Former Chief Transformation Officer, Providence

Sara Vaezy is the former Executive Vice President and Chief Strategy and Digital Officer for Providence, a $29B integrated health system, where she was responsible for the development of the organizations’ strategic vision and transformation through technology innovation efforts. Vaezy led the teams who drove system strategy, digital enablement and transformation through product partnerships and incubation, clinical care transformation technologies such as virtual care, marketing and consumer experience, platform company creation and commercialization, and enterprise experience—driving sustainable growth and system transformation in service to improving the health of Providence’s communities.

A healthcare visionary, Vaezy is led Providence’s approach to artificial Intelligence (AI)—including strategy, guardrail, infrastructure, and product development, as well as responsible adoption and use case prioritization. She built a consumer technology stack within Providence that is enabling the first ‘digital flywheel’ for health systems that is revolutionizing the organization’s solution delivery capabilities. Additionally, she led the Providence Digital Innovation Group (DIG), a unique model that successfully incubates greenfield, platform technologies that solve real-world healthcare challenges, and spins them out as venture-backed commercial organizations. She established Providence as a leader and partner in the digital health ecosystem, collaborating with over 100 health systems, venture capitalists, industry analysts, health futurists and visionaries, and digital health organizations.

She is a board director of the National Committee for Quality Assurance (NCQA), a non-profit organization that sets standards and measures for healthcare quality, a board director of Praia Health and a board observer for DexCare, two of DIG’s spin-off companies, and a faculty member of the Harvard Executive Education program, where she teaches courses on digital health strategy and innovation. She is a Health Evolution Forum Fellow, a World 50 Digital 50 member, and a Forbes Business Development Council Member, and has received numerous awards and honors including the Rock Health Top 50 in Digital Health Luminary (2023) and the Business Insider 30 under 40 Transforming the Future of Healthcare (2019) awards. Her writing has been featured in many publications including Harvard Business Review and the New England Journal of Medicine Catalyst.

Vaezy holds a Master of Health Administration (MHA) and a Master of Public Health (MPH) in Health Policy from the University of Washington School of Public Health, as well as Bachelor of Arts degrees in Physics and Philosophy from the University of California, Berkeley. She is passionate about transforming healthcare through technology while advancing health justice, equity, diversity, and inclusion in the healthcare industry and beyond.