Dr. Sharlie Irby, DHA, M.Ed., RN

Dr. Sharlie Irby, DHA, M.Ed., RN, is an accomplished healthcare leader with more than 25 years of nursing experience spanning clinical operations, intensive care, clinical informatics, quality improvement, healthcare technology transformation, regulatory readiness, and workforce development. She currently serves as Director & Clinical Nurse Specialist at Nashville General Hospital, where she applies her extensive clinical and leadership background to support quality, safety, workforce development, and patient-centered care. Her career has included leadership across acute care, safety-net, academic, community, and military healthcare environments serving diverse and underserved populations.

Dr. Irby has developed deep expertise in clinical informatics and electronic medical record transformation, including major implementations involving Cerner, Soarian Clinicals, and the Department of Defense's MHS GENESIS system. As a Clinical Informaticist/SME II, she supported the Defense Healthcare Management System Modernization project, focusing on clinical workflow analysis, change management, clinical adoption, implementation readiness, training, and end-user support across military treatment facilities. Earlier in her career, she served as a Cerner Senior Training Specialist, Clinical Applications Manager, and Soarian Clinicals Training Manager, where she led large-scale training initiatives, workflow development, system implementation, and clinical technology adoption.

Her leadership philosophy is grounded in compassionate accountability, equitable treatment, workforce development, and operational excellence. She is recognized for helping healthcare professionals understand not only how processes and technologies change, but why those changes matter to patient care. Her accomplishments include achieving sustained VAP documentation and audit compliance of at least 98%, supporting CMS, Tennessee Department of Health, and The Joint Commission readiness, leading quality improvement initiatives, and overseeing operations involving approximately 60 employees, travelers, and agency staff. With her combination of advanced academic preparation, nursing expertise, informatics experience, and people-centered leadership, Dr. Irby brings a strategic yet compassionate approach to improving healthcare systems and empowering the workforce.