by Christina Echegaray
Meg Rush, MD, MMHC, who began her career at Vanderbilt University Medical Center more than three decades ago, has been named interim president of Monroe Carell Jr. Children’s Hospital at Vanderbilt, effective immediately.
Rush succeeds Luke Gregory, MBA, MHA, the hospital’s longtime chief executive officer who died Oct. 18 following a lengthy battle with lymphoma.
Rush has served as Children’s Hospital chief of staff since 2007, and subsequently added the responsibilities of executive medical director in 2012. She has led the development of program strategies for the hospital’s business enterprise — on and off campus — served as a representative from administration to the hospital’s medical staff and led vital quality and safety initiatives.
Rush, an Ohio native, has spent more than half her life in Nashville, arriving in 1984 just after graduation from the University of Cincinnati Medical School, caring for the hospital’s tiniest and sickest patients while training as a neonatologist. An acclaimed clinician and educator, she is widely known throughout VUMC as a highly accomplished senior administrative leader.
Her appointment comes at a time of strategic growth for Children’s Hospital as it continues to advance both the size of its geographic footprint across the region and the scope and depth of its clinical programs. Recent examples include the completion of construction of a new exterior that houses 160,000 square feet of space, including a new 38-bed, 40,000 square-foot 10th floor Pediatric Heart Institute that opened this summer. The hospital will open its second new expansion floor — the 11th floor — in early 2020, and is preparing to open a new surgery and clinics facility in Murfreesboro in November.
“Throughout her career Dr. Rush has been a passionate advocate for the most vulnerable patients we serve,” said C. Wright Pinson, MBA, MD, Deputy Chief Executive Officer and Chief Health System Officer for Vanderbilt University Medical Center.
“Meg is well known and widely respected among the community pediatricians we collaborate with to provide outstanding care, and by the many wonderful individuals and organizations from across our community who help support the mission of Monroe Carell Jr. Children’s Hospital at Vanderbilt. She will work diligently to help ensure the hospital’s continued success.”
