Mitesh Rao, MD

System Patient Safety Officer

Stanford Healthcare

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Mitesh B. Rao a featured speaker at HealthSpaces. 

 Dr. Mitesh B. Rao, MD, MHS is the System Patient Safety Officer for Stanford Healthcare where he leads Patient Safety for the Enterprise. Dr. Rao also serves as Director of the Center for Advancing Patient Safety (CAPS), which focuses on advancing the science and implementing new innovations in the fields of Patient Safety and Quality Improvement. A Board Certified Emergency Medicine Physician, he practices clinically as an Assistant Professor of Emergency Medicine at the Stanford School of Medicine.

Previously, he was trained in leadership and research skills as a Fellow in the prestigious Robert Wood Johnson Clinical Scholars Program. Subsequent to his time at Yale, he served as the Director of the Patient Safety Education Program at Northwestern Medicine. As a physician leader, he was helped implement systems-level improvements for quality and safety in institutions across the country and overseas that have had lasting effects on patient care provision. He has also led teams serving contracts with various governmental and non-profit agencies such as the Joint Commission Resources, CMS, the Canadian Patient Safety Institute, Partners Health Care, and the American College of Surgeons in multiple campaigns and initiatives to improve Patient Safety on a national level.

Dr. Rao also served as the Head of Research and Integration for the health innovation program at Northwestern. In this role, he developed an expertise in improving care provision through innovative methodologies. He spearheaded efforts to integrate innovative technologies into the health system to improve patient care in a variety of settings, including telemedicine and mHealth initiatives. Working both with innovators and researchers across the various schools of the University as well as promising startups from around the country, Dr. Rao helped guide and refine the process for vetting and integrating pilot programs to test new technologies within the clinical venue. He also serves as a mentor to multiple healthcare-focused startups and accelerator groups across the country in order to help guide the development of implementation of innovative solutions that can sustainably impact patient care provision.