen County EMS Standards Committee. Allen County EMA Board.  IPFW Community Health Community (Board Member).  Parkview Field Event and Baseball Stadium-First Aid Services Coordinator. Lectured nationally ER Process Improvement, ER Billing and Coding, Customer Service, ER Leadership, and ER Quality Topics.  Currently Independent ER Nursing Consultant and Adjunct Faculty IVY Tech College in Fort Wayne, IN. 

Bob Edmondson, FACHE - Board Member

Senior healthcare industry leader with deep experience in strategic planning, business development, joint ventures, and project management for physician groups, health systems, and post-acute providers. Collaborates across the healthcare spectrum to drive value innovation and enhance health of populations. Leader in building value-based systems for risk, including ACO's, shared savings and Bundled Payments for Care Improvement (BPCI). Specialties: Healthcare innovation, strategic planning, population health, disease management, business development, physician network growth, joint ventures, start-ups, remote technology.

Maureen “Mo” Canellas MD - Board Member

Maureen Canellas, M.D. joined the board in 2018 as the first in-training board member. She completed her emergency medicine residency in 2019 at the University of Chicago where she held the position of chief resident. She has now transitioned to the University of Massachusetts for a two-year fellowship in emergency medicine administration, while also completing an MBA at MIT. With a background in applied mathematics, her research interests focus on flow mechanics of large emergency department systems, inter-departmental approaches to overcrowding, and national metric trends. Though her career is just starting, Maureen has had multiple opportunities to present her research across the U.S. and has won several local and national awards for her work and leadership.

Kathleen Merkley, DNP, ANP, FNP - Board Member

Kathleen Merkley, DNP, ANP, FNP has been a nurse/clinical nurse specialist/ED nurse practitioner with Intermountain Healthcare, in Salt Lake City, Utah for over 30 years.  She has an extensive clinical background in ED, and has done clinical quality improvement work with the Intermountain Intensive Medicine Clinical Program.  While at Intermountain she was instrumental in developing an ED EMR.  She has published numerous articles related to  emergency department care, informatic topics and process improvement work.  She has been certified as a nurse practitioner in both adult and family medicine since 1992 and received her doctorate in nursing practice from the University of Utah in 2013. 

Kathleen has worked at Health Catalyst since March of 2013, as a senior vice president in Professional Services and has led a Health Catalyst team of clinical professionals, which has focused on using analytics to drive clinical improvement work   She has worked with clinical teams in various health systems  to reduce 30-day heart failure readmissions, improve the care of septic, pneumonia and ACS patients, reduce elective inductions and NTSV C-sections and improve ED throughput.  Kathy is also involved in development of the Health Catalyst content library and is on faculty at the University of Utah College of Nursing.

Robert M. Risch, MD, MBA, FACEP is a board-certified emergency medicine physician with over 20 years of experience in emergency medicine and leadership. He is passionate about education, quality, and process improvement through his numerous roles in multiple healthcare organizations. Dr. Risch graduated from the University of Florida with a degree in microbiology, attended medical school at the University of South Florida in Tampa, FL, and completed his residency in emergency medicine at Carolinas Medical Center in Charlotte, NC. He received a Master’s in Business Administration from Auburn University while working in a Level I Trauma Center in Savannah, Georgia, and served on the Georgia College of Emergency Physicians Board. Dr. Risch’s expertise is in clinical informatics and is a certified Lean Six Sigma Green Belt. 

Dr. Risch serves as the Chief Quality Officer at Integrative Emergency Services (IES) in Dallas, Texas. He has built a of team clinical leaders who accelerate knowledge translation to deploy and measure numerous quality programs. This has been accomplished through education and the creation of clinical informatics that provide real-time feedback to front line emergency physicians. Since 2011, Dr. Risch has served as the Medical Director and Chairman of the Emergency Department at Baylor Scott & White Medical Center Grapevine - a level II trauma center. He previously served as Chairman of the Baylor Scott & White Quality Alliance Best Care Subcommittee on Emergency Medicine. While at IES, Dr. Risch developed and directs the annual IES Quality Summit - the largest conference in Texas focused solely on improving the quality of care in emergency medicine through evidence-based practices. Celebrating its 8^th consecutive year, the summit is designed to share best practices with approximate 400 frontline physicians and APPs, including hospital administrators, and key stakeholders who are dedicated to enhancing the delivery of healthcare through emergency medicine. Special areas of clinical focus include Sepsis and trauma. Additionally, Dr. Risch serves as the institutional Sepsis Work Group chairman.