Lisa Lemmons is a native of Chesterton, Indiana and has lived in the Region for 22 years. She works for Press Ganey Associates and is passionate about patient care, health and safety. She continuously puts others first, and has always been a big believer in helping people and genuinely caring about the needs of others.
“I want us all to have a common goal,” said Lemmons. “I want to focus on patient safety. Nurses aren’t focused on their own goals, and the doctors aren’t caring about themselves. Everything needs to be patient focused and aligned around that. We get to have a direct impact on local, national and international hospitals. Being able to affect health care on that large of a scale is pretty great.”
Lemmons’s passion for health care stems from her mother. She recently endured a health situation where Lemmons noticed the lack of patient care.
“I noticed a lack of coordination between all of the doctors and specialists. They each had their own independent goal in mind, but no one was really looking at the big picture-the patient,” said Lemmons. “No one ever asked her about her options and what would work best for her lifestyle. I saw that and there needs to be that coordination for patients, because a lot of times they don’t even realize what is happening.”
Lemmons had to become her mother’s advocate. She believes doctors need to become the patient’s advocate, and that the healthcare system should work for the patient.
“Everyone needs medical attention in their life. It’s completely unavoidable. Everyone is born and everyone is injured. Healthcare is something people need. It’s a part of our lives,” said Lemmons. “People’s mental and physical health is what’s important in living, and what’s more important than that?”
Lemmons’s career gives so much to the community. She wants others to see the importance in giving back and helping others.
“It started with my career in mental health. I saw how patients were treated, and I knew I had to have a direct impact on that in some way, even if I wasn’t a doctor. Working in mental health opened me up to these people who had hard lives to live, and they didn’t have the support they needed and people didn't understand them either,” said Lemmons. “I had such empathy for them, they’re people’s brothers and sisters, and they were kind of discarded by society. I took all of that knowledge from what I learned there and applied it to my current position.”
Lemmons said her parents had instilled the importance in helping others, and she wants to do the same for her children. Her father was in the Peace Corps and her mother was a teacher helping Special Education students.
“Their natural inclination to help people who needed it the most taught me to do the same. My grandmother was a nurse, so we always talked about the medical field, and I always had an interest in that. My family’s interest was what inspired me to do what I do now,” said Lemmons.