The Rita D. Zielstorff Nursing Informatics Leadership Award

2026 Sue Whetstone MS, RN NI-BC

Susan Whetstone, MSN, RN-BC, NE-BC · Director of Clinical Informatics, Brown University Health (2017–2026) Retired · NENIC Past President

Two Decades of Bridging Bedside Care and Health Technology: The Career of Susan Whetstone

On March 29, 2015, hundreds of clinicians across Brown University Health went live on Epic simultaneously — one of the most complex electronic health record implementations ever attempted in New England. Behind that landmark go-live was Susan Whetstone, then serving as Epic Acute Care Project Leader, who had spent months coordinating clinical readiness, facilitating executive workgroups, and ensuring that frontline staff were prepared for the most consequential technology transition of their careers.

It was, in many ways, the defining public moment of a career built on exactly that kind of work: translating clinical reality into technological solutions, and vice versa. “The systems have to serve the people who deliver care,” is a principle that has guided Whetstone throughout her more than two decades in nursing informatics leadership.

Whetstone’s path into informatics grew out of direct clinical and operational experience. As Administrative Director of Inpatient Surgical Services and Nursing Informatics at Rhode Island Hospital, she directed multiple managers and led system-wide deployments of Siemens BCMA, CPOE, clinical documentation, and medication reconciliation technologies — hands-on work that gave her an unusually grounded perspective on what health IT must do to support safe patient care.

From 2017 to 2026, as Director of Clinical Informatics at Brown University Health — Rhode Island’s largest health system — she directed enterprise-wide informatics strategy, led a team of Clinical Informaticists and a Training Team Manager, and oversaw information systems spanning clinical, academic, and research environments. Colleagues and observers describe her role as equivalent in scope and influence to that of a Chief Nursing Informatics Officer: a strategic, systems-level thinker who aligned informatics with the organization’s broadest safety and quality goals.

Holding dual board certifications as a Certified Informatics Nurse (RN-BC) and Certified Nurse Executive (NE-BC), Whetstone bridges the clinical, operational, and technological dimensions of health informatics with a depth of preparation that is rare in the field.

Whetstone’s influence has extended well beyond Brown University Health. She has served NENIC — the New England Nursing Informatics Consortium — in a progression of leadership roles including President, Past-President, Secretary, and Member-at-Large, reflecting both a long-term commitment to the organization’s mission and a consistent willingness to take on responsibility.

Her record as a presenter spans more than two decades of regional and national engagement:

–    NENIC Annual Symposium (multiple occasions)

–    Boston Area Nursing Informatics Consortium

–    Organization of Nurse Leaders (MA-RI)

–    Epic XGM

–    Siemens User Summit

A peer-reviewed publication in the Journal of Healthcare Information Management (2006) anchors a scholarly record that demonstrates a career-long commitment to translating practice into knowledge the field can use.

What distinguishes Whetstone in the accounts of colleagues and direct reports is not only her technical command or strategic acumen, but her orientation toward people. She is described consistently as a trusted mentor and an exemplar of nursing informatics leadership — someone who champions the clinical workforce by making sure systems reduce burden rather than compound it.

The Lifespan Quality Leader Award, received in 2016, reflects the esteem in which she is held across the clinical community: recognition not merely for technological achievement, but for the quality of care her work has helped to sustain.

In an era when health systems face mounting pressure to adopt new technologies rapidly, Whetstone’s career offers a model for doing so thoughtfully — grounded in clinical experience, guided by a commitment to the workforce, and executed with the kind of leadership that earns lasting trust.

The Rita D. Zielstorff Leadership Award honors those who lead with vision, educate with purpose, and drive change that matters. Sue Whetstone is all of this — and more.