Lesa Yawn, JD, PhD

Lesa has over forty years of clinical, administrative, operational and consulting experience in healthcare. As a senior corporate trainer and in house consultant for a national hospital system, Lesa was responsible for the development and implementation of clinical programs and oversaw regulatory compliance and accreditation preparation for the behavioral health professional and clinical services divisions. As a former Executive Senior Vice President of one of the largest managed care companies, Lesa oversaw multiple Commercial, Medicaid and Medicare management care implementations and took that knowledge and expertise to emerging public sector Prepaid Inpatient Health Plans (PIHP), Insurers, Managed Care Companies and state and federal government agencies. Lesa has provided consultation services to more than 37 state, regional and local jurisdiction authorities. Services have focused on system transformation issues and have included readiness reviews for operational areas, technical training on key functions of utilization management, crisis, central access, prior authorization, post payment review, network management, quality management, compliance and program integrity. Always operational in focus, Lesa has expertise in building partnerships that ensure consumer access and availability in state-wide systems. Lesa is also a widely recognized published expert on standards development and accreditation assessment and survey preparation. She has provided consulting services to more than 380 hospital systems, insurance and managed care companies and private and public agencies securing successful accreditation by NCQA, URAC, CARF, COA and TJC. Lesa is a former member of The Joint Commission Professional Technical Advisory Committee (PTAC), former member of the CARF Board of Directors and has participated on the NCQA and URAC advisory committees for behavioral health standards development. Lesa holds Doctorate degrees in Clinical Psychology and Jurisprudence with a specialty in Medical Ethics.