by Christina Echegaray
Meg Rush, MD, MMHC, President of Monroe Carell Jr. Children’s Hospital at Vanderbilt, has been named a 2022 Women of Influence by Nashville Business Journal (NBJ).
Rush is among 35 women recognized for their business and community leadership roles in 10 categories. Winners are nominated by the public and selected by a panel of NBJ judges. Rush was recognized in the 2022 Top Executive category, which honors women CEOs and presidents.
“Dr. Rush has dedicated her career to serving as a tremendous advocate of quality and compassionate care. Her servant-leadership and steadfast dedication improves the health and well-being of children throughout Middle Tennessee and across the Southeast,” said C. Wright Pinson, MD, Deputy CEO and Chief Health System Officer for Vanderbilt University Medical Center. “She is very deserving of this honor.”
Rush earned her undergraduate degree from DePauw University in Indiana and her medical degree from University of Cincinnati School of Medicine. She arrived at Vanderbilt in 1984 to do her residency and neonatology fellowship with the Department of Pediatrics and joined the faculty in 1990. She has spent nearly four decades focused on the care of children. She earned a Master of Management in Health Care in 2013 from the Vanderbilt University Owen Graduate School of Management.
Rush was named chief of staff of Children’s Hospital in 2007, subsequently adding the responsibilities of executive medical director in 2012. She took the helm as President of the hospital in February 2020.
“I am incredibly humbled and honored to be one of the Nashville Business Journal’s 2022 Women of Influence awardees,” Rush said. “I have had the true privilege of serving as a senior leader at Monroe Carell Jr. Children’s Hospital at Vanderbilt, where every day we provide care for more than 1,800 children from our region, our state and even beyond. The children we serve are our collective futures, so it is truly a joy to come to work every day, to lead a large team dedicated to health care for children and youth, to see where we have been, and plan for the future. I think I have the most rewarding job in Nashville.”
Among several other notable honors, Rush has been named a “Woman to Watch in Medicine” by Nashville Medical News as well as a Juvenile Diabetes Research Foundation Living and Giving Honoree. In 2019 she received the Distinguished Alumni Award from the University of Cincinnati School of Medicine.
The Women of Influence winners will be featured in a special print edition of NBJ, and the group will be honored during a luncheon in May.