Maryland Action Coalition Leadership Summit 2026 Examines Critical Shifts in Health Care Policy, Workforce Dynamics

July 22, 2026
MDAC panel
pictured, l. to r.: Susan Corbridge, PhD, APRN, FAANP, FNAP, FCCP, FAAN; Christine Frost, DNP '23, MBA, MSN '04, RN, NEA-BC; Karen Doyle, DNP '20, MS '91, MBA, BSN '85, RN, NEA-BC, FAAN; Joan Tilghman, PhD, RN, CNE, WHNP-BC

The University of Maryland School of Nursing (UMSON) hosted the 15th annual Maryland Action Coalition (MDAC) Leadership Summit on May 21, with this year’s theme, Time to Pivot and Shift: Navigating the Changing Nursing Landscape, offering much to discuss. The event brought 170 attendees from across health care and academia to the School in Baltimore, focusing on progressive approaches to teaching and models of leadership.

The summit addressed the strategic challenges facing health care leaders across policy, nursing workforce development, and economic sectors. Leaders explored how to pivot proactively in response to these challenges, ensuring their teams remain resilient and future ready.

Morning keynote speaker Heather O’Sullivan, MSN, APRN, FAAN, president and chief operations officer of Healthcare at Home for Mass General Brigham, emphasized the increasingly important role nurses have as more and more people seek hospital care at home in her address, “Nurses Navigating the Future of Health Care: Hospital Care at Home.”

Erin Schurmann, MPA, PMP, associate director of strategic initiatives at the Maryland Health Services Cost Review Commission, provided the afternoon keynote, during which she shared critical insights into the AHEAD (Achieving Healthcare Efficiency through Accountable Design) Model, a voluntary, state-based total cost of care model that allows Maryland to manage health care costs and quality and to improve the overall health of the state.

Highlights from MDAC 2026

Yolanda Ogbolu, PhD '11, MS '05, BSN '04, NNP, FNAP, FAAN, the Bill and Joanne Conway Dean of the University of Maryland School of Nursing and professor, welcomes MDAC attendees. 

Heather O’Sullivan presents the morning keynote, “Nurses Navigating the Future of Health Care: Hospital Care at Home.”

“This model of care provided the human-to-human contact that inspired providers to go into the profession in the first place.” 

Lisa A. Seldomridge, PhD, RN, CNE, ANEF, left, accepts the 2026 Dr. Peg E. Daw Exemplary Leadership Award from Mary Etta C. Mills, ScD, MS ’73, BSN ’71, RN, NEA-BC, FAAN, professor emerita and a member of the MDAC Planning Committee.

Angelica Fernandez-Dizon, DNP, MD, MBA-HCM, NP-C, assistant professor at UMSON, offers a podium presentation, “System Readiness as a Leadership Imperative: Aligning Academic and Practice Environments to Strengthen Nursing’s Future.”

 “The gap between academia and practice is a fault line.” 

 

Panelists, l. to r.: Susan Corbridge, PhD, APRN, FAANP, FNAP, FCCP, FAAN; Christine Frost, DNP '23, MBA, MSN '04, RN, NEA-BC; Karen Doyle, DNP '20, MS '91, MBA, BSN '85, RN, NEA-BC, FAAN; Joan Tilghman, PhD, RN, CNE, WHNP-BC

Erin Schurmann delivers the endnote about the AHEAD model.

“Under the AHEAD model, you need to consider the health care workforce holistically and not silo our focus around one particular role within hospitals, or one particular setting of care. Everyone here knows that the workforce is a complex ecosystem.”

 

MDAC attendees raise a glass to toast 15 years of MDAC identifying innovative ways of collaborating that advance nursing excellence to prepare nurses to lead in any health care setting.