Veteran Patient Experience Executive Jennifer Baron Joins NRC Health as Its First Chief Experience Officer

Baron will align and advance NRC Health’s experience solutions platform to solve health care industry challenges and continue effectively innovating and supporting experience improvement for health systems across the nation.

LINCOLN, Neb.--(BUSINESS WIRE)--NRC Health, a recognized leader providing solutions and data driven insights for improving health care experiences, announced today the appointment of Jennifer Baron as the organization’s first chief experience officer. Baron’s addition is part of the organization’s continued investments in leadership and innovation to align with the evolving healthcare landscape.

In this newly created role, Baron will lead NRC Health’s experience strategy, sustaining and advancing the alignment of the organization’s experience platform to serve its partners’ unique and changing needs. Baron – a veteran health system experience executive and advocate for centering patient and employee voices – has a keen understanding of both the challenges and opportunities for health systems in delivering quality patient experiences. Under Baron’s leadership, NRC Health will further its ability to support partners in improving the patient experience.

“Jennifer’s work and knowledge of major health systems across the country will help ensure that our full-spectrum healthcare experience platform is properly serving the industry for years to come,” said Helen Hrdy, chief customer officer at NRC Health. “Her extensive practical application of Human Understanding in major healthcare markets will offer our partners proven peer-level executive support and strategic insights for performance improvement that promises to move the industry. We are excited to welcome Jennifer to NRC Health.”

Baron’s deep background leading patient experience in complex health systems has made her a proven collaborator in clinical environments. Leveraging her 31 years in health care, she will spearhead NRC Health’s thought leadership as the organization continues to bring its robust data and insights to practical applications for health systems and their patients.

Baron joins NRC Health from UC Davis Health, where she served as chief experience officer since 2020. In this role, she led UC Davis Health’s holistic experience framework, advancing a human-centered culture that prioritizes excellent experiences for patients and families as well as faculty and staff. As part of this focus, Baron spearheaded the development of UC Davis Health’s Experience Roadmap, an evidence-based muti-year plan for hardwiring human centricity across the health system.

“For health systems, ensuring an excellent patient experience is a core component of providing quality care and services,” said Baron. “NRC Health has a deep history of humanizing health care for patients and care teams. It’s an honor to be able to use my many years of health system leadership to help other health care systems and their leaders truly put the people and communities they serve at the center of everything they do.”

Previously, Baron was the executive director of experience design at Indiana University Health, where she held several other roles in the years prior. Baron earned a bachelor’s degree in communications from Ball State University and is a Certified Patient Experience Professional.

Baron officially joins NRC Health on June 28, 2024.

About NRC Health

For more than 40 years, NRC Health has led the charge to humanize health care and support organizations in their understanding of each unique individual. NRC Health’s commitment to Human Understanding® helps leading health care systems get to know each person they serve not as point-in-time insights, but as an ongoing relationship. Guided by its uniquely empathic heritage, NRC Health’s patient-focused approach, unmatched market research and emphasis on consumer preferences are transforming the health care experience, creating strong outcomes for patients and entire health care systems. For more information, email [e-mail], or visit www.nrchealth.com.